The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1894-01-04

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| himself No weapon of the sdrt |
speak of was found about the house.
In short, it is certain that Talbot
could not have killed himself; he was
murdered
Take care what you are sayingr
said Bacarac.
"'Wait till you hear me thrrugh,'
said l. There was something pc" pliar
about Mrs. Talbot's corpse, too
"'Ahr said Bacarac-
Yes, there was an incision on the
left side, just below the breast. 1t was
made by surgeon, and with just such
an instrument as that which killed
Talbot If had been going to dissect
the body with view to finding out the
condition of the heart, l should have
made the cut right there, and in pre-
cisely that way. But whoever the sur
geon in this case was, his dissection
never got beyond that first incision.
For some reason, he stopped right
there. Maybe he was suddenly inter-
rupted. Now it's an interesting ques-
ton who interrupted him? Whoever it
was he never spoke of it afterward. If
it was some confdant of his own, of
course the dissection would have pro-
ceeded. If it was a stranger, he would
have told of it-provided he was alive
to tell. But if he were murdered IN
order to prevent his telling, Where is
the murdered body? No one is missing
in this town; and there has been only
one body found that could have been
murdered, and that happens to be the
body of Talbot himself. The inference
is, that it was he who broke in upon
this surgeon in the midst of his work.
He may have suspected something, you
see, and followed him up. And that
would also account for the otherwise
ineXplicable fact that both the bodies
were found in Talbot's house. For,
after numbering Talbot, it would occur
to the surgeon that the best way out of
the scraEe for him would be to take
both cotpses out of his own house and
leave them at Talbot's, where they
would ultimately be found. and the in
ference drawn that was actually
adopted at the inquest 1t all seems
reasonable enough SO far, doesn't it?
Now the next thing TO determine is,
who could have been the surgeon who
dug up the body, began the dissection,
was interrupted by Talbot and killed
him to save exposure There are three
medical men in town, believe, besides
you and me. 1t must be one of them,
no doubt. All we have to do is to find
out what each one of them was doing,
or where he was, on the night of the
! fIo,, +ol- ,,-hn
whereabouts are not satisfactorily ac-
counted for, and investigate all his cir
cumstances and conduct on or about
that time, until we get the evidence to
convict him Do you agree with me?'
"'You are very Ingenious said the
doctor, in a husky sort of voice. 1
am really not competent to aid you
"'You see, you took everything for
granted. And then you went off to
were gone two or three days. BY the
way, you must have travelled by a
roundabout route to get to the place
you said you were gong to; the ticket
you bought at the station would have
carried you almost in the opposite d.
rection. 1t must have been an impor-
tant case, too, if one could judge by
the size of the valise you had with you;
it was big enough to hold a ladys
dress. Speaking of that, doctor, do
you recollect some weeks ago sending
me a parcel of books that J asked to
| borrow of you? It's an odd coinci-
dence, but they were wrapped up in
bit of the same sort of black cambria
that was used to cover the body of Mrs
Talbot. And not only that, but
Well" continued my poetical- ok
! ing friend, poor Bacarac broke down
at that point He couldn't hold out
any longer. 1t was a rather sorry spec
| tacle, and | was really sorry for him.
l had all the evidence to finish him, had
he held out; but | believe, in the midst
of his agony and collapse, he was more
relieved than otherwise to confess.
And he explained, in his confession,
one or two points that had remain ed a
puzzle to me, and they relieved him of
much of the odium of the deed, too.
''He had been deeply interested in
the case, and in the woman herself, as
well; and, though he had never done
anything overtly wrong, he had shown
enough of his feeling to make Talbot a
bit suspicious of him. When she died,
he was still in doubt as to the real. ma
ture of her disease, which was in some
respects an almost unique complica-
ton; and the idea occurred to him to
get the body and investigate it. He
was prompted to do it, however, only
partly by his scientific curiosity; he had
a morbid craving to have in his pos
session all that was left of the woman
he had loved, too. He went out alone,
dug her up with his own hands, filed
in the grave and brought her home in
his wagon without discovery--as he
thought. But, in fact, Talbot was
logging him all the while. He got her
into his workroom, prepared her, for
the table and had begun work, when
he was nearly stunned by tremen-
dous blow ON the back of the head. He
turned and there was Talbot, with "a
club in his hand and foaming at ithe
mouth. He had the club up and made
rush for him; there was no question:
but he meant to kill him. Bacarac had
in his hand the instrument of dissec-
ton; he thrust it out instinctively as
the other came on, at the same timei