Ottumwa semi-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1916-1918, 1917-03-13

uP VIC SOALiol pcIh oA ShS SoA ASAA, w 49,
a lady in evening dress with scarf
round her head, that was pretty sure
that he was the murdered man. I also
told him that l had seen the man in
evening dress come into the garden
and go up the right hand path parallel
to the central path and that woman
yelled. and wearing a big feathered
hat, had gone up the central path about
fifty yards behind the lady and the
murdered man, and that I had strolled
up that path myself. met Alice Devine,
and gone with her into the lawn on the
! left; and that we had heard revolver
shot and scream. and seen the man in
evening dress bolt.
I"Did you recognize him." said Pardoe.
| "No, didn't. only saw little bit
of his face. He bolted with his back to
me-" said.
Would you know him if you saw
him again." said Pardoe.
| mo, l shouldn't" said.
Would the young lady know him :"
enquired Pardoe.
J 81 don't think there's chance OF it, !"
! I said. she got just the same view
of him that did and she was very
much startled by the shot and the
scream"
That's a pity said Pardoe. He
paused and added: did you see the
lady in the evening frock plain enough
to recognize her again."
| mo; she was a good way in front Of
me up the path But I got an impress
sion that she was all right - lady,
don't you know" said I.
This foreigner hardly looks tho
kind Of man lady would be walking
with at this hour, here said the doc.
tor.
You're right there. Doctor Bran
don" said Pardoe slowly. But then
there's this bag of sovereigns."
"Blackmail?" said Doctor Brandon.
Looks very like it, said Pardoe.
But why should she shoot him?
She's got the letters" said
1--WE don't know that, m'Lord,' said
Pardoe "She may have got them after
he was shot,
"But then she'd have carried them
of, envelopes and all. She wouldn't
have waited to make sure that they
were the right letters and dropped the
envelopes said
That's so," said Pardoe.
"She may have wanted to make sure
that he did not blackmail her again.
and shot him as the best way of doing
s., it," said Doctor Brandon.
I'VE don't know that it was her who
did shoot him. said Pardoe.
He began to question me again about
the man in evening dress, about his
! figure. his height and breadth, whether
he walked like gentleman or not
told him what could remember OF
it but 1t was not much. When the
man came into the garden, had not
been particularly interested in him,
and that little cloud had made the
moonlight dim.
| Then he asked in what position the
murdered man had been lying when
I first came on the lawn. ! told him
I that he had been lying on his face and
that he had fallen with his face toward
/ the left hand shrubbery out of which
the man in evening dress had bolted.
He asked Doctor Brandon whether a
man with that wound would fall
straight forward. Brandon said that he
might pitch forward on his face or he
might spin round and then fall
/ well, the way he lay doesn't clear
! the man in the evening dress from the
shooting; it leaves the place where the
shot came from quite open; said Par
+, doe.
Then he questioned Brookes about
| the finding of the revolver. He. too,
seemed puzzled by the fact that the
| barrel Of it had been sticking in the
turf: and pointed ont that it was ly-
ing halfway between the body and the
! right hand shrubbery so that If the
man in evening dress had fired it. he
must have bolted right across the lawn
past the woman Pardoe went on to
question Brookcy about the people he
had seen in the Gardens while on his
, beat that evening. Brookes had seer
none OF the actors in the tragedy.
Then the two policemen who had
been securing the garden for some one
who had heard the sound of the shot.
or seen the lady Or the man in evening
dress as they came into the garden or
! fed out Of it, came back with the It'd
ings that they had not found any one
who could give any information. They
had found four pairs Of lovers, but
each pair had been so absorbed in each
others society that they had seen and
heard nothing
Pardoe stood quiet. frown'ng and
thinking: then he told the inspector
that he was going straight off to Soho
TO try and find something at Bechut's
lodging that might throw some light
on the matter, and that he would come
back at half past three, when there
would be light enough to search the
lawn and the strawberries thoroughly.
Leaving the inspector and Brookes
in charge of the lawn, Pardoe, the doc
tor and I came out OF the garden, fol
lowed by the two policemen wheeling
the ambulance with the dead man on
1t. babe them good night, and went
homo.
ITO Be Continued)