San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1891-06-12


ment of the previous two days, that he
fell asleep the instant he lay down. He
was awakened by wild scream and a
heavy fall.
He raised himself up, still heavy and
bewildered with sleep. At first he did
not remember where he was. Was he
in his prison cell? or had he been hanged,
and was this after death? In few mo-
ments he came to himself. The candle
was tiaring in the socket. The faint
gray OF dawn was coming through the
dusty panes of the eastern window.
Who had screamed? The sick man, of
course. Keppel looked toward the bed;
it was vacant. What had happened? He
got to his feet and made step forward.
He trod upon something that yielded
beneath his weight. 1t was the body of
the invalid. Recoiling, he fetched the
expiring candle and bent over it. The
mans body WIS drawn together, lying
on its side. The hands were over the
face. In the right hand was long
knife.
Evidently he had crawled from his bed
and stolen on Keppel with the intention of
stahbing him, but just before he could
accomplish his purpose the specter by
which he imagined himself haunted had
interviewed. The man was dead. The
candle fiickered and died out. Keppel
made a spring for the other candle, but
remembered that he ha / no matches
He could not stay with the body in the
darkness, 50 he made his way to the
open air. The morning sky was clear,
the eastern horizon a pale yellow. He
paced up and down before the house till
the sun rose, his mind full of gloomy
thoughts. Horror and misery pursue
him everywhere. He had the revolver
in his pocket why not use it on himself
and end all? He paused, debating the
question, but finally shook his head. He
had had so many escapes lately that he
persuaded himself he might have been
preserved for purpose. The unclouded
sun, rising over the blue verge of the
distant ocean, was an omen of hope. He
turned, and reluctantly re-entered the
house.
The sunlight fell upon the corpse as it
lay there. Keppel set resolutely to work.
He straitened out the arms and legs
and rolled up the body in blanket from
the bed. He tied it round with piece
of rope from the fishnet. 1t was now
ready for burial. But how was he to dig
a grave? He had no spade. Yet the body
could not be left above the ground; it
might breed a pestilence. This reflection
led to another. If the man had died of
yellow fever all his clothing must hold
the contagion and should be burned.
Keppel resolved to do this at once. The
coat and trousers were lying on stool
at the head Of the bed. He took them
up, and some papers slipped from the
pocket and fell ON the floor. He ex-
amined them, at first inditferently, then
with more interest. There was pass
port with several vises upon it, showing
a journey through Egypt, India, Aus
tralia and Panama. There were several
letters, apparently from persons Of high
authority in Paris, recommending the
bearer, Maurice Solange, to the good Of
fees of foreign consuls. 1t appeared,
moreover, that Maurice must have been
a parsonage of some Importance, or, at
any rate, that he had been intrusted
with an important mission. These let
tiers of recommendation could have been
delivered only by the French emperor's
authority. ......
But the nature of the mission was not
specified in the papers. 1t even seemed
as if this non-specifcation had been care
fully intended. There was reason.
then, for keeping the thing secret-a
secret of state. .....- .. .......
Was it likely, however, that the poor
wretch, whose body lay yonder awaiting
burial, would murder a man for the sake
of secret of state? Nothing was less
likely. What good could the secret do
the murderer? Was it thing he could
sell? Some secrets were salable, no doubt.
But Maurice, an authorized agent on his
way to America, must have been coming
to impart the secret to the government
here; therefore no sale could have been
contemplated. Besides, the dead man
had said something about a treasure
millions of money. That might have
been the mere rawlings of insanity: but
possibly it was not. A murder commit
ted for millions of money was compre-
hensible, and this would account for the
murderer's strange behavior. On the
other hand, if those millions had been
stolen, where were they? Were they
about the premises?
Keppel Darke had never heretofore re-
garded money as a supreme object of
ambition But things were changed
with him now. He was an outcaset from
society; mankind was hostile to him; in
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