The Wolf Point herald. (Wolf Point, Mont.) 1913-1940, 1920-02-19

Ou lllt uOOls Dul tiCg NOAfSyCu uOli-
ing to him. There were marks on the
window-sil, but what they signifed he
had no notion.
However, he went through his per-
Torrance conscientiously. 1t was his
way of taking formal possession Of the
case.
He rose, a little flushed, and, aban-
doning the magnifying-glass, made a
comprehensive survey of the room
from a position neal the door. If he
discovered anything, his discoveries
were entirely negative, and served
only to deepen the mystery of the case.
As Mr.. Snyder had said, there was
no chimney, and nobody could have
entered through the locked door.
There remained the window. 1t was
small, and apprehensiveness possibly
on the score of burglars had caused
the proprietress to make it doubly Sc
cure with an iron bar. No human be-
ing could have squeezed his way
through it.
After a quarter of an hour he left
the room, locking the door behind him.
No more unsatisfactory preliminary
investigation could ever have been
made.
1t was late that night that he wrote
and dispatched to headquarters the re-
port which had amused Mr.. Snyder.
The interval he filled up by making
guarded inquiries among his fellow
boarders.
He had no difficulty in making them
talk. Nothing like the death of Cap
tain Gunner had ever happened among
them, and the difficulty would have
beer to start successfully any other
topic of conversation.
Captain Muller, the big German.
who, by virtue of having been the dead
mans roommate, might, if he had de-
sired, have held the position of princi-
pal speaker and Star-witnesS, was the
only man who seemed TO have nothing
to say. He was plainly a man of silent
habit, and not even his vicarious con-
nection with the tragedy could shake
him from it.
The theories of the others ranged
from heart-disease-in spite of the
doctors definite statement to the con-
trary-to the ingenious suggestion
from one of the party that Captain
Gunner had been bitten by a snake at
some previous date, several years be-
fore, and that the poison had lain dor
mant in his system until this moment.
The theorist claimed to have known
a man who had made a voyage with a
man to whom a precisely similar eX.
perience had happened. The only weak
spot in the story was the fact that the ,
speakers informant had the reputa- !
ton of being the most ~persevering liar !
in his native state of Massachusetts, !
and had twice claimed to have seen !
the sea-serpent. &
Young Mr.. Cakes went to his room {
with the beginnings of a bad headache. q
All the really reliable information ,
which he had acquired from his com :
panions he had embodied in his report, =
and, as he had admitted in that docu- t
ment, it did not lead to anything very v
definite. k
1t was in his room that he first L
snatched at the avenging Indian the !,
Dry as a possible solution, and, if he II
been honest with himself he would Z
have admitted that there was a good
Zeal of the emotions of the drowning Il
nan toward the straw in his attitude t.
it. a
Nothing supported the theory ex- 4,
,ept his active Imagination. u
Captain Gunner had certainly visit .,
ID India in the course of his wander :
ngs, but there the trail stopped. He :
lad never shown any of the signs
which might be supposed to mark the
conscious of being ceaselessly pur-
ued by the outraged servants of an
indian god.
In his rambles along the waterfront
e had frequently met Indians, but he
betrayed no nervousness. On the
ontrary, if they happened to get in
is way, he had usually kicked them.
his was not the attitude of a hunted
Cakes was bound to admit that his
onfidence in the Indian theory was 4
OF very robust. He had put it to Mr..
hJ0NA III MS AOPOlb as Oil Ill
ence of good faith, as a proof that
is busy brain was at work and that II
e was bringing a laudable nimbleness Il
E imagination to the quest, than be- |t
BE really believed it. *
His innuendo against Mrs. Pickett E
pure spite. The woman irritated {
IN profoundly, and it soothed him 10 {
lncy himself even for a moment 6
atching her like a hawk, and causing E
r. %uneasiness by his relentless pur- E
lit. Z
He was a detective, but he was E
man. Il
Certainly Elliott Cakes was not en- 6
wing himself. The man of all others E
he had admired and revered &
ost intensely all his life-Elliott &
lkes, to wit-was beginning to show 2
of not being so tremendous as he s
d always pictured him. IL
He was being tried and found want s
:. IL