The Dalles times-mountaineer. [volume] (The Dalles, Or.) 1882-1904, 1895-09-28
THE FoULEsT CRIME.

THE FOULEST CRIME.
The Durrant case drags along
slowly, but day by day the states at
torney is drawing the net tighter
around the defendant, and the testi-
mony tending to show his guilt is
slowly but steadily accumulating. 1t
has been shown that the testimony of
the school girls that they saw Blanche
Lamont get on street car with
stranger on that fatal Sd of April, and
that they identified Durrant as that
stranger is correct. The testimony OF
the venerable Mrs. Crosset settles
that. She swears that on the Sd of
April she rode on that car with Dur
rant; that she got off the car at the
same time he and the school girl ac-
companylng him did, and that on
reaching the sidewalk he introduced
the girl to her as Miss Blanche La
mont. This was less than two hours
before the time when Organist King
saw Durrant when he came down from
the belfry of Emanuel church, where
the body of the poor girl was after
wards found. The venerable lady says
that at the time she could not help but
notice Durrant's actions. She knew
him well, and her impression was that
he had been drinking. His eyes were
bloodshot. and she observed flip
pancy in his manner that was unusual
in him. She inquired when she ar
rived home if "TheO" had taken to
drinking. An hour, or an hour and
half, after her meeting with Durrant
he was seen by King coming down
from the belfry, gasping for breath,
staggering, horrifed. He said he had
been fixing the gas pipes and had been
overcome by the gas. and. sent for a
bottle OF brOmo-seltzer-a nerve tonic.
That night at meeting in the church
he asked Mrs. Vogel, with whom
Blanche lived, if she, Blanche, was
not coming to the meeting. He had
never inquired concerning Blanche
before. He persistently denied having
seen or been with Blanche Lamont on
the Sd of April, but now his attorneys
admit that he was with her, but that
he left her on the car. He was the
last person seen with her. He was
seen to leave the car with her, to 60 to
the church with her, and from that
time until the murdered body of Ma
mie Kelley was found in the library OF
the. church two weeks later her fate
was unknown. Then systematic
search revealed the body of the miss
ing Blanche Lamont in the belfry of |
the church-the belfry from which the |
organist, King, saw Durrant come |
staggering and overcome the evening |
the girl disappeared. 1t was horri-
BILE crime, and fend from hell might |
well have come gasping and horror
stricken from its commission. When
the murderer's cruel hands closed
round the slender throat of the inno-
cent and defenseless girl; when with
the strength of despair she struggled
1OE hCA tAiuu anu lOi iiiO3 90 hSh WI II
clothing shows she did struggle, and
when at last her slender strength
yielded to the brutal clutch upon her
throat and she sank limp and lifeless
to the foor-when after all this the
vile brute insulted the dead and unre-
sisting body, and clambered down,
down from the gloom, from the horror
he had left behind, and stood where
once more the light of Gods sunshine
smote him as rods OF steel, no wonder
that he gasped for breath, and sank
almost fainting on the floor. How
memory must have conjured up the
picture of that fair young face that
but an hour before had smiled at him!
How every motion of that supple body,
every glance, every word that dropped
from those confiding lips must have
risen up to torture him with the vision
of that lifeless thing from which he
had Just fed, and whose soul alone {
had escaped his defiling touch. And
yet after this, we are are told this
v Gnu ACpCduCo hio Vi lihC, olo Dooh oilO | .
life of another innocent child. We !.
confess that it is impossible for US to
believe that aught in human shape
could have gone through second ex-
perience like that, willingly; hence
cannot bring ourself to believe that :
the same hand committed both mur-
ders. The cunning shown in the first
murder was entirely lacking in the t
second. In the case of Blanche La \
mont, the murderer showed the cum =
ming of a madman. The body was so
disposed of as to have practically de-
led detection. The clothing was hid d
len in hooks and corners in such
manner that it took hours for the busy . .
,earchers to unearth them. In the t
second murder there was no attempt @
whatever at concealment. Had the
same person killed Mamie Kelley that 8
murdered Blanche Lamont, would not = =
he have adopted the same method of 9
hiding the body? If he carried the n
body of Blanche Lamont up the steep y
of the belfry, why did he not y =
.lso carry the lighter body of little {
Mamie Kelley up the same stairway? "
We believe Durrant murdered Blanche
Lamont, but does it seem possible that v
ne could have committed the other "
crime? And yet, if he is guilty, as we I
believe him to be, he cannot be meas b
lred by anything possessing human
attributes. The testimony of wit
,esses, the model of the belfry, nay! v
wen the touch of the dead girls gar :
nents as they we're carried by him, a
lever caused a tremor, the movement Il
# muscle, or the dropping of an eye a
id of that cold and impassive face.
I he is guilty of both murders then y
indeed has the bottomless pit yielded .
ts foulest fiend to show the human c
orm soulless, incarnate, damned. Il
ITEr1S IN BRIEF. ii
Il
Nil.