Omaha daily bee., 1902-11-23

lie had some strong motive IN doing 50.
"He evidently had a motive in the crime"
I remarked. "If we could only discover Il
we might. perhaps. fix upon the assassin. L"
YES" he exclaimed thougbtfully. But
to tell you the truth, Ralph, old chap, the
fact which is p~uzzling me most Of all at
this moment is that extraordinary forebod-
ing Of evil which you confessed to ne day
before yesterday. You had your suspicious
aroused. somehow. Cudgel your brains and
hin what induced that very curious
presase Of evil"
1--WE tried and tried again, but l can fix
on nothing. Only yesterday afternoon,
when Sir Bernard incidentally mentioned
old Mr.. Courtenay. II suddenly occurred TO
me that the curious excitement within me
had some connection with him. or course
he was a patient, and l may have studied
his case and given a lot Of thought to II,
but that wouldn't account for such an OPP
preston as that from which I've been .suf-
f~ering.'
you certainly did have the blues badly
the night before last" he said frankly.
And by some unaccountable manner your
curious feeling was an intuition of this
tragic occurrence. Very odd and mysteri-
Gus, to say the least"
"Uncanny, l call IT," I declared.
Eyes, 1 agree with you" he answered. 1T
Is an uncanny affair altogether. Tell me
about the ladies. Where are they?"
1 explained how Mrs. Courtenay had been
absent, and how she had been Frustrated by
the news Of his death.
He stroked his mustache slowly, deeply
rejecting.
Exactly"
And I went on to describe the wild scene
which followed my admission that her hus-
band was dead. l explained 1t to him in
detail, for l saw that his thoughts were
following in the same channel as my own.
We both pitied the unfortunate woman. My
friend knew her we'll, for he had often &C
companied me there and had spent the
evening with us. Ethelwynn liked him for
his careless bohemianism, and for the fund
Of stories always at his command. Some
times he used to entertain us for hours to-
gether, relating details of mysteries upon
which he had at one time or another been
engaged. Women are always fond of
mysteries, and he often held both Of them
breathless by his vivid narratives.
Thorpe. the detective from Scotland Yard.
a big, sturdily-built. middle-aged man,
whose hair was tinged with gray, and whose
round, rosy face made him appear the pic
ture Of good health, Joined us a m
later. In a low, mysterious tone he ex-
planned to my friend the circumstance OF
| Short having admitted possession Of the
knife hanging in the hall.
In 1t Amber Jevons at once scented a
clue.
81 never liked that fellow!" he exclaimed,
turning to me. my impression has always
been that he was a sneak, and told old
Courtenay everything that went on either in
drawing room or Kitchen"
Thorpe, continuing, explained how the
back door had been found unfastened, and
how Short had admitted christening 1t in
order to go forth to seek the assassin.
"a ridiculous story-utterly absurd" de-
clared Jevons. "A man doesn't rush out to
shed blood for blood like that"
"Of course not" agreed the detective.
ITO my mind appearances are entirely
against this fellow. Yet, we have one fact
to bear in mind, namely. that being sent
TO town twice he was afforded every OPP
oortunity for escape"
''He was %artful," l remarked. HE knew
that his ratest plan was to remain and face
it. II, g seems very probable, the crime
was planned, 1t was certainly carried out
at a most propitious moment"
"It certainly was" observed my friend,
carefully scrutinizing the knife, which
Thorpe had brought to him. This" he
said, must be examined miscroscopically.
You can do that, Boyd"
at will be easy to see II there are any
traces OF blood upon it. To all appear
ances 1t has been recently cleaned and
oiled"
short admits cleaning 1t. but he says
he did SO three days ago." l exclaimed.
He gave vent to a low grunt, from which
I knew that the explanation was unsatis-
factory. and replaced the knife in its faded
velvet sheath.
Save for the men upon whom suspicion
had thus fallen, the servants had all gone
to the house where their mistress was
lodged, after being cautioned by the police
to say nothing Of the matter, and to keep
their mouths closed to all the reporters who
would no doubt very soon be swarming in
the district eager for every scrap OF infor-
nation. Their evidence would be required
at the inquest, and the police forbade them,
until then, to make any comment, or to
give any explanation OF the mysterious
/ affair. The tongues Of domestics wag
| quickly and wildly in such cases, and have
many times been the means Of defeating
the ends OF justice by giving away i'm
portant clues to the press.
Amber Jevons, however, was a practiced
| hand at mysteries. He sat down in the
library, and with his grabbed handwriting
covered two sheets of paper with notes upon
the case. l watched as his pencil went
swiftly to work. and when he had finished
I saw him underline certain words he had
written.
Thorpe appears to suspect that fellow
Short" he remarked, when / met him again
in the library a quarter Of an hour later.
1--WE Just been chatting with him, and to
me his demeanor is not that OF a guilty
man. He's actually been upstairs with the
coroner's ofhcer in the dead mans room.
A murderer generally excuses himself from
entering the presence Of his victim"
WELL" 1 exclaimed, after a pause you
know the whole circumstances now can
you see any clue which may throw light
on the AFFAIR.""
He slowly twisted his mustache again;
then twisted his plain gold ring slowly
round the little finger OF the left hand-a
habit Of his when perplexed.
mo, Ralph, old chap; can't say 90.
he answered. There's an unfathomaole
mystery somewhere, but in what direction
I'm utterly at a loss to distinguish"
But do you think that the assassin is
a member of the household? That seems
TO me our first point to clear up"