The St. Charles herald., 1922-06-03

head which diZZied him bu- leIt hlih
strength to strike again, and ms
, knuckles reached the mans face once
more, but he got another heavy Dlo"
in return. The man was graphing
no longer: he swung Alan to one side
and off of him, and rolled himself
away. He scrambled to his feet ana
dashed out through the library, across
the hall, and into the service ROOM
Alan got to his feet; dizzied and not
yet familiar with the house, he blum
dered against wall and had to feel
his way along 1t to the service room; !;
as he slipped and stumbled down the
stairway. a door closed loudly at the
end of the corridor he had seen at
the foot of the stairs. He ran along
the corridor to the door; 1t had closed
with a spring lock, and seconds passed
while he felt in the dark for the catch :;
he found it and tore the door open,
and came out suddenly into the cold
air of the night in a paved passage
way beside the house which led in one
direction 70 the street and in the
other to a gate opening on the alley.
He ran forward to the street and
looked up and down. but found 1t emp.
the end OF the alley. where it inter-
sected the cross street, the figure Of
the man running away appeared sud-
denly out Of the shadows, then dis
appeared: Alan. following as far as
the street, could see nothing more OF
him; this street too was empty.
He ran a little farther and looked,
then he went back to the. house. The
side door had swung shut again and
latched. He let himself in at the front
door and turned on the light in the
reading lamp in the library. The
electric torch still was burning on the
floor and he picked 1t up and eXtin-
guished It; he went upstairs and
brought down his shoes. He had seen
wood fire set ready for lighting in
the library, and now he lighted it and
sa. before 1t drying his wet socks be-
fore he put on his shoes. He was still
shaking and breathing fast from his
struggle with the man and his chase
after him, and by the strangeness Of
what had taken place.
When the shaft of light from the
torch had flashed across Alan's face
in the dark library. the man had not
taken him for wha. he was-a living
person: he had taken him for spec
ter. His terror and the things he had
cried out could mean only that. The
specter Of whom? Not of Benjamin
Corvet; for one Of the things Alan
had remarked when he saw Benjamin
Corvet's picture was that he himself
did not look at all like his father. Be
sides. what the man had said made it
certain that he did not think the spec
ter was Ben; for the specter had
"got Een." Did Alan look like some
one else. then? Like whom? Evil
dently like the man-now dead, for
he had a ghost-who had "got" Ben.
in .he big mans opinion. Who could
that be?
Alan got up and went to look, at
himself in the mirror he had seen in
the hall. He was white, now that the
flush Of the fighting was going; he
probably had been pale before with
excitement, and over his right eye
there was a round black mark. Alan
looked down at his hands; little
skin was off one knuckle. where he
had struck the man. and his fingers
were smudged with black and sotty
dust. He had smudged them on the
papers upstairs or else in feeling his
way about the dark house, and at
some time he had touched his fore
head and left the black mark. That
had been the bullet hole"
The res. that the man had said had
been reference to some name; Alan
had no trouble to recollect the name,
and, while he did not understand 1t
at all, 1t stirred him queerly-"the MI
waka." What was that? The queer
excitement and questioning that the
name brought, when he repeated 1t
to himself. was not recollection; for
he could not recall ever having heard
the name before; but it was not COM
pletely strange to him. He could de-
fine the excitement it stirred only In
that way.
Sheriff. had believed that here in
this house Benjamin Corvet had left
or might have left-a memorandum, q
record, or an account Of some sort
which would explain to Alan. his son.
the blight which hung over his life.
Sheriff. had said that it could have
been no mere intrigue, no vulgar per-
sonal sin; and the events of the night
had made that very certain; for, plain.
ly, whatever was hidden in that house
involved some one else seriously, des.
perately. There was no other way tC
explain the intrusion of the sort OF
man whom Alan had surprised there
an hour ago.
The fact that this other man
searched also did not prove that Ben
tamin Corvet had left record in the
house, as Sheriff. believed; but IL
certainly showed that another person
believed-or feared-it. Whether OF
not guilt had sent Benjamin Corvet
away four days ago, whether or not