The silver state. [volume] (Winnemucca, Nev.) 1909-1925, 1916-01-13
WAS IT A SPECTER?


a dusty SuDuTDdu ldue. f1o iOFOu hOAs
and he was engaged to be married to
her, with the complete disapproval OF
every reasonable person who had
been consulted. And this half-clan-
destine meeting was tonight to take
the place of the grudgingly sanctioned
weekly interview-because a certain
rich uncle a visiting at her house.
and her mother was not the woman to
acknowledge to a moneyed uncle a
match 80 deeply ineligible as hers
with him.
So he waited for her, and the chill
of an unusually sewers evening en-
tered into his bones.
The policeman passed him with
but a surly response to his good
night" The bicyclists went by him
like gray ghosts with fog-horns; and
1t was nearly ten o'clock and she
had not come.
He shrugged his shoulders and
turned toward his lodgings. His road
led by her house-desirable, commo-
dious. suburban-and he walked slow
IJ d6 nO DCaiCu u 04C hAi6Abb SFCA
now, be coming out. But she was
not. There was no sign of move
ment about the house, no sign of
life. no lights even in the windows.
And her people were not early peo-
pie. He paused by the gate. wonder
ing. Then he noticed that the front
door was open-wide open-and the
street-lamps shone a little way into the
dark hall.
He walked Up the path and listened.
No sign of life. He passed into the
hall. There was no light anywhere.
Where was everybody, and why was
the front door open? Everyone was
out, evidently. But the unpleasant
sense that he was, perhaps, not the
first casual visitor to walk through
the open door impelled him to look
through the house before he went
away and closed it after him. So he
went upstairs, and at the door of the
first bedroom he came to he struck
a wax match, as he had done in the
sitting rooms. Even as he did 80 he
felt that he was not alone, and he was
prepared to see something; for what
he saw he was not prepared. For
what he saw lay on the bed, In a
white, loose gown-and it was his
sweetheart, and her throat was cut
from ear to ear. He did not know
what happened then, but the police
man found him in a fit, under the
lamp-post at the corner of the street.
He could not speak when they picked
him up, and he passed the night in
the police cells, because the policeman
had seen plenty OF drunken men be-
fore, but never n in a fit.
The next morning he was better,
though still white and shaky. But
the tale he told the magistrate was
convincing, and they sent a couple of
~constables with him to her house.
There was no crowd about it as he
had fancied there would be. and the
blinds were not down.
AS he stood, dazed, In front of the
door, 1t opened and she came out.
He held on to the door-post for sup
port.
She's all right, you see," said the
policeman who had found him under
the lamp; Il told you you was
drunk; but you would know best"
When be was alone with her, he
told her.
But, my dearest" she said, II dare
say the house was dark, for we were
oil Of fho Ahnotar nth ~u rY-AT.
and no doubt the door was open, for
the servants will run out II they're
left. But you could not have been
in that room, because | locked it when
/ came away, and the key was IN my
pocket. l dressed In a hurry, and l
left my odds and ends lying about"
Il know" he said; II saw-why, I
even noticed the calendar on the
neutrality-suspicious. Fl, At least,
1t couldn't be that, because this is
May. And yet it was. Your, calen-
dar is at October 81, isn't it?"
mo, of cours IL isn't" she said
smiling rather anxiously. You must
have had a dream. or a vision or
something"
He did not believe in visions, but
he neves rested day or night till he
got his sweetheart and her mother
away from that commodious house
and settled them in a quite distant
suburb. In the course OF the remoy.
al, he incidentally married her, and
the mother went on living with them
His nerve must have been a good
bit shaken, because ne was very
queer for a long time, and was al.
ways inquiring II anyone had taken
the desirable suburban house; and
when an old stock broker with a
family took 1t, he went the length OF
calling on the old gentleman and i'm
ploring him, by all hat he held dear
not to live In hat fatal house.
"Why?" said the old stock broker
not unnaturally.
And then he got so vague and con
fused, between trying to tell why and
trying not to tell why, that the stocl
III hrnknw uhAwun1 A&vn ~xa