Lexington gazette. [volume] (Lexington, Va.) 1871-1962, 1907-05-29
THE OLD STONE
HOUSE.

copyright, 1906, by c. II. SutcnHe'l
There had been a murder and;e sui
eide in the old stone house, and 1t had
been shut up for twelve years. Six
blocks away q tailor named Snayne
had an apprentice named Bascomb
The lad was the son Of a widow, and,
though only fourteen years of age, she
could not control him. He was TO
mantle and adventurous rather than
vicious. The tailor was pracucai
man, and when his apprentice showed
lack of energy and zeal he gave him
thrashing. He had done this I'VE OF
six times when Joe, as the boy was
Familiarity called, quietly slipped out
one night and set out on an adven-
ture.
The mystery of the old stone house
had strongly appealed to young bas-
comb. Just after dusk Of an evening
in May he bought candles, Matches
bread, sausage and butter Of a grocer
and carried them into the alley behind
the house.
There was a wall twelve feet high,
but back of the florists place he found
a board ten feet long. This he used 10
get himself and his purchases up one
side and down the other. The GROUNDS
were a tangle of vines and shrubs and
grass. and the old house doomed up
darkly with every door and blind nall
ed. There was no cowardice III the
bow. He sat down on a rotting door
step and made his supper and then lay
down among the weeds and slept
soundly until daylight. When he had
his breakfast, he set about breaking In.
He accomplished the feat by climbing
to the roof of a shed and forcing
blind and prying up sash. When ne
was once inside, he closed the blind
again. Then he lighted a candle and
went on q tour of discovery.
From a lot of moth eaten bedding the
boy selected the best and set up house
keeping in servants room In the
second story. He explored the house
to find only grimness and dust and
darkness. He slept as soundly on MS
first night in the old house as he mad
ever done at the tailOr's. On the sec
ond night he was awakened by per-
sistent noise. 1t sounded like two
pieces of metal being struck together.
He got up, lighted his candle and pass
ed through the upper part OF the
house. He found nothing to explain
the noises. Then he descended to the
ground floor. He was In his bare feet
| and moved without sound. He had to
| move carefully, too, as the floors had
dry rotted and become shaky Down
here the noises came to him more
| plain. and he located them as coming
from the cellar. This was a part OF
the house he had not visited yet He
| did not 90 down now. He had more
| courage than ninety-nine men in hum
| dred. but he baked at that. He knew
that it was like a dungeon down there
| and if uncanny things were to be met
| with it would be below stairs. He re-
| Turned to his bed and his sleep, saying
| that he would investigate when day
| light came.
| After breakfast next morning the
boy lighted his candle and started on
| his trip. He had found the cellar door
| fastened on his first exploration
through the house. What had struck
him as curious was that the fastening
| WAS on the other side. An iron he
| found In the kitchen was used as q
| pry, and after ten minutes Work the
door was opened.
| Descending the stairs, he found below
a cellar and a subcellar, and down In
the latter were the wine vaults. The lad
might have looked for foul air on de-
| scending the stairs, but there was
none. There was the blacklist kind OF
darkness in the cellar, with the heat
ing apparatus and It's pipes rusted
away and fallen apart. The door to
the subcellar was also fastened on the
other side. The boy did not even stop
to wonder how the person who had
made these doors fast on the down
side could have afterward left the
house. but forced the second as he had
the first. In the subcellar were seven
large wine bins and a large square
room. The air down there was purer
than on the parlor floor. A detective
would have paused to cogtate over
this. but the boy didn't. He entered
the big room after housing among the
wine bins for awhile, and there he got
his explanation of the clinking noises
he had heard the night before.
The room was the workshop Of a
gang of counterfeiters. There were
bogus gold and silver coins lying about
almost by the bushel. There were
molds and dies and presses. There
were a furnace and several melting
pots There were jars of acids and
hundreds of pounds of metal. There
were a table, chairs, lamps and dishes
At the rear end of the room was a
small door, but this was locked with
key and could not be pried open
Joe had seen bogus coins and heard
all about counterfeiters, and he was
soon aware of the Importance of his
find. When he had used up a couple
Of hours looking about, he returned
upstairs. fastening the doors behind
him as we'll as he could. He had M
impulse to rush off to the police. AS
; matter of fact, he remained in thu
house for a whole week longer, goinf
out twice at night to purchase pro
visions before he made up his mind t.
! go back to the tailoring business
, Then he went to the police. His stor!
, was not credited until a detective hat
, accompanied him to the house. Thei
Il was figured that the door from thu