The Washington times., 1913-04-12

"a W ne Q-Qn 90 lndt- ne Gu
seN1 a perfectly obvious thing-a
thing SO obvious that 1 never
never thought of it. But
wait! Let me tell the story in order
My first plan was to take the even
ing train up to Oldboroush, spend the
night there and drive out to Beech
Hill In the morning. But, at the last
minute. changed my plan. 1 saw by
the papers thar they'd just started
running the night boats up there. aud
that offered several advantages. 1t
cut out both the railway station am
the hotel-two good places to avoid If
you're also trying to avoid observa-
fion
irst mild days is good to look at. l
generally sleep pretty well on anything
thst's moving, and SO / counted as an
other advantage good nights sleep"
He laughed ruefully.
Didn't you get it?' l asked.
II got" said he, what l really think
was the most horrible. abominaole
night ever had in my life. / tried to
ge to bed early, 10 begin with, and
that's always a mistake. Got into my
bunk, turned out the light and began
waiting for sleep about two hours be-
fore its scheduled time to arrive.
There couldn't have been many pas
sengers, but, with the typical intelli-
KGnCe sOI MS Cldss, INt puEStT put lie III
a stateroom next to one that was occu
pied. There was nothing but thin.
wooden partition between, going up to
within six inches of the ceiling. and
that space was left. open and grilled for
PURPOSES of ventilation. Through what
Il gained by ventiIating one stateroom
into another I never could see. l no
ticed before ] turned of my light that
one piece of the wire grill was broken
and had been taken out. / had no
a. IL Co. thar lnnt r Iarx
TO act like a fidgety old woman when |
travel. so I made the best of it and
went to bed.
The adjoining stateroom was dark at
that time, the occupants of it evidently
having come aboard early and gone to
bed. Because i heard A murmur Of
voices even then-two women's voices.
Nothing they really said came through,
for they'd evidently noticed my light
and were talking low on purpose. But
what commanding and the other little
bit servile. Some lady and her maid,
Judged them to be- or companion.
well. the sound of their voices vas
rather soothing than otherwise, and the
throb of the boat was rather pleasant
I got my muscles relaxed and my pill
lows comfortable, and was, ! thought,
on the point of slipping off to sleep,
when ] heard thin, little uttering
laugh. It came from the next state
room,
Drew, there was something horrible
about it, You may think that's inlaStn-
alton or -post-impressionism de-
veloped from something that happened
afterward. But / tell you IL wasn't
The sound OF that laugh made my blood
run cold. 1t wasn't loud or prolonged.
nothing like the burst of maniacal
laughter that Jane Eyre used to hear,
but, somehow, IL didn't belong with
ouief, weli-bred voices / heard. 1t was
A disconnected as II IL had been
phonograph record.
81 sat up in my bunk with the
sweat standing out all over me.
There was a rustic in the next room
that sounded as IL some one was get
ting out of the upper berth. and then
the quiet voice went on again.
well, ] lay down, swore at myself.
and told myself to go to sleep. But 1t
wasn't two minutes before the laugh
came again. 1t wasn't any louder this
time, but 1t lasted longer. and the
repetition didn't make II any the less
horrible. / heard one OF the voices
after that, but the other didn't speak
one of the two natural voices. /
mean. Pretty soon. though. another
voice spoke. The same voice that had
laughed spoke through a horrible
sort OF giggie.
"What II said was: Dead. She's
dead And then il laughed again.