Waterbury evening Democrat., 1905-07-03

talk had revealed numerous favorable signs The man had been at Kentucky Military Institute and one of Fergu- sons chums had likewise been trained i there. Thence came the discovery of common acquaintances.
 They went out on the car to Fergu- sons place and went in talking earn estly of the strike and of labor prob ] lens generally. The man had no sym pathy for the "scab,' and Ferguson had less for the union teamsters. They were absorbed and earnest.
 Ferguson began at once making preparations for the night. talking meanwhile. He sat with shoe in his hand and his guest was standing be- fore him.
 The change was like flash, and like flash Ferguson's. fist had struck out a fierce blow below the belt, as this man suddenly dropped his voice and reached for Ferguson's watch. ] The big, deep chest of the man went shut like burst balloon and he fell over. quite unconscious. Ferguson caught him as he fell and in an instant was crowding him out through the open window. The body dropped heav- fly and never stirred.
 Every thief has soul" Ferguson had no superstitions about immortality. What Prof. Munsterberg has to say on that subject quite ex- pressed his own views. but the words rang insistently as he looked once more on that helpless thing below. Fear he never felt for moment. What the world would say he little cared. Whatever 1t was that troubled him was purely personal-his own af- fair.
 He sat long into the morning facing that-his own affair After all. were they so different? Was he, the good hearted benefactor of men and believer in thieves souls. so very different from the thief out there? Were they not both thoughtless followers of impulses that needed only to be reviewed in the mind to Stay them from action? To think afterward-even the philanthro- pist must know the pain of that some times. What was the right of 1t then if this was all wrong?
 There was some one stirring below. Voices came drifting in through the open window. A growing grayness and the sounds of awakening traffic told that the night was far spent. The day was coming. and with 1t new fac tors in this awful problem of life. and perhaps death. Was it death that he had brought to this other one. this other who had come into his own life unasked, unknown? And he. Fergu- son. who had willed him only good had he sent him out into the great silence, the silence more terrible than that of night or of infinite space?
 Ferguson did not move. He lay on the couch and tried to sleep. Slowly he began to see the possibilities that might grow out of this adventure. Might he not be held responsible for crime? He began to see the thing grow big. It was more than personal affair. He saw how it touched his friends. his family. and it came over him how it reached out and touched all society One has deal more food for thought if he will not think until afterward.
 He was reused early. An oficer had come to learn what had happened. They had found Smith Wilkins. mo- torious criminal. lying unconscious in the court below Ferguson's window. The man had been hunted for weeks. There were dark deeds to his credit. He had studied and improved himself while in Joliet He was clever beyond most men.
 He was dead.-Chicago Record-Her- ald.