Evening star., 1924-04-06


painted and was now black
with age. To keep out the
L winter cold, il was banked
with dirt about the base. At one cor
ner the spring rains, pouring down
from a broken caves trough, had
washed away the dirt, embankment,
disclosing the rotten ends of the per-
pendicular siding boards. At the
other corner of the north front was
gnarled honeysuckle vine, two-thirds
dead. Its spreading branches, leafiess
or bearing only scant and sickly Ter-
lure, clung to the warped sideboards
ike the gaunt arms of an old hag enl-
bracing the ruinous house. One grimy
pane was broken out Of the window
in the west gable and the hole had
been stuffed with rags.
For long time debt and drink and
sin had blasted this place, and now
there was something else. Under the
hot morning sun three women and
two children stood in the bare door
yard. visibly budding together,
blanched and agape. They stared now
at the house, now at the two empty
automobiles standing by the road
side-one of them a long, gray five
passenger car. the other a red two
passenger roadster. Sometimes, with
an excess of horror, they looked over
at a skinny old crone who hoped
and peered about the two automobiles
with an uncanny excitement. One of
the children was a red-headed and
freckled boy of ten, whose long legs
protruded from frayed breecheS that
failed by some inches to reach his
knobby knees. His mouth was open
as though it had been frozen that
way.
Coming out of the house, Skinner
noticed this gaping boy first of all.
In his rapid walk toward the red au
tomobile he even looked around and
noticed a bony horse standing with
his head over the rickety barnyard
fence and looking on as though it.
too, were specializing upon what had
happened Then he saw the skinny
cronc behind his machine, watching
him with snappy little eyes-as beady
and nervous as those of rat-and
he apprehended at once that she
burned with gruesome excitement.
Her snappy eyes watched his advance
a moment, then she darted at him.
Have y seen the tracks," she de-
manded. iii show 'em to y. This
way. This way" Her weazen hand
clutched at his coat sleeve and she
nodded her old head at him.
Skinner thought of an unclean old
bird as she bobbed along the road
side-keeping a little in advance of
lilac thicket she halted, STOPPING and
pointing her lean arm and extended
index finger in a rigid line. The
tracks of an automobile showed
plainly on the grass there. At q
glance Skinner saw that machine
had drawn up in the cover of the lilac
thicket, then backed away to turn
around
He turned it around" said the
crone, her beady eyes swapping at
Skinner. See yerer" STOPPING, with
her arm and forefinger extended, she
followed the curving track which the
machine had made in backing and
turning.
Backed plumb into that" she said,
triumphantly, and even before she
pointed to them. Skinner noticed
that twigs and branches of the young
tree were broken. He reached up and
picked a thread of black cloth from
Il broken branch. Plainly the top of
the car had been up and the collision
with the tree had torn it.
Backed plumb around, Plumb
around" she said, and swung her
skinny old arms in q half circle. as
hr in nSrin he
around. Plumb around" she re-
peated, repeating the gesture also.
Skinner found it peculiarly gruesome.
fI see" he murmured and started
abruptly across the road toward his
car.
!, = !. :;
TN following the long gray car out
from town he had taken most of
the curves on two wheels at risk of
his neck. Even now, after ten min
utes spent in the farmhouse, the deed
had only just accomplished itself It
was SO recent that it still ooZed and
1uivered under the bright morning
sun.
That came to him as he drove away,
and he shuddered- Partly from a
mere instinct of flight, he jammed his
foot savagely against the accelerator.
But there was professional reason
for speed, too; and as the little red
car leaped away his shocked brain
began composing the story as it would
appear in the extra 1t would be the
first extra Allentown had ever ex
perienced, and he wondered how much
of a hit that metropolitan touch
would make.
A wiry and understood man was
Skinner, tanned a good leathery brown
There were a few gray hairs in his
bristling, intractable mustache, and
his gray eyes studied the back-reel-
ing road through a pair of round,
gold-bowed spectacles. A faded cloth
hat was jammed down on his solid
head. He wore a limp shirt, with
a rusty little tie under the limp turn
down collar, and an office-stained
alpaca jacket over that. Manifold
adventures had enriched him little,
except in experience; but as usual
he was quite boyishly eager over his
new adventure of the Allentown
Gazette.
A quick side glance showed that
90 speedometer was registering
shirty-five miles an hour, and when
he looked back to the road two gal
Looping horsemen had popped up out
Of the ground. He recognized the
grizzly bearded one on the left and
nodded, as he flashed past-with
grim little smile, for the man was
carrying a repeating shotgun, and
Skinner approved of that. Under GER
tain circumstances buckshot was very
effective.
Two minutes later he slowed up