Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1912-02-04
CHAPTER II.
Once More the Obvious.

You don't suppose for a moment
hope, that a girl like Louisa would allow
her mind to dwell on such horrors Mys-
terious crimes in strange cities-and in
London, too for matter of that-are.
alas! Of far too frequent occurrence to be
quite as startling as they should be.
A day or two later Louisa Harris and
her aunt, Lady Ryder, crossed over to
England. They had spent five weeks in
Italy and one in Brussels. not with a
view to dreaming over the beauties OF
the Italian lakes, or over the art treas
ures collected in the museums of Brus-
sells, but because Lady Ryder had had
bronchial catarrh which she could not
shake off, and so her doctor had ordered
her a thorough change. Bellaggio was
selected and Louisa accompanied her.
They stayed at the best hotels both In
Bellaggio and in Brussels. where Lady
Ryder had several friends whom she
wished to visit before she went home.
Nothing whatever happened that should
not have happened: everything was or
derby and we'll managed; the courier and
the maid saw to tickets and to luggage.
to hotel rooms and sleeping compart-
ments. II was obviously their mission In
life to see that nothing untoward or I'M
expected happened. but only the obvious.
1t was clearly not their fault that Miss
Harris had seen a cab in which an I'M
known man happened to have been MUIR
dered.
Louisa, with view to preventing her
aunt from going to sleep after dinner and
thereby spelling her nights rest, had told
her of the incident which she had wit
messed in the Boulevard Waterloo, and
Lady Ryder was genuinely shocked. She
vaguely felt that her niece had done
something unlcdylike and odd, which was
so unlike Louisa.
The latter had amused herself by scan
ming number of English papers in order
to find out what was said in London
about that strange crime, which she had
almost witnesSed-the man stabbed
through the neck, from ear to ear. and
the wound so small it might have been
done with a skewer. But, with charac-
teristic Indifference, London paid but lit
tie heed to the mysterious dramas of a
sister city. A brief account OF the grue-
some discovery-a figurative shrug of the
shoulders as to the incompetence of the
Belgian police, who held neither clue
to the perpetrator Of the crime nor to the
identity of the victim. Just a stranger
an idler. Brussels was full of strangers
just now. His nationality? who knows?
His individuality? there seemed no one
to care. The police were active, no doubt,
but so far they had discovered nothing.
Two men. the murderer and the muir,
dered engulfed in that great whirlpool
known as humanity, small units of no
Importance, since no one seemed to care.
Interesting to the detective whose duty
it was to track the crime to Its perpe-
traitor. Interesting to the reporter who
could fill a column with accounts of depo-
sitions. of questionings, Of examinations.
Interesting to the after-dinner talker who
could expatiate over the moral lessons to
be drawn from the conception of such a
crime.
But the murdered man goes to his grave
unknown, and the murderer wanders
Cainlike on the face Of the earth-as mys-
terious, as unknown, as silent as his
victim.