Hopkinsville Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1889-1918, 1907-01-15

along just as Il Is doing now, and the
darkness was so thick you could cut
it--that the man without a head got
in and sat down opposite me-just
as our German friend there is sitting
opposite you.
4 hope you won't get to thinking
that have escaped from an asylum
he continued; although ] am free to
admit that what / said just now would
be considered ample grounds for do
ing so. Nevertheless" His voice
sank, and the smile slid down his
cheek and vanished-'it was the plain,
unvarnished truth, and it happened as
| told' you-whilst we we're scudding
! along through this Inferno-like dark
ness, just as the train is doing now"
But man without a head!' ven
tured to expostulate And to enter
moving train--in a tunnel! The thing
is impossible, you know, impossible!"
1T happened two years ago, and
was going then (as am going now
to Luvinci, small station just out
side of this tunnel on the Italian side.
At that time l was connected with a
Franco-Itanan firm of jewelers. and
as the samples carried we're extreme.
ly valuable, / made it a point when
travelling by train to always engage an
J entire compartment and have the
, guard lock me in securely. / was,
therefore, quite alone when the affair
OF which l am about to tell you oc-
| Cured. was, moreover, unusually
! careful on this particular occasion, and
kept a loaded revolver lying upon the
seat beside me- Some four months
previously, fellow commercial trav-
eler, who had the misfortune to re-
semble me very closely indeed had
been murdered in a compartment Of
the Lyons express, and his murderer,
who was most fortunately captured,
| confessed that he had mistaken the
man for me.
"On the morning prior to my start
| ing upon the journey of which | am
now telling you, this murderer had
been guillotined in Paris, and there
was a full account of the execution in
all the evening papers, La Presse in
particular giving a very graphic de-
scription of it, l think I read it quite
dozen times that night and dozen
| more the next morning, and l was
reading it again when the train
whizzed suddenly into this tunnel. The
horrible droning of the wheels, com
bined with the gloom and, perhaps, the
| grewsomeness of the thing l had been
reading, got on my nerves and when
heard the door behind me-the
locked door!-open and close with a
bang, I fairly bounded from my seat.
AS 1 faced around, my heart hammer
ing against my ribs as though it would
beat its way out of me, | saw standing
before me the shape of a man with
a great scoop cut out of his coat and
shirt where the collar should have
been, a SLIM red line running round
his throat, and above that line a gray
white dead face with shut eyes and
hanging lips"
"AchI Lieber Gott."
/ / heard the words quaver out from
the Germans corner, but could MOI
see his face, for the thick vapor which
the opened window had let in floated
between us, humid, yellow, reeking Of
sulphur. l looked round at the Cor
nishman, every fiber of my being ting
ling, and something creeping up my
| neck.
Go on" l said family. you are
sure it wasn't nerves."
"As sure as I am that you are sitting
here beside me this minute" he re-
| piled. Nerves may often make man
fancy that he sees things, but they
can't make those things talk"
And he talked?"
YES. AS l faced round and saw
him, his dead lips said quite distinct
ly: Good evening, comrade. We
travel far and fast. 1t may be morn.
ing to you, but it is evening to me-
for everi' And then, with a wave Of
the hand, inviting me to resume my
seat, he sat down in the corner near
the window and turned his dead face
towards me, his eyelids never once
lifting, and his head, Jared by the
movement of the train, rocking I'M
steadily upon his shoulders. Once he
put up his hand to steady 1t, and as
his fingers touched that red line about
his throat, The trademark OF Mon
sieur de Paris he said, with a CHASTITY
movement of the lips which, in a liv-
ing man, would have been a smile.
He guillotined me at dawn this morn
ing"
The Cornishman stopped short and
1 saw his eye travel to the window.
Along the vapor-smeared surface OF
the glass faint glow of light was
creeping--a light which presently
burst into the compartment with such
a fierce and binding glare that for an
instant / could see nothing. Then /
became conscious that we were out of
the tunnel, and that the German was