THE DISAPPEARANCE OF JOHN ACKLAND.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume 14, Issue 1118, 14 January 1870, Page 3

THE DISAPPEARANCE OF JOHN ACKLAND.

i . . . A TRUE STORY. ; ' IN THIRTEEN CHAPTEEB.— ©HAMSEE IX.. (From'" All tHe Year Bound.") In the followinf^'eX'traordinary narrative nothing is fictitious tout the? names of bhe persons. On inquiry at the ipdlite station in Charleston, S.C., Mr. Tom Ackland, accom-,-panied by Mr. Cartwrighfc, was shown the hat and book mentioned by the- Charleston Messenger. Mr. Tom Ackland ratheirthought that he had once seen the book in> the possession of his Cousin John. Bat of" this he could not reel sure; The name,, both in the book and in the hat, was printed. The handwriting on the margin of the page opposite the marked ; passage in the book proved to be quite illegible, but bore a strong resemblance to the -. sprawling and unsteady characters of thelasfc two letters received by Mr* Tom Ackland from his cousin. Inside the hat they • found the mark of a Georgetown maker, partly effaced. The police, after their first inquiries in Charleston, having jumped to the conclusion that they were being hoaxed, had treated the whole affair so carelessly that they had not even attempted to follow up this indication. Carfcwright .was the first to point it out;. In consequence of this discovery, Mr. Tom Ackland immediately proceeded to Georgetown, and had no difficulty in finding there, the hatter whose name and address Cartwrighb had detected inside the hat. On examining the hat,, and referring to his books, the. hatter identified/ .fcfisi,* having been sold on the 29th of last September. To whom ? He could not say. So many different hats were sold in tne course of a day, to so many different people. He would ask his young men. One of his young men thought he had sold a hat of that description some time ago, but .-• could not, positively say it was on the 29th of September, to a gentleman who had one arm in a sling. Eight arm? Could not remember, but thought it was the right arm. Hat was paid for in ready money. Was the gentleman on foot, or in a' carriage? Thought he was on foot, but could ;nbfc remember distinctly. ■ ■ . This was all the information Tom Aekland could obtain at Georgetown. He inquired at alt the hotels there, but could nob find the name of Ackland inscribed in any of their books. On his return. to-.. Charleston, Cartwright told him that; his-.... own inquiries at the hotels and boardinghouses in that city had been equally infructuoiis. On inquiring at the post-office, • they were informed that letters had certainly been received there for John K. Ackland; Esq., and regularly delivered to a gentleman so calling himself, who applied for them daily. What sort of looking gentleman ? Very invalid-looking gentleman, always muffled up to the chin in a long cloak, and seemed to suffer from cold even when the weather was oppressively hot. " Was he at all like this gentleman ?" asked Cartwright, pointing to Tom Ackland. Eeally couldn't recal any resemblance. Noticed anything else particular about him ? Yes. He carried one arm in a sling, and limped slightly. Anything else ? Yes. Spoke with rather an odd accent. Yankee accent ? . : Well, hardly. Couldn't well say what it was like. But the gentleman rarely spoke at all, and seemed rather deaf. Had been for his letters lately ? JNTofc since the 15th of October. There was one letter still lying there to his address. Explanations having been given by the two gentlemen, this letter was eventually, with the sanction of the police officer, who accompanied them, handed over to Mr. Tom Ackland, that gentleman having claimed it on behalf of his cousin. •It prored to be his own reply to John Ackland's last letter to himself. Had the gentleman never communicated to the post-office his address in Charlesi ton ? i Nevei\ ; Tom groaned in the spirit. He could 1 no longer entertain the least doubt that his worst fears had been but too well • founded. The absolute and universal • ignorance which appeared to prevail at . Charleston of the existence of any such person as John Ackland would have been • altogether inexplicable if John Ackland's i own letters to Tom, alluding to the pro- . found seclusion in which he had been s living ever since his arrival in that city, i did not partly explain it. No such person : having ever been seen or heard of on 'Change, or at any of the banks in Char- . leston, how had John Ackland been living ? > Cartwright suggested that it was possible* • that he might have been living all this • while on the money which he himself had , paid over to him in notes at Glenoak. " That is true;" thought Tom Ackland ; < for he remembered that his cousin, in his last letter from Glenoak, had stated that i the notes were still in his possession. But i nothing short of insanity could account i for his not having deposited them, since I then, at any bank. Unhappily such an ■ hypothesis was by no means improbable. Who was that Spanish gentleman who i pi'ofessed to have discovered the hat and : book of John Acldand's on the bank of ' the river ? Could he have been John • Ackland's assassin? But if' so. why should P he have spontaneously attracted attention ; to the disappearance of his A T ictim, and . promoted investigation into the circum- ■ stances of it? His story, as reported by •. the Charleston Messenger, was indeed so ? extravagant as to justify the opinion ex- ■ pressed by that journal. But Tom Auk- . land had in his possession letters from his r ' cousin which rmide the story appear far ; less improbable to him than it might rea- ? sonably appear to any one not acquainted • with the state of John Acldand's mind ■ during the last month. It was very unl. lucky that, there was now no possibility , of seeing and speaking with that Spanish. • gentleman. !Po,r the gentleman in ques- . tion, after having postponed his departure ' in order to aid tho inquiries of the police, L had left Charleston about two days bei fore Tom Ackland's arrival there, on beiug ■ assured by the authorities that his pres sence was not required. And he had left I behind him no indication of his present 3 whereabouts. This was the position of affairs- with Mr. - Tom Acklaud, and his inquiries appeared ) to have come to a hopeless dead lock, i when, late one night, Mr. Cartwright. (who l had been absent during the whole of the f day) burst into his room with the an- ) nouncement that he had obtained important t information about John Ackland. 3 It had occurred to him, he said, that John Ackland must, from all accounts, 3 have been a confirmed invalid for the last 3 few months. If so, ho would probably a have sought some country lodgiug in the 0 neighbourhood of Charleston, where the d situation was healthiest, without being mcc conveniently far from town, in case he 1 should require medical assistance. Acting - at once on this supposition (which, in order ', not to excite false hopes,- in case it should lead to nothing, he had l-efniined from s communicating to Tom); he had deter,------e j mined to visit all the environs of Charless j ton. He had that, morning selected for i his first voyage of discovery alocality only

4 %*evtr miles distuui ;'. jm Charleston, which c tae knew to be a particularly healthy situation. His inquiries there were not successful, and he was on the point of returning to Charleston, when he fortunately recollected that he had not yet visited a little lodging-house where he remembered hay- . ing once taken rooms himself, many years ago, when he was- at Charleston with his poor wife, then in very weak health. He was hot aware whether that house still existed, but he thought he would try ; and lie had been rewarded for his pains by learning from its landlady that some time ago a gentleman, who said his name was Aokland, called there, saw the house, and took it for six months. He paid the rent in advanoe, and had placed his effects in the house. But, to the best of the landlady's belief, he had not once slept at home since he became her tenant. He frequently came there, indeed, during the day, and had sometimes taken his meals there. But on all such occasions it was his habit to lock the door of his room as long as he was in it. Nothing would induce him to touch food in the presence of anyone. She had served him his dinner often, but had never seenhim eat it. Sometimes he carried part of ifc away with him ; and once he told her that he did this in order to have the food analysed. He appeared to be under a constant impression that his food was poisoned ; and the landlady was of opinion that her lodger was a decided . monomaniac, but that he was perfectly harmless. She said he was a very eccentric gentleman, but an excellent tenant. He had been at the house on the morning of the 16th (she rememberod the date because of a washing bill which he told her to pay for, him on that day, arod for which She has not yefc beenreimburs ed). He regained at home during the w hole of the day, but. locked up his room', as usual. About six o'clock in the evening he went . out, locking the doors of all th-.e sitting- . rooms and bed-rooms, and takini * the key .with him. Before leaving the House, he V . 1 her that he was likely to be ai isent for tOK time, and he was pursued by c nemies, S ° m( k *"' fchei ' e wouid probably be in cjuiries a ? T 1 ?! 1 but slie was not to notice them, about him, o ount to men ti O n his na me to and on no ac. • asneverseenhimsince. But anyone. # Shek precisely tallies with her description ot . nusat tf fl . that which was give. P d She is a very old wo. .' - , T V." 1 ,' rather deaf, and very /^ * *»\£ think she can either read ox T? fiU m ff , of this information I obtain* d jom the -> nigger gal who does all the Wfc T Tot* ot tlle house. She eventually promised v<> have the locks opened in our presence tomorrow; and I have settled that, if agreeable to you, we will drive over there after breakfast." Thus Carfctfright to Tom Ackland. „ •,, Poor Tom Ackland was profoundly affected by this fresh evidence of ze? v . a . vu < 1 sympathy on the part of Mr. Cartwri b '*- IJ . But Cartwright himself made light of hu"* ' own efforts. , " Pooh, pooh, my dear sir !" he said, in reply to Tom's repeated expressions of gratitude ; "if he was your cousin, was he not also my friend ?" "When Tom Ackland entered the first room, from which the lock was removed, in the house to which Cartwright conducted him on the following day, one glance round it told him all, and, with a low moan of pain, he fell upon the bed and sobbed. There, on that bed, was the dressinggown which poor John Ackland had worn the last evening on which he and Tom had sat together discussing John's plans for the future. There, in the wardrobe, were John Ackland's clothes ; there, on the shelf, were John. Ackland's books ; there, on the table, were John Ackland's papers. And among those papers Torn afterwards found an unfinished letter addressed to himself. It was written in those sprawling shaky characters which Tom had lately been learning, sadly, to decipher, and which were so all unlike the once firm and well-formed handwriting of his cousin. " God bless you, dear Tom !" (the letter said). "My last thought is of you. I have borne it long. I cannot bear it longer. Nobody will miss me but you. And you, if you could see me as I am now, if you could know all that I have been suffering, even you, would surely wish for me that relief from misery which only death can give. They are after me day and night, Tom. They have left me no peace. Mary Mordent is at the bottom of it all. She hides herself. But I know it. I have no heart to post this letter, Tom. I have no strength to finish it. Good-bye, Tom. Don't fret. Dear, dear Tom, goodbye." Tom Ackland returned to Boston with two convictions. One, that his unfortunate cousin had perished by suicide on the night of the 16th of October; the other, that Philip Cartwright was a most unselfish, warm-hearted fellow. The whole story of John Ackland's mysterious disappearance and lamentable death had excited too much curiosity, and been too hotly discussed, both at Eichmond and Boston, to be soon forgotten in either of those |localities. Serious quarrels had arisen (in Richmond at least), and old acquaintances had become estranged in consequence of the vehemence with which diverse theories were maintained by their respective partisans on the subject of John Ackland's fate. But time went on, and, as time went on, the story became an old story which no one cared to refer to, for fear of being voted a bore. There was not wanting at Richmond, however, some few persons by whose suspicious fancies Philip Cartwright, against all evidence to the contrary, remained uncharitably connected with the mysterious disappearance and subsequent suicide of the Boston merchant, in a manner much less flattering to that gentleman's character than Mr. Tom Ackland's grateful recollection of his iriendly exertions at Charleston. '