A MEMORY THAT CAME BACK.

Northland Age, Volume VI, Issue 40, 30 May 1910, Page 10

A MEMORY THAT CAME BACK.

TRAIL THAT LKD TO A LONG LOST POT OF GGIJ). CHAPTER I. Judge Marcellus and Abe Cronkite tasscd through the broad corridor fro u t:n ir carriage and stood on the front porch admiring the wooded tlo.e and the glistening bay beyond. •lot a lad place, Abe," said the Jid . for you to pass a few days vacation in your supposed character as —’’ * Huhh sir," warned the detective. • These walls are old enough to have car, you know." Even ns he spoke an elderly woman glided around from the side as'silently alert us a shadow and bowed respectfully before them. “My mistress, Mrs. Wynkoop, expected to be back from her drive with the children before you arrived," she said apologetically. "If you r tense I will gladly show you to the li rary, where my master is confined with his sprained ankle."

"You are very good," replied the Jrd e. ‘‘‘This must be "

“The housekeeper, Mrs. Tuers, at our service, sir."

As she led the way, courteous, obser.ant, Cronkite closely noted the simfde particulars which somehow joined to impress him : the scant flat gown of Quaker hue, the white hair tight to the head, the silver-bound spectacles of generous size, and the wan, impassive face which even they did n ;t deprive of a certain reminiscent comeliness. Yes, it must be the eyes glowering beneath, deep and sombre, that betrayed the repressed power.

Hugh Wynkoop gave an impatient wave of relief from his rolling chair at the sight of his visitors, natural enoueh in a man bound in his youth \nd vigour. “Welcome, Judge !" he cried. “You Are faithfully exact to the call of my tetter, but it seems as if j u”. were tardy by weeks. So this is the man who is to do the trick, the famous

'“Baines, the landscape gardener, sir," interposed Cronkite closing the door the tighter after he had quickly opened it. “No need of that," laughed Wynkoop. “My household would be a collective model for Caesar’s wife ; but the true instinct will show itself, hey, t’rfln—l mean Baines ? That’s right. There is work and to spare for it here, my man I may take your coming as assent to my project, Judge." “A very qualified assent," replied the Judge. “1 am glad to accept your hospitality for a few days, and to have our friend here serve you as he can ; but 1 cannot approve " "You must admit, squeezed as I am for money, that it is natural I should search for 100,000 dols. in rold."

“Natural, yes, but unwise. I saw your father, Hugh, burn and wither from the heat of such a quest."

"He told me all about it on his deathbed He said it was not right that the Wynkoops should ever come to want from lack of finding what rightfully belonged to them.

“Oh, I know, I know the bittern f s of hope deferred ; 1 have been ffeling'it already in this confounded chair. Bat now, but now the hope is the stronger ; the bitterness has I am resolved, I am resolved, Judie." “Yours to command, sir,” said Abe Cron’ ite at a sigh of resignation from the Judge, “if you will give me my instructions."

“That’s the ticket." cried Wynexultantly bestriding his hobby. ‘Know then that my paternal grandf t ier, a timid recluse, became so alarmed during the civil war when Lee came over the mountain wall to invade the North that be converted all of his securities into g< Id to n to the amount of 100,000 dols , which he incontinently secreted until the clouds should roll by. “unfortunately he was killed diret’y afterward in a runaway accident, and his faithful servant, Silas Mean;, who alone shared the secret with him, was thrown out on his head an i so seriously injured that he i a babbling idiot to this day. Tbi» i old still remains hidden somewhere abort this house or estate, thou h ray poor father, as the Judge truly says, made frantic search for it.

"I need it and I want it ; 1 must have it. Now, what is the best way to go about finding it ?" “If Silas Means once knew," reflected Abe Cronkite, “then his knowledge may not be lo3t. There has been won 'erful development in surgeiy during the last fifty years. What was hopeless then is certain now. I should have the old fellow examinil by medical experts to determine whether his senses might not be

restored by an operation. “‘As simple as Columbus's egg !” fairly shouted Wynkoop. “Yet no one ever thought of it before. I’ll ask Ned Wynkoop directly he comes back to recommend the very best. Ned is my second cousin, you know, Jud/e—quite a dab at medicine himself, though he hasn’t the heart to do much cutting. *He s staying with me now—only ran up to town yesterday for a day .o. Of course, I’ll have to put him wise ; but no harm in that. Ned can Le close mouthed when he likes, and I always did intend to give him a whack if the treasure was ever found, he’s so chronically hard up, the good fellow. “But, confound it, I'm reckoning without my subject. Old Silas wandered away three months ago and hasn't been here since. Doesn’t that beat the For heaven’s sake, Rosemary, what has happened ? The children “ “The children are safe, Hugh,” cried the pretty young woman who

had just tumultuously entered ; “but, oh, what a sight! What a shock for us all ! As we drove through the ravine the horses shied and backed. There by the roadside lay the dead body of an old man, of old Silas, Hugh. Dear me, dear me !" CHAPTER 11. Late the next evening, as the Judge sat in comfortable disorder in his pretty sitting-room, Cronkite entered and drew a chair close beside him. “Well, my man, back from the inquest ?" asked the old jurist. '"What was the sapient verdict ? That old Silas lost his life as he long since lost his head—by an accidental fall ? The county shouldn’t have touched so obvious a case."

“It was wilful murder by some person or persons unknown, sir," the detective answered gravely. “There could be no question of it. He had been shot through the heart from behind—oh, pardon me !" With an alert look he tiptoed to the door. He pressed his handkerchief against it, and it stuck as if with wax.

“Is it possible ?" rejoined the Judge, ignoring from pride so surprising an act. “I cannot well imagine a crime more needlessly atrocious. What advantage could come to anyone through the death of such a poor old idiot ?"

“That is not all, sir," Cronkite went on, returning, his tones the more impressive as they were lowered. “1 noticed signs in the body that ill accorded with the description you have just given of Silas Means. "It was cleanlyit was well and neatly clad. The hands and shoes showed care ; the expression of the face was intelligent. Surely this man could ngt have been idiotic at the time of his death.

“So, sir, I had a private talk with the Coroner and the District Attorney after adjournment—more sagacious officials than one might expect in so isolated a region. As a result we made a further and secret examination of the body, and found on the skull unmistakable evidence of trephining. Old Silas, sir, was murdered because he knew, because he remembered."

The Judge paced hastily up and down the floor. “ A fine ending to a few days’ rest !" he grumbled. “I was just getting used to early hours, leisurely eating, and sweet do nothing, and behold, like the Apostle, you show me a mystery. “So be it. I see, of course, your confounded, inevitable deduction. You think that the course you recommended was tried on old Silas, and that be was killed lest he should tell again what he had already told or perhaps reveal again what he had already revealed." "Mure probably the latter, sir. It seems to me that old Silas on coming to himself, regaining the strength and learning to an extent the evil \Vroiight by his mental sleep would first of all put his money to the test by going alone to the hiding place of the treasure. The person follo.ving him would then be able to remove this gold at his will—not an easy task, mind you, for it must weigh 400 pounds." “Well, well," demanded the impatient Judge, '“what course of procedure did you and your official allies upon ?"

“That they should follow the open evidence of the bullet wound for the detection of the murder, sir, and that I should follow the hidden evidence of the trephining for the recovery of the treasure ; but that all the evident should be used by either side if necessary to success." ‘ Then you had better combine the little there is at once. The outlook seems hopeless to me.”

“1 can’t say that I agree with you there. Judge," replied Cronkite, cheerfully. "I understand that Dr. Ad ward Wynkoop returns to this h .use to morrow." As the detective uttered this name in tones strangely loud the handkerchief lightly clinging to the door, fell to the floor. Never was there a cleverer signal for action. “Please keep on talking—any kind of rot, sir,” he whispered, and as light as the fall of the handkerchief he slipped across the room, out of the window, and along the verandah rcof. “The subject of evidence," soliloquised the Judge obediently, “though so vast, so complex, naturally, I may say, necessarily, separates itself into two distinct and independent parts—namely, the direct and the circum tent on sounds in the hall outside his door.

“Ah, I have caught you, as T knew I should, listening,” said Cronkite, "You must tell me all you know !“ “i have only been waiting to be sure before offering to do so." answered the woman who had been leaning there, her voice vibrant with truth. CHAPTER 111. Dr. Edward Wynkoop was agreeably surprised to find other guests on his return to the house. He regarded the Judge as a family functionary, somewhat superannuated perhaps, yet a tower of respectability for jefjuge in time of need. He took pains, then, to ingratiate himself with the old lawyer by his attentions, and those confidences regarding personal trials and ambitions which are so flattering. Baines, the landscape gardener, too, seemed a plain and practical man, too, absorbed in his own concerns of developing and beautifying the grounds to bother with other matters. Perhaps he might be led to take steps that would make safety doubly assured. So the doctor lost no time in persuading by shrewd indirections his fair connection, Rosemary, his cousin’s wife, into the opinion that the ravine should be filled up, thus obviating the steep and dangerous ascent and descent of the driveway

Indirection, indeed, was the doctor's favourite method, his golden rule being to let others do for him what he might otherwise have to do for himself. He did not even scruple to avail himself of the aid of Mrs. Tuers, who, having been employed but a year as. housekeeper, could not be expected to show the expansive interest of an old retainer. “My good woman," he said to her one day within the hearing of all, “I know you will be so kind as to prepare a little luncheon «for me to take to-morrow when I go fishing—don’t fail, Ella, on your life, to put, you know what, in the box," he managed to hiss for her ears alone, and then he turned smilingly to expatiate to the Judge on his love of nature.

A fine athletic figure, the doctor, early, the next morning, as he slipped down the stairs in his fishing togs. On the landing he paused as if he knew before he heard, and looked up with lazy grace into Rosemary’s face.

“Here it is, monster," she gasped, white faced, as she extended her hand shrinkingly. The doctor dropped the ivory-hand-led revolver into his side pocket. “Beauty and the beast," he mocked. “Oh, thrice happy beast !" “If you would only be as generous as you are clever,” she pleaded. “My generosity wouldn’t amount to much should I be so stupid."

“Why*do you persist in yoair odious designs ?" demanded Rosemary. “You know how 1 bate, I despise, I fear you. You know if I breathed the slightest hint to Hugh he would kill you."

“As he killed old Silas? Ah, Rosemary, why light against the inevitable ? Once away, with youth, love, wealth, the wide, wide world at your disposal, you will look back as to a prison house, as to its warden.”

“It is my home ; he is my husband. “

“So I just said,’’ returned the doctor, and with the air of a conqueror he passed down the stairs. Even more masterful was his mien as he entered the housekeeper’s room, where Mrs. Tuers sat idle and listless. “You don’t look like one about to enter her kingdom,’’ he said as he took the luncheon box from her.

“‘I have entered it—the kingdom of damnation,” protested Mrs. Tuers ; but he with a laugh went blithely on his way, all unconscious * that a moment later—a moment too late—the woman had risen, with arms outstretched, crying softly, hesitatingly, “Ned, dear Ned !” Blithely went the young athletic doctor on his way, fairly walking on air. Generous ? Well, no ; not until his own just requirements had been satisfied ; but clever ? Yes, he had indeed been clever. Clever, to have remembered from a child the legend of the hidden treasure ; clever, to have divined the only way of filching the truth from old Silas’s s led brain, to have caused the old man to be operated upon, to have followed him from city to ci to the hiding place. Clever, to hive dropped Hugh’s revolver by th murdered man’s side, just where 1 mary must recognise it. Clever, most clever, to have had a slave and a spy in the house for a year to find the unsuspected key and thus make success certain in the awful moment of failure. Little wonder * that the doctor walked lightly on air on his way to the place where the treasure was hid. The safety of simplicity ! The doctor had well nigh laughed aloud when he had seen old Silas scramble down the grassy bank, force his way through the tangle underbrush by the brook and tear off enough of the encarpment of sod to disclose the heavy oak door. Now as he opened this door with the key from the luncheon box and entered the stone-built well house, buried by a landslide many years before that timid recluse of a Wynkoop had utilised it, he did laugh joyously, as a conqueror. He stepped inside ; he closed the doorhe lighted a pocket lamp. As the faint glimmer penetrated the heavy blackness he looked about —a conqueror no longer. There were shelves, truly, but they were empty. Yet they bore marks, circular marks, as if golden coin had been stacked there. They were empty, but the treasure—for which he had risked his life, his. soul—-it had been taken, it was gone ! Even as the doctor tottered, aghast amid the crash of hope, the crush of fear, the door of the hut opened. In a paroxysm of rage he sprang at the throat of Baines, the landscape gardener.

'“lt is you, it is you, with your infernal puttering about the grounds, who have robbed your employer !“ he cried. “Give it up, give it up at ouce—the gold I say, the gold, or I will kill you !” “As you killed old Silas ” retorted Cronkite coolly, as with scarcely an apparent effort he forced the convulsive wretch, his arms pinioned to his sidtes, to the ground.

“Now,” the detective continued, standing over the levelled revolver, “get up and sit on that, stool of repentance over there. You and T must have a little talk before the Judge who holds your fate in balance gives you the choice between banishment for life or a shameful death.”

! As if.possessed by a helpless, hopeiess nightmare, Ned Wynkoop obeyed. “Give me that ivory-handled revolver you have in your side pocket," was the next inexorable order ; and again the doctor blindly obeyed.

1 “'We have been working on two distinct lines, the county authorities and I,” continued Cronkite. “They to catch the murderer, I to recover the treasure. “As you yourself just surmised, I have been successful in my task. The gold that was stored away here so many years ago is now in the dor-

session of its rightful owner, Hugh Wynkoop. “Suppose now I give them the benefit of what I have learned in this quest of which they are absolutely ignorant ; suppose I tell them of my finding you here this morning with the revolver, which the fatal bullet fits ”

“That can be explained," broke in the doctor thickly. “I brought it aS a favour to Mrs. Wynkoop, to hide it where it would be covered up for ever when you filled in the ravine as she has asked you to do. “It would be up to her then, wouldn’t it, to * explain where she got it, to show that Hugh didn’t have it with him, as she still believes he did, on that lonely prowl of his a day or so before the body was found during which he claims he sprained his ankle ? Aha !" "Suppose I tell them of the key to this door in your possession, the key you received this morning in the luncheon box, the key which was found after long search by the woman working in your interest, the woman serving in disguise, the young woman who looks an old woman.” “Damnation !“ muttered the doctor ; “Ella has betrayed me. She must have noticed, seen, heard ’’ "Yes," said a stern voice, “that is it. That poor devoted creature of yours, whom you robbed of her innocence, turned into a spy and tool and planned to deseft, did notice, see, hear enough in her sleepless jealousy to fathom your designs against your cousin’s wife. What can a betrayer expect but beytayal?” It was Judge Josiah Marcellus who spoke, advancing from the open with the majesty with which he used to open court, speaking with the cold impressiveness which he used to pronounce doom. Instinctively the doctor rose to his feet, but not yet was his head bowed. “A pretty scandal it will make,” he sneered, "‘if it comes out that his own wife suspected Hugh Wynkoop of murder, and with good cause too. A pretty scandal it will make if it comes out, as it must, that she was about to elope with me to Europe."

“If there is ever the slightest whisper of any such vile scandals against the good and simple women whom you have terrorised you shall hang by the neck until you are dead,” declared the Judge. “Do you think it will be hard to show who it was that caused the trephining of old Silas’s skull ?” “Ah,” moaned the doctor, and he bowed his head. “He said, that man there, whoever he is—that man said the Judge would give me a chance, a choice,” he faltered. “I ask for mercy, Judge,” “Mercy you shall have," returned the Judge. “Not on your own miserable account, but for the sake of my clients, whom first of all it is my duty to serve. Go forth, Cain, and wander a fugitive and a vagabond over the face of the earth. Our silence as to your knowledge of the treasure will be your safety." They stood, master and man, in the doorway, and watched almost with awe the doctor as he slunk through the brush, for already desolateness clung to him. Then from the roadside a woman sprang after him—Mrs. Tuers, the housekeeper, younger now in dress and form. At the touch o! her hand the doctor turned with a scream and struck her in the face, but still she persisted. still she followed, until as they reached the top of the slope and began to descend they disappeared from sight together. ’ “From the cradle to the tomb, ever, with tender arms extended," mused the Judge.—“ New York Sun.”