Charlevoix county herald. (East Jordan, Mich.) 189?-1953, 1917-10-05


the kitchen for a drink of water Just
before retiring. i had oversight, and
was compelled to hurry to the Office
II was not until that night that
learned the fate OF my second dog He
hao been found dead at the bottom OF
the " shaped court. directly under
my open windows. The mark OF q
cord ! found about his neck.
With a choking sense of the uncan
niness OF the thing, l rushed to the
kitchen range and tore off the lids.
Lying over the edge of the fire.
bricks onto the top of the oven was
charred end Of Irvine.
In the hope that this might serve
as a clue. drew ii out. But found
1t so utterly ordinary as to be -un-
traceable. myself had ball OF
exactly similar Irvine in a drawer of
my desk. AS for the entrances
doors and windows were exactly as
they had been in the case of the
other dog, showing no signs of dis
turhance. 1t was impossible to find a
trace of any means by which an en-
trance had been effected.
Two months passed by with no un-
usual occurrence. Then Aunt Dinah's
parrot was found drowned in one OF
the kitchen tubs. II had been done
on the fifth day of May.
or course, the parrot might have
got out Of his cage and fallen into the
water; but two things made this seem
unlikely. One was the fact that there
had been no water left in the tub, so
far as any one in the house knew.
The other was the strange coinci-
dence, that we were working on a
case where we had found an unidenti-
fed infant body in one of the park
lakes.
II having been a warm night, !
had left the window of my den at the
front open. This might have provided
an entrance for the mischief-maker.
one would risk climbing down a rope
from the roof for the sole purpose
of killing the parrot of a poor, harm
less old black nanny.
In way. this was but a trlfle. Yet,
taken In connection with the loss of
my dogs, and the fact that all of these
losses held such strange similarity to
actual murders, / must admit that
they got very much on my nerves.
had been working fearfully hard
during the winter and spring.
/ decided to take long vacation,
and was permitted by the mayor to do
so. Iwent abroad. / was given the
three summer months.
Through the chance of missing my
steamer, / did not get home till the
3rd of September. / soon had my
Lands and my mind full of work.
Hardly had i been week in the
Office when we were brought to deal
with mystery that has never been
cleared up. An old man, generally
leputed to be a miser, living alone
with his wife in house on the out
skirts, was found choked to death in
his bed.
The mans wife slept through the
night without discovering the tragedy,
so silent had been the work of the
murderer. Robbery was unquestion-
ably the motive for this crime.
Strangely enough, the thieves had
been frightened away without even
making an attempt to search for loot.
Suspicion would have fallen on the
cid woman herself had not one of the
windows been jimmied. Besides, the
dark blue marks on the murdered
mans throat showed plainly that they
had been done by fingers. and it was
quite beyond belief that the old
widow had strength enough for the
deed.
Night and day the best men In my
department worked on this case for
weeks. / myself have never worked
harder. There were several nights
when / broke all my rules for early
sleep-some when | got no sleep at
all
Such was the case on the night Of
the 9th of September, when we had
thought we held clue-which proved
to lead nowhere the very next day.
Tired out, went to bed the following
night Immediately after my dinner.
The next morning / awoke from a
dream that some one was being muir
dered.
Though it was later than / usually
rose, l seemed dead asleep, and 1t
took me a moment or two to locate
the screams and recognize the voice
that was uttering them. 1 rushed to
The room of the old negroes.
Old Aunt Dinah was sitting up in
the bed, rocking herself to and fro In
an ecstasy of grief and terror. Never
m my life have / seen any one so
Horribly frightened or more evidently
broken-hearted.
The old negro was dead on the pill
low beside her.
A quick examination showed that he
had been throttled by some person
with strong fingers. II was the only
clue we were ever to get to the
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