Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-08-21
THE SNARE
OF CIRCUMSTANCE
BY
Edith E. Buckley.


next that / recall hearing of Mr.. Somhers
was of his tragic end.
The case was a particularly mysterious
and complex one. it seemed to me. but
the men who were assigned to investi-
gate Ii reached quick conclusions. and
they were prepared by the end of the
first week to lay the responsibility for
the deed. with an outwardly convincing
chain of proof, at the door of the nephew,
Harrison Milbrath.
Detail upon detail that had not oc-
CURED to me when l outlined the case TO
Kilbourne flashed through my mind. Evil
dence had developed the fact that MIR.
Somhers and his nephew had lived to-
gether under stirring conditions. With
servants and acquaintance in general
Mr.. Somhers had a reputation of being
amicable and benevolent, student who
preferred his books TO animate compan-
ionship, but who greeted the occasional
visitor to Overlook with an old-world
courtesy.
With Harrison Milbrath he was the re-
verse. He made no secret Of his aver
sion to the lad. whom most people were
disposed to like. and before Harry's de-
parture for college the violent quarrelS
i'm which uncle and nephew engaged were
town talk
On the 18th Of October following
Harrys graduation from college. the serv-
voices in Mr.. Somhers' library. Shortly
thereafter Harrison Milbrath left the
house. At the luncheon hour the house
maid tapped upon Mr.. Somhers' door. as
usual, announcing lunch. Sometimes FIR.
Somhers answered the summons. as often
he did not: and it was an understood
condition in the household that the meal
was not to be kept for him after a
given time. On this day he did not lunch
neither did Milbrath appear. At 8 o'clock
the dinner gong was sounded. and when
the half hour had passed without the
appearance in the dining room OF either
MIR. Somhers or the younger man the
housemaid again tapped at the library
door. There was no answer.
She tapped again and again, and then.
with a curiosity that she could not re-
sist, she cautiously turned the doorknob.
The door yielded to her touch and she
peeped inside. The room was In dark
ness, but the light from the entry
fell directly upon the figure of Mr.. SOM
hers, recumbent upon the couch. There
was nothing unusual in his attitude, so
far as the girl could describe, but with
prescience of calamity she fled scream
ing TO the kitchen. She declared that
Mr.. Somhers was dead. aud continued to
scream until she tainted.
The stableman. who was eating his
evening meal in the kitchen at the mo-
ment, acceding to the clamor OF the cook.
went reluctantly to the library. declaring
that Mr.. Somhers was probably only
asleep and that he would lose his job
for his interference. What he saw turn
ed him cold with horror and-well. half
an hour later all Winton knew that the
estimable Peter Somhers had met a
tragic end. -s =
He lay upon his back on the couch, his
hands and feet hanging over it. a cash
upon his left temple and eye. Life had
been extinct, physicians said, fully two
hours. The curious fact that had men,
toned to kilbourne of the absence OF
blood stains. except on the body and
clothes of the victim, had not been dweit
upon sufficiently, 1t seemed to me. From
the nature of the wound IL must have
bled freely. Had the assassin stopped.
then. after his terrible deed. to stanch
the flow of life-blood? 1t seemed SO. and
he must have taken away with him the
cloth or sponge used for that purpose.
And the oilcloth. From where had that
come. that no one recognized it?
On the morning following Harrison Mil
brath. white and hollow-eyed, returned
to Winton on the southbound train. He
had been in Boston. he said. from 4
o'clock on the previous afternoon until
that morning, when. on reading the
shocking news of his uncle's death, he
had hurried back.
When he came to trial the prosecution
made out a different situation. He had
duarreled with his uncle in the morning.
it asserted. and had left the house a lit
tie later. looking pale and fierce. He
had eaten dinner at noon at the village
hotel after which he walked back to
Overlook. entered the house quietly by
means of his latchkey and attacked his
uncle with murderous intent. He had
paused to stanch the flow of blood and
to move his victim to the couch or, pos
sibly. he had killed him as he slept. Then
he slipped through the library window,
found unlocked. or boldly left by the
front door, which locked behind him.
Then the prosecution produced the con-
ductor of the o'clock train from Bev-
erly TO Boston. who swore that Milbrath
had been a passenger on his train on
October H.
Milbraths defense denied this. He had
started for Boston at one-thirty. Unfor-
tunately however. the conductor Of the
one thirty train could not recall his pas
sengers of that day sufficiently well to
verify this assertion. Milbrath was fairly
well known among the trainmen on the
Boston trains. for. being Harvard man,
he had been a frequent patron OF the
road that passed through Beverly. But
as misfortune would have il. the men in
charge of both afternoon trains on Octo-
Der II were comparative strangers TO
that section.
The defense did not, however, deny that
there had been an unusually stormy
scene between uncle and nephew on the
morning preceding the tragedy, nor did
it challenge the states evidence that Mil
brath dined at the village hosiery and
later returned to Overlook. But Ii aver
red that the defendant had not seen his
uncle after the mornings disagreement.
He returned for his suit case, which was
packed to be taken away. for he had
previously planned a trip to Boston that
day. He entered the house, not by means
of his latchkey, but through side door,
which he tried and found unlocked-not-
withstanding the testimony Of the maids
that this door and all other outside doors
were locked that day He went directly
10 his room on the second floor where
he remained for ten minutes. and then
went out Of the house and walked through
the woods to the Beverly station.
At the second trial. six months later,
the state and the defense offered practi-
cally the same evidence. but this time
Harrison Milbrath proved an alibi on the
day of the murder
To the establishment OF every one Ii
seemed, an elderly gentleman of unques-
tionable reliability u recalled definitely
at that moment that ii was a clergyman
testified that he met Harrison Milbrath at
the Park Square station in Boston at 4
o'clock on the afternoon of October IL.
and that Milbrath and he were together
until late in the evening. He maintained
this assertion through a rapid fire of
cross-examination. but with good -humor-
ed wit parted every question that would
lead him into a quagmire OF explanation.
II was no ones affair. he informed the
state, why Mr.. Milbrath and he were to-
gether that day. II should be sufficient
that the three witnesses who corrobo-
rated his testimony were reliable persons.
Step by step my memory carried me
hack over the details of the case: even
the names of many OF the witnesses, with
the mental pictures that / had formed
of their appearance. came back to me
yiyidly Suddenly out from all the Others
who found Mr.. Somhers body on the
couch uho had been so badly oyercop,a