Lyon County times. [volume] (Silver City, Nev.) 1874-1907, 1890-11-29
just family seen above masses of green

! At last. to her surprise, she saw him
coming up the lawn from the outer road
with man on either side Of him. She
slipped into the house again, and watched
the approaching figures from oie of the
drawing room windows.
While she did SO Natalie entered the
room. Il see Gerald Ravelow coming
here" she broke out, with two men in
his company. Who are they?"
81 have no idea," answered Brenda
turning from the window. why should
| have?"
Natalie gave slight laugh that was
like sneer made into sound. just then
steps were heard on the piazza Moved
by sudden impulse, Brenda flung open
the blinds of the window near which
She had been standing
"Tlis way, Gerald" she said
Gerald entered soon afterward alone.
But Brenda saw that his two companions
waited just outside.
The young man put out his hand to-
ward Brenda while he fixed hard and
cold stare at Natalie.
81 have paper" he said. written a
day or two before his death by your late
husband. In that paper he accuses you
of trying to poison him. He detected
you, but said nothing. He preferred to
die by your hand, since he had loved you
so well that to live on would have been
horror. Iquote almost his exact words.
And there is no doubt about the authen-
ITCHY of this paper that he left Bren-
da, here, received it from him and
placed it secretly within his breast after
he had been laid ia his coffin. found
it there In it he also states that not
long ago he forced from you certain
confession regarding Il man named Ar
chibald Clay. and that he has reason to
believe you hide at the present time
packet of letters from this man and
one OF more bottles of poison as well
within a particular cabinet upstairs. /
I have secured a search warrant and must
therefore,
At the word search warrant" Natalie
/ darted toward the door, Gerald followed
her. after swift sign through the wide
piazza window He sprang up stairs.
knowing the house so well that the cab
met to which his friends letter had al
luded and the apartment in which it
stood were both well remembered by him
But quick as he had been. Natalie
reached the cabinet before him. He saw
her kneeling at one of its open drawers.
The next instant he saw her lift some
thing to her lips. Almost Immediately
after that she fell heavily backward
There had lain swifter poison here in
the cabinet than that stealthy one which
had doubtless wrought her husband S
death.
She was quite lifeless when they picked
her up. Afterward, when rigid exam
nations were made as to her previous
life, it seemed slight wonder that such a
woman should have preferred to end by
suicide the final collapse of her evil hopes
She had undoubtedly been the wife of a
certain dlsreputable Englishman called
Capt" Clay, and one of whose aliases
was Leveridge, long before her marriage
with poor infatuated Louis Bond. From
some of the letters from this man found
in the cabinet it was only too evident
that she had planned Louis murder with
his full knowledge, and that the two ex-
pected at some future day to enjoy the
wealth which would thus vilely have
been secured.
During the following autumn occurred
Geralds marriage with Brenda, greatly
to the delight of Mrs. Ravelow, whose
health had now regained its usual gentle
state of invalidism Some time before
this event Brenda had visited the vault
where her brother lay, and had first or
dered with her own hand what disarray
had been caused by Gerald's weird visit
and afterward quietly obtained aid for
the restoration of the injured coffin.
| But Gerald could never DO induced to
accompany her on either of the several
little pilgrimages which her task in
volved mo, Brenda he would say
there are memories connected with
that place which will haunt me till
die. No need of making them more
vivid than they are sure to be already
But once Brenda said: Perhaps you
are quite wrong in believing, Gerald
that anything supernatural really oc-
Cured that night In my hurry and
agitation, seizing moment when she
was not present, thrust the paper with
in poor Louis breast. 1t may be that
lodged it insecurely, and that the move
ment of the coffin afterward displaced
it still more When, as you say, you
disparted the flowers that lay on the
breast of Louis, the paper may have
been half concealed by these, while its
-whiteness corresponded to that of the
flowers themselves. all being seen in a
dim light. Hence, when the candle
| fell"-
"Fell?" interrupted Gerald. "Why
do you state that it fell."
Brenda smilAl ever so family. BE
cause you had set it, in its sconce, at the
/ edge of one of the stone inches. That
it should fall would have been nothing
remarkable. And when, as it seemed
to You. the paper was almost put into
your ou,stretched hand, this may merely
have been the natural result of its hav-
n