



                               THE VALLEY OF FEAR

                               Arthur Conan Doyle







                                Table of contents

         Part I
        The Warning
        Sherlock Holmes Discourses
        The Tragedy of Birlstone
        Darkness
        The People Of the Drama
        A Dawning Light
        The Solution

         Part II
        The Man
        The Bodymaster
        Lodge 341, Vermissa
        The Valley of Fear
        The Darkest Hour
        Danger
        The Trapping of Birdy Edwards
        Epilogue



















                                      PART I

                            The Tragedy of Birlstone





          CHAPTER I
          The Warning


     "I am inclined to think--" said I.

     "I should do so," Sherlock Holmes remarked impatiently.

     I believe that I am one of the most long-suffering of mortals; but
     I'll admit that I was annoyed at the sardonic interruption.

     "Really, Holmes," said I severely, "you are a little trying at
     times."

     He was too much absorbed with his own thoughts to give any immediate
     answer to my remonstrance. He leaned upon his hand, with his untasted
     breakfast before him, and he stared at the slip of paper which he had
     just drawn from its envelope. Then he took the envelope itself, held
     it up to the light, and very carefully studied both the exterior and
     the flap.

     "It is Porlock's writing," said he thoughtfully. "I can hardly doubt
     that it is Porlock's writing, though I have seen it only twice
     before. The Greek e with the peculiar top flourish is distinctive.
     But if it is Porlock, then it must be something of the very first
     importance."

     He was speaking to himself rather than to me; but my vexation
     disappeared in the interest which the words awakened.

     "Who then is Porlock?" I asked.

     "Porlock, Watson, is a nom-de-plume, a mere identification mark; but
     behind it lies a shifty and evasive personality. In a former letter
     he frankly informed me that the name was not his own, and defied me
     ever to trace him among the teeming millions of this great city.
     Porlock is important, not for himself, but for the great man with
     whom he is in touch. Picture to yourself the pilot fish with the
     shark, the jackal with the lion--anything that is insignificant in
     companionship with what is formidable: not only formidable, Watson,
     but sinister--in the highest degree sinister. That is where he comes
     within my purview. You have heard me speak of Professor Moriarty?"

     "The famous scientific criminal, as famous among crooks as--"

     "My blushes, Watson!" Holmes murmured in a deprecating voice.

     "I was about to say, as he is unknown to the public."

     "A touch! A distinct touch!" cried Holmes. "You are developing a
     certain unexpected vein of pawky humour, Watson, against which I must
     learn to guard myself. But in calling Moriarty a criminal you are
     uttering libel in the eyes of the law--and there lie the glory and
     the wonder of it! The greatest schemer of all time, the organizer of
     every deviltry, the controlling brain of the underworld, a brain
     which might have made or marred the destiny of nations--that's the
     man! But so aloof is he from general suspicion, so immune from
     criticism, so admirable in his management and self-effacement, that
     for those very words that you have uttered he could hale you to a
     court and emerge with your year's pension as a solatium for his
     wounded character. Is he not the celebrated author of The Dynamics of
     an Asteroid, a book which ascends to such rarefied heights of pure
     mathematics that it is said that there was no man in the scientific
     press capable of criticizing it? Is this a man to traduce?
     Foul-mouthed doctor and slandered professor--such would be your
     respective roles! That's genius, Watson. But if I am spared by lesser
     men, our day will surely come."

     "May I be there to see!" I exclaimed devoutly. "But you were speaking
     of this man Porlock."

     "Ah, yes--the so-called Porlock is a link in the chain some little
     way from its great attachment. Porlock is not quite a sound
     link--between ourselves. He is the only flaw in that chain so far as
     I have been able to test it."

     "But no chain is stronger than its weakest link."

     "Exactly, my dear Watson! Hence the extreme importance of Porlock.
     Led on by some rudimentary aspirations towards right, and encouraged
     by the judicious stimulation of an occasional ten-pound note sent to
     him by devious methods, he has once or twice given me advance
     information which has been of value--that highest value which
     anticipates and prevents rather than avenges crime. I cannot doubt
     that, if we had the cipher, we should find that this communication is
     of the nature that I indicate."

     Again Holmes flattened out the paper upon his unused plate. I rose
     and, leaning over him, stared down at the curious inscription, which
     ran as follows:

                         534 C2 13 127 36 31 4 17 21 41
                         DOUGLAS 109 293 5 37 BIRLSTONE
                              26 BIRLSTONE 9 47 171

     "What do you make of it, Holmes?"

     "It is obviously an attempt to convey secret information."

     "But what is the use of a cipher message without the cipher?"

     "In this instance, none at all."

     "Why do you say 'in this instance'?"

     "Because there are many ciphers which I would read as easily as I do
     the apocrypha of the agony column: such crude devices amuse the
     intelligence without fatiguing it. But this is different. It is
     clearly a reference to the words in a page of some book. Until I am
     told which page and which book I am powerless."

     "But why 'Douglas' and 'Birlstone'?"

     "Clearly because those are words which were not contained in the page
     in question."

     "Then why has he not indicated the book?"

     "Your native shrewdness, my dear Watson, that innate cunning which is
     the delight of your friends, would surely prevent you from inclosing
     cipher and message in the same envelope. Should it miscarry, you are
     undone. As it is, both have to go wrong before any harm comes from
     it. Our second post is now overdue, and I shall be surprised if it
     does not bring us either a further letter of explanation, or, as is
     more probable, the very volume to which these figures refer."

     Holmes's calculation was fulfilled within a very few minutes by the
     appearance of Billy, the page, with the very letter which we were
     expecting.

     "The same writing," remarked Holmes, as he opened the envelope, "and
     actually signed," he added in an exultant voice as he unfolded the
     epistle. "Come, we are getting on, Watson." His brow clouded,
     however, as he glanced over the contents.

     "Dear me, this is very disappointing! I fear, Watson, that all our
     expectations come to nothing. I trust that the man Porlock will come
     to no harm.

     "Dear Mr. Holmes [he says]:
     "I will go no further in this matter. It is too dangerous--he
     suspects me. I can see that he suspects me. He came to me quite
     unexpectedly after I had actually addressed this envelope with the
     intention of sending you the key to the cipher. I was able to cover
     it up. If he had seen it, it would have gone hard with me. But I read
     suspicion in his eyes. Please burn the cipher message, which can now
     be of no use to you.
     "Fred Porlock."

     Holmes sat for some little time twisting this letter between his
     fingers, and frowning, as he stared into the fire.

     "After all," he said at last, "there may be nothing in it. It may be
     only his guilty conscience. Knowing himself to be a traitor, he may
     have read the accusation in the other's eyes."

     "The other being, I presume, Professor Moriarty."

     "No less! When any of that party talk about 'He' you know whom they
     mean. There is one predominant 'He' for all of them."

     "But what can he do?"

     "Hum! That's a large question. When you have one of the first brains
     of Europe up against you, and all the powers of darkness at his back,
     there are infinite possibilities. Anyhow, Friend Porlock is evidently
     scared out of his senses--kindly compare the writing in the note to
     that upon its envelope; which was done, he tells us, before this
     ill-omened visit. The one is clear and firm. The other hardly
     legible."

     "Why did he write at all? Why did he not simply drop it?"

     "Because he feared I would make some inquiry after him in that case,
     and possibly bring trouble on him."

     "No doubt," said I. "Of course." I had picked up the original cipher
     message and was bending my brows over it. "It's pretty maddening to
     think that an important secret may lie here on this slip of paper,
     and that it is beyond human power to penetrate it."

     Sherlock Holmes had pushed away his untasted breakfast and lit the
     unsavoury pipe which was the companion of his deepest meditations. "I
     wonder!" said he, leaning back and staring at the ceiling. "Perhaps
     there are points which have escaped your Machiavellian intellect. Let
     us consider the problem in the light of pure reason. This man's
     reference is to a book. That is our point of departure."

     "A somewhat vague one."

     "Let us see then if we can narrow it down. As I focus my mind upon
     it, it seems rather less impenetrable. What indications have we as to
     this book?"

     "None."

     "Well, well, it is surely not quite so bad as that. The cipher
     message begins with a large 534, does it not? We may take it as a
     working hypothesis that 534 is the particular page to which the
     cipher refers. So our book has already become a large book which is
     surely something gained. What other indications have we as to the
     nature of this large book? The next sign is C2. What do you make of
     that, Watson?"

     "Chapter the second, no doubt."

     "Hardly that, Watson. You will, I am sure, agree with me that if the
     page be given, the number of the chapter is immaterial. Also that if
     page 534 finds us only in the second chapter, the length of the first
     one must have been really intolerable."

     "Column!" I cried.

     "Brilliant, Watson. You are scintillating this morning. If it is not
     column, then I am very much deceived. So now, you see, we begin to
     visualize a large book printed in double columns which are each of a
     considerable length, since one of the words is numbered in the
     document as the two hundred and ninety-third. Have we reached the
     limits of what reason can supply?"

     "I fear that we have."

     "Surely you do yourself an injustice. One more coruscation, my dear
     Watson--yet another brain-wave! Had the volume been an unusual one,
     he would have sent it to me. Instead of that, he had intended, before
     his plans were nipped, to send me the clue in this envelope. He says
     so in his note. This would seem to indicate that the book is one
     which he thought I would have no difficulty in finding for myself. He
     had it--and he imagined that I would have it, too. In short, Watson,
     it is a very common book."

     "What you say certainly sounds plausible."

     "So we have contracted our field of search to a large book, printed
     in double columns and in common use."

     "The Bible!" I cried triumphantly.

     "Good, Watson, good! But not, if I may say so, quite good enough!
     Even if I accepted the compliment for myself I could hardly name any
     volume which would be less likely to lie at the elbow of one of
     Moriarty's associates. Besides, the editions of Holy Writ are so
     numerous that he could hardly suppose that two copies would have the
     same pagination. This is clearly a book which is standardized. He
     knows for certain that his page 534 will exactly agree with my page
     534."

     "But very few books would correspond with that."

     "Exactly. Therein lies our salvation. Our search is narrowed down to
     standardized books which anyone may be supposed to possess."

     "Bradshaw!"

     "There are difficulties, Watson. The vocabulary of Bradshaw is
     nervous and terse, but limited. The selection of words would hardly
     lend itself to the sending of general messages. We will eliminate
     Bradshaw. The dictionary is, I fear, inadmissible for the same
     reason. What then is left?"

     "An almanac!"

     "Excellent, Watson! I am very much mistaken if you have not touched
     the spot. An almanac! Let us consider the claims of Whitaker's
     Almanac. It is in common use. It has the requisite number of pages.
     It is in double column. Though reserved in its earlier vocabulary, it
     becomes, if I remember right, quite garrulous towards the end." He
     picked the volume from his desk. "Here is page 534, column two, a
     substantial block of print dealing, I perceive, with the trade and
     resources of British India. Jot down the words, Watson! Number
     thirteen is 'Mahratta.' Not, I fear, a very auspicious beginning.
     Number one hundred and twenty-seven is 'Government'; which at least
     makes sense, though somewhat irrelevant to ourselves and Professor
     Moriarty. Now let us try again. What does the Mahratta government do?
     Alas! the next word is 'pig's-bristles.' We are undone, my good
     Watson! It is finished!"

     He had spoken in jesting vein, but the twitching of his bushy
     eyebrows bespoke his disappointment and irritation. I sat helpless
     and unhappy, staring into the fire. A long silence was broken by a
     sudden exclamation from Holmes, who dashed at a cupboard, from which
     he emerged with a second yellow-covered volume in his hand.

     "We pay the price, Watson, for being too up-to-date!" he cried. "We
     are before our time, and suffer the usual penalties. Being the
     seventh of January, we have very properly laid in the new almanac. It
     is more than likely that Porlock took his message from the old one.
     No doubt he would have told us so had his letter of explanation been
     written. Now let us see what page 534 has in store for us. Number
     thirteen is 'There,' which is much more promising. Number one hundred
     and twenty-seven is 'is'--'There is'"--Holmes's eyes were gleaming
     with excitement, and his thin, nervous fingers twitched as he counted
     the words--"'danger.' Ha! Ha! Capital! Put that down, Watson. 'There
     is danger-- may-- come-- very-- soon-- one.' Then we have the name
     'Douglas' --'rich-- country-- now-- at-- Birlstone-- House--
     Birlstone-- confidence-- is-- pressing.' There, Watson! What do you
     think of pure reason and its fruit? If the greengrocer had such a
     thing as a laurel wreath, I should send Billy round for it."

     I was staring at the strange message which I had scrawled, as he
     deciphered it, upon a sheet of foolscap on my knee.

     "What a queer, scrambling way of expressing his meaning!" said I.

     "On the contrary, he has done quite remarkably well," said Holmes.
     "When you search a single column for words with which to express your
     meaning, you can hardly expect to get everything you want. You are
     bound to leave something to the intelligence of your correspondent.
     The purport is perfectly clear. Some deviltry is intended against one
     Douglas, whoever he may be, residing as stated, a rich country
     gentleman. He is sure--'confidence' was as near as he could get to
     'confident'--that it is pressing. There is our result--and a very
     workmanlike little bit of analysis it was!"

     Holmes had the impersonal joy of the true artist in his better work,
     even as he mourned darkly when it fell below the high level to which
     he aspired. He was still chuckling over his success when Billy swung
     open the door and Inspector MacDonald of Scotland Yard was ushered
     into the room.

     Those were the early days at the end of the '80's, when Alec
     MacDonald was far from having attained the national fame which he has
     now achieved. He was a young but trusted member of the detective
     force, who had distinguished himself in several cases which had been
     entrusted to him. His tall, bony figure gave promise of exceptional
     physical strength, while his great cranium and deep-set, lustrous
     eyes spoke no less clearly of the keen intelligence which twinkled
     out from behind his bushy eyebrows. He was a silent, precise man with
     a dour nature and a hard Aberdonian accent.

     Twice already in his career had Holmes helped him to attain success,
     his own sole reward being the intellectual joy of the problem. For
     this reason the affection and respect of the Scotchman for his
     amateur colleague were profound, and he showed them by the frankness
     with which he consulted Holmes in every difficulty. Mediocrity knows
     nothing higher than itself; but talent instantly recognizes genius,
     and MacDonald had talent enough for his profession to enable him to
     perceive that there was no humiliation in seeking the assistance of
     one who already stood alone in Europe, both in his gifts and in his
     experience. Holmes was not prone to friendship, but he was tolerant
     of the big Scotchman, and smiled at the sight of him.

     "You are an early bird, Mr. Mac," said he. "I wish you luck with your
     worm. I fear this means that there is some mischief afoot."

     "If you said 'hope' instead of 'fear,' it would be nearer the truth,
     I'm thinking, Mr. Holmes," the inspector answered, with a knowing
     grin. "Well, maybe a wee nip would keep out the raw morning chill.
     No, I won't smoke, I thank you. I'll have to be pushing on my way;
     for the early hours of a case are the precious ones, as no man knows
     better than your own self. But--but--"

     The inspector had stopped suddenly, and was staring with a look of
     absolute amazement at a paper upon the table. It was the sheet upon
     which I had scrawled the enigmatic message.

     "Douglas!" he stammered. "Birlstone! What's this, Mr. Holmes? Man,
     it's witchcraft! Where in the name of all that is wonderful did you
     get those names?"

     "It is a cipher that Dr. Watson and I have had occasion to solve. But
     why--what's amiss with the names?"

     The inspector looked from one to the other of us in dazed
     astonishment. "Just this," said he, "that Mr. Douglas of Birlstone
     Manor House was horribly murdered last night!"





          CHAPTER II
          Sherlock Holmes Discourses


     It was one of those dramatic moments for which my friend existed. It
     would be an overstatement to say that he was shocked or even excited
     by the amazing announcement. Without having a tinge of cruelty in his
     singular composition, he was undoubtedly callous from long
     over-stimulation. Yet, if his emotions were dulled, his intellectual
     perceptions were exceedingly active. There was no trace then of the
     horror which I had myself felt at this curt declaration; but his face
     showed rather the quiet and interested composure of the chemist who
     sees the crystals falling into position from his oversaturated
     solution.

     "Remarkable!" said he. "Remarkable!"

     "You don't seem surprised."

     "Interested, Mr. Mac, but hardly surprised. Why should I be
     surprised? I receive an anonymous communication from a quarter which
     I know to be important, warning me that danger threatens a certain
     person. Within an hour I learn that this danger has actually
     materialized and that the person is dead. I am interested; but, as
     you observe, I am not surprised."

     In a few short sentences he explained to the inspector the facts
     about the letter and the cipher. MacDonald sat with his chin on his
     hands and his great sandy eyebrows bunched into a yellow tangle.

     "I was going down to Birlstone this morning," said he. "I had come to
     ask you if you cared to come with me--you and your friend here. But
     from what you say we might perhaps be doing better work in London."

     "I rather think not," said Holmes.

     "Hang it all, Mr. Holmes!" cried the inspector. "The papers will be
     full of the Birlstone mystery in a day or two; but where's the
     mystery if there is a man in London who prophesied the crime before
     ever it occurred? We have only to lay our hands on that man, and the
     rest will follow."

     "No doubt, Mr. Mac. But how do you propose to lay your hands on the
     so-called Porlock?"

     MacDonald turned over the letter which Holmes had handed him. "Posted
     in Camberwell--that doesn't help us much. Name, you say, is assumed.
     Not much to go on, certainly. Didn't you say that you have sent him
     money?"

     "Twice."

     "And how?"

     "In notes to Camberwell post-office."

     "Did you ever trouble to see who called for them?"

     "No."

     The inspector looked surprised and a little shocked. "Why not?"

     "Because I always keep faith. I had promised when he first wrote that
     I would not try to trace him."

     "You think there is someone behind him?"

     "I know there is."

     "This professor that I've heard you mention?"

     "Exactly!"

     Inspector MacDonald smiled, and his eyelid quivered as he glanced
     towards me. "I won't conceal from you, Mr. Holmes, that we think in
     the C. I. D. that you have a wee bit of a bee in your bonnet over
     this professor. I made some inquiries myself about the matter. He
     seems to be a very respectable, learned, and talented sort of man."

     "I'm glad you've got so far as to recognize the talent."

     "Man, you can't but recognize it! After I heard your view I made it
     my business to see him. I had a chat with him on eclipses. How the
     talk got that way I canna think; but he had out a reflector lantern
     and a globe, and made it all clear in a minute. He lent me a book;
     but I don't mind saying that it was a bit above my head, though I had
     a good Aberdeen upbringing. He'd have made a grand meenister with his
     thin face and gray hair and solemn-like way of talking. When he put
     his hand on my shoulder as we were parting, it was like a father's
     blessing before you go out into the cold, cruel world."

     Holmes chuckled and rubbed his hands. "Great!" he said. "Great! Tell
     me, Friend MacDonald, this pleasing and touching interview was, I
     suppose, in the professor's study?"

     "That's so."

     "A fine room, is it not?"

     "Very fine--very handsome indeed, Mr. Holmes."

     "You sat in front of his writing desk?"

     "Just so."

     "Sun in your eyes and his face in the shadow?"

     "Well, it was evening; but I mind that the lamp was turned on my
     face."

     "It would be. Did you happen to observe a picture over the
     professor's head?"

     "I don't miss much, Mr. Holmes. Maybe I learned that from you. Yes, I
     saw the picture--a young woman with her head on her hands, peeping at
     you sideways."

     "That painting was by Jean Baptiste Greuze."

     The inspector endeavoured to look interested.

     "Jean Baptiste Greuze," Holmes continued, joining his finger tips and
     leaning well back in his chair, "was a French artist who flourished
     between the years 1750 and 1800. I allude, of course to his working
     career. Modern criticism has more than indorsed the high opinion
     formed of him by his contemporaries."

     The inspector's eyes grew abstracted. "Hadn't we better--" he said.

     "We are doing so," Holmes interrupted. "All that I am saying has a
     very direct and vital bearing upon what you have called the Birlstone
     Mystery. In fact, it may in a sense be called the very centre of it."

     MacDonald smiled feebly, and looked appealingly to me. "Your thoughts
     move a bit too quick for me, Mr. Holmes. You leave out a link or two,
     and I can't get over the gap. What in the whole wide world can be the
     connection between this dead painting man and the affair at
     Birlstone?"

     "All knowledge comes useful to the detective," remarked Holmes. "Even
     the trivial fact that in the year 1865 a picture by Greuze entitled
     La Jeune Fille a l'Agneau fetched one million two hundred thousand
     francs--more than forty thousand pounds--at the Portalis sale may
     start a train of reflection in your mind."

     It was clear that it did. The inspector looked honestly interested.

     "I may remind you," Holmes continued, "that the professor's salary
     can be ascertained in several trustworthy books of reference. It is
     seven hundred a year."

     "Then how could he buy--"

     "Quite so! How could he?"

     "Ay, that's remarkable," said the inspector thoughtfully. "Talk away,
     Mr. Holmes. I'm just loving it. It's fine!"

     Holmes smiled. He was always warmed by genuine admiration--the
     characteristic of the real artist. "What about Birlstone?" he asked.

     "We've time yet," said the inspector, glancing at his watch. "I've a
     cab at the door, and it won't take us twenty minutes to Victoria. But
     about this picture: I thought you told me once, Mr. Holmes, that you
     had never met Professor Moriarty."

     "No, I never have."

     "Then how do you know about his rooms?"

     "Ah, that's another matter. I have been three times in his rooms,
     twice waiting for him under different pretexts and leaving before he
     came. Once--well, I can hardly tell about the once to an official
     detective. It was on the last occasion that I took the liberty of
     running over his papers--with the most unexpected results."

     "You found something compromising?"

     "Absolutely nothing. That was what amazed me. However, you have now
     seen the point of the picture. It shows him to be a very wealthy man.
     How did he acquire wealth? He is unmarried. His younger brother is a
     station master in the west of England. His chair is worth seven
     hundred a year. And he owns a Greuze."

     "Well?"

     "Surely the inference is plain."

     "You mean that he has a great income and that he must earn it in an
     illegal fashion?"

     "Exactly. Of course I have other reasons for thinking so--dozens of
     exiguous threads which lead vaguely up towards the centre of the web
     where the poisonous, motionless creature is lurking. I only mention
     the Greuze because it brings the matter within the range of your own
     observation."

     "Well, Mr. Holmes, I admit that what you say is interesting: it's
     more than interesting--it's just wonderful. But let us have it a
     little clearer if you can. Is it forgery, coining, burglary--where
     does the money come from?"

     "Have you ever read of Jonathan Wild?"

     "Well, the name has a familiar sound. Someone in a novel, was he not?
     I don't take much stock of detectives in novels--chaps that do things
     and never let you see how they do them. That's just inspiration: not
     business."

     "Jonathan Wild wasn't a detective, and he wasn't in a novel. He was a
     master criminal, and he lived last century--1750 or thereabouts."

     "Then he's no use to me. I'm a practical man."

     "Mr. Mac, the most practical thing that you ever did in your life
     would be to shut yourself up for three months and read twelve hours a
     day at the annals of crime. Everything comes in circles--even
     Professor Moriarty. Jonathan Wild was the hidden force of the London
     criminals, to whom he sold his brains and his organization on a
     fifteen per cent commission. The old wheel turns, and the same spoke
     comes up. It's all been done before, and will be again. I'll tell you
     one or two things about Moriarty which may interest you."

     "You'll interest me, right enough."

     "I happen to know who is the first link in his chain--a chain with
     this Napoleon-gone-wrong at one end, and a hundred broken fighting
     men, pickpockets, blackmailers, and card sharpers at the other, with
     every sort of crime in between. His chief of staff is Colonel
     Sebastian Moran, as aloof and guarded and inaccessible to the law as
     himself. What do you think he pays him?"

     "I'd like to hear."

     "Six thousand a year. That's paying for brains, you see--the American
     business principle. I learned that detail quite by chance. It's more
     than the Prime Minister gets. That gives you an idea of Moriarty's
     gains and of the scale on which he works. Another point: I made it my
     business to hunt down some of Moriarty's checks lately--just common
     innocent checks that he pays his household bills with. They were
     drawn on six different banks. Does that make any impression on your
     mind?"

     "Queer, certainly! But what do you gather from it?"

     "That he wanted no gossip about his wealth. No single man should know
     what he had. I have no doubt that he has twenty banking accounts; the
     bulk of his fortune abroad in the Deutsche Bank or the Credit
     Lyonnais as likely as not. Sometime when you have a year or two to
     spare I commend to you the study of Professor Moriarty."

     Inspector MacDonald had grown steadily more impressed as the
     conversation proceeded. He had lost himself in his interest. Now his
     practical Scotch intelligence brought him back with a snap to the
     matter in hand.

     "He can keep, anyhow," said he. "You've got us side-tracked with your
     interesting anecdotes, Mr. Holmes. What really counts is your remark
     that there is some connection between the professor and the crime.
     That you get from the warning received through the man Porlock. Can
     we for our present practical needs get any further than that?"

     "We may form some conception as to the motives of the crime. It is,
     as I gather from your original remarks, an inexplicable, or at least
     an unexplained, murder. Now, presuming that the source of the crime
     is as we suspect it to be, there might be two different motives. In
     the first place, I may tell you that Moriarty rules with a rod of
     iron over his people. His discipline is tremendous. There is only one
     punishment in his code. It is death. Now we might suppose that this
     murdered man--this Douglas whose approaching fate was known by one of
     the arch-criminal's subordinates--had in some way betrayed the chief.
     His punishment followed, and would be known to all--if only to put
     the fear of death into them."

     "Well, that is one suggestion, Mr. Holmes."

     "The other is that it has been engineered by Moriarty in the ordinary
     course of business. Was there any robbery?"

     "I have not heard."

     "If so, it would, of course, be against the first hypothesis and in
     favour of the second. Moriarty may have been engaged to engineer it
     on a promise of part spoils, or he may have been paid so much down to
     manage it. Either is possible. But whichever it may be, or if it is
     some third combination, it is down at Birlstone that we must seek the
     solution. I know our man too well to suppose that he has left
     anything up here which may lead us to him."

     "Then to Birlstone we must go!" cried MacDonald, jumping from his
     chair. "My word! it's later than I thought. I can give you,
     gentlemen, five minutes for preparation, and that is all."

     "And ample for us both," said Holmes, as he sprang up and hastened to
     change from his dressing gown to his coat. "While we are on our way,
     Mr. Mac, I will ask you to be good enough to tell me all about it."

     "All about it" proved to be disappointingly little, and yet there was
     enough to assure us that the case before us might well be worthy of
     the expert's closest attention. He brightened and rubbed his thin
     hands together as he listened to the meagre but remarkable details. A
     long series of sterile weeks lay behind us, and here at last there
     was a fitting object for those remarkable powers which, like all
     special gifts, become irksome to their owner when they are not in
     use. That razor brain blunted and rusted with inaction.

     Sherlock Holmes's eyes glistened, his pale cheeks took a warmer hue,
     and his whole eager face shone with an inward light when the call for
     work reached him. Leaning forward in the cab, he listened intently to
     MacDonald's short sketch of the problem which awaited us in Sussex.
     The inspector was himself dependent, as he explained to us, upon a
     scribbled account forwarded to him by the milk train in the early
     hours of the morning. White Mason, the local officer, was a personal
     friend, and hence MacDonald had been notified much more promptly than
     is usual at Scotland Yard when provincials need their assistance. It
     is a very cold scent upon which the Metropolitan expert is generally
     asked to run.

     "Dear Inspector MacDonald [said the letter which he read to us]:
     "Official requisition for your services is in separate envelope. This
     is for your private eye. Wire me what train in the morning you can
     get for Birlstone, and I will meet it--or have it met if I am too
     occupied. This case is a snorter. Don't waste a moment in getting
     started. If you can bring Mr. Holmes, please do so; for he will find
     something after his own heart. We would think the whole thing had
     been fixed up for theatrical effect if there wasn't a dead man in the
     middle of it. My word! it is a snorter."

      "Your friend seems to be no fool," remarked Holmes.

     "No, sir, White Mason is a very live man, if I am any judge."

     "Well, have you anything more?"

     "Only that he will give us every detail when we meet."

     "Then how did you get at Mr. Douglas and the fact that he had been
     horribly murdered?"

     "That was in the enclosed official report. It didn't say 'horrible':
     that's not a recognized official term. It gave the name John Douglas.
     It mentioned that his injuries had been in the head, from the
     discharge of a shotgun. It also mentioned the hour of the alarm,
     which was close on to midnight last night. It added that the case was
     undoubtedly one of murder, but that no arrest had been made, and that
     the case was one which presented some very perplexing and
     extraordinary features. That's absolutely all we have at present, Mr.
     Holmes."

     "Then, with your permission, we will leave it at that, Mr. Mac. The
     temptation to form premature theories upon insufficient data is the
     bane of our profession. I can see only two things for certain at
     present--a great brain in London, and a dead man in Sussex. It's the
     chain between that we are going to trace."





          CHAPTER III
          The Tragedy of Birlstone


     Now for a moment I will ask leave to remove my own insignificant
     personality and to describe events which occurred before we arrived
     upon the scene by the light of knowledge which came to us afterwards.
     Only in this way can I make the reader appreciate the people
     concerned and the strange setting in which their fate was cast.

     The village of Birlstone is a small and very ancient cluster of
     half-timbered cottages on the northern border of the county of
     Sussex. For centuries it had remained unchanged; but within the last
     few years its picturesque appearance and situation have attracted a
     number of well-to-do residents, whose villas peep out from the woods
     around. These woods are locally supposed to be the extreme fringe of
     the great Weald forest, which thins away until it reaches the
     northern chalk downs. A number of small shops have come into being to
     meet the wants of the increased population; so there seems some
     prospect that Birlstone may soon grow from an ancient village into a
     modern town. It is the centre for a considerable area of country,
     since Tunbridge Wells, the nearest place of importance, is ten or
     twelve miles to the eastward, over the borders of Kent.

     About half a mile from the town, standing in an old park famous for
     its huge beech trees, is the ancient Manor House of Birlstone. Part
     of this venerable building dates back to the time of the first
     crusade, when Hugo de Capus built a fortalice in the centre of the
     estate, which had been granted to him by the Red King. This was
     destroyed by fire in 1543, and some of its smoke-blackened corner
     stones were used when, in Jacobean times, a brick country house rose
     upon the ruins of the feudal castle.

     The Manor House, with its many gables and its small diamond-paned
     windows, was still much as the builder had left it in the early
     seventeenth century. Of the double moats which had guarded its more
     warlike predecessor, the outer had been allowed to dry up, and served
     the humble function of a kitchen garden. The inner one was still
     there, and lay forty feet in breadth, though now only a few feet in
     depth, round the whole house. A small stream fed it and continued
     beyond it, so that the sheet of water, though turbid, was never
     ditch-like or unhealthy. The ground floor windows were within a foot
     of the surface of the water.

     The only approach to the house was over a drawbridge, the chains and
     windlass of which had long been rusted and broken. The latest tenants
     of the Manor House had, however, with characteristic energy, set this
     right, and the drawbridge was not only capable of being raised, but
     actually was raised every evening and lowered every morning. By thus
     renewing the custom of the old feudal days the Manor House was
     converted into an island during the night--a fact which had a very
     direct bearing upon the mystery which was soon to engage the
     attention of all England.

     The house had been untenanted for some years and was threatening to
     moulder into a picturesque decay when the Douglases took possession
     of it. This family consisted of only two individuals--John Douglas
     and his wife. Douglas was a remarkable man, both in character and in
     person. In age he may have been about fifty, with a strong-jawed,
     rugged face, a grizzling moustache, peculiarly keen gray eyes, and a
     wiry, vigorous figure which had lost nothing of the strength and
     activity of youth. He was cheery and genial to all, but somewhat
     offhand in his manners, giving the impression that he had seen life
     in social strata on some far lower horizon than the county society of
     Sussex.

     Yet, though looked at with some curiosity and reserve by his more
     cultivated neighbours, he soon acquired a great popularity among the
     villagers, subscribing handsomely to all local objects, and attending
     their smoking concerts and other functions, where, having a
     remarkably rich tenor voice, he was always ready to oblige with an
     excellent song. He appeared to have plenty of money, which was said
     to have been gained in the California gold fields, and it was clear
     from his own talk and that of his wife that he had spent a part of
     his life in America.

     The good impression which had been produced by his generosity and by
     his democratic manners was increased by a reputation gained for utter
     indifference to danger. Though a wretched rider, he turned out at
     every meet, and took the most amazing falls in his determination to
     hold his own with the best. When the vicarage caught fire he
     distinguished himself also by the fearlessness with which he
     reentered the building to save property, after the local fire brigade
     had given it up as impossible. Thus it came about that John Douglas
     of the Manor House had within five years won himself quite a
     reputation in Birlstone.

     His wife, too, was popular with those who had made her acquaintance;
     though, after the English fashion, the callers upon a stranger who
     settled in the county without introductions were few and far between.
     This mattered the less to her, as she was retiring by disposition,
     and very much absorbed, to all appearance, in her husband and her
     domestic duties. It was known that she was an English lady who had
     met Mr. Douglas in London, he being at that time a widower. She was a
     beautiful woman, tall, dark, and slender, some twenty years younger
     than her husband, a disparity which seemed in no wise to mar the
     contentment of their family life.

     It was remarked sometimes, however, by those who knew them best, that
     the confidence between the two did not appear to be complete, since
     the wife was either very reticent about her husband's past life, or
     else, as seemed more likely, was imperfectly informed about it. It
     had also been noted and commented upon by a few observant people that
     there were signs sometimes of some nerve-strain upon the part of Mrs.
     Douglas, and that she would display acute uneasiness if her absent
     husband should ever be particularly late in his return. On a quiet
     countryside, where all gossip is welcome, this weakness of the lady
     of the Manor House did not pass without remark, and it bulked larger
     upon people's memory when the events arose which gave it a very
     special significance.

     There was yet another individual whose residence under that roof was,
     it is true, only an intermittent one, but whose presence at the time
     of the strange happenings which will now be narrated brought his name
     prominently before the public. This was Cecil James Barker, of Hales
     Lodge, Hampstead.

     Cecil Barker's tall, loose-jointed figure was a familiar one in the
     main street of Birlstone village; for he was a frequent and welcome
     visitor at the Manor House. He was the more noticed as being the only
     friend of the past unknown life of Mr. Douglas who was ever seen in
     his new English surroundings. Barker was himself an undoubted
     Englishman; but by his remarks it was clear that he had first known
     Douglas in America and had there lived on intimate terms with him. He
     appeared to be a man of considerable wealth, and was reputed to be a
     bachelor.

     In age he was rather younger than Douglas--forty-five at the most--a
     tall, straight, broad-chested fellow with a clean-shaved,
     prize-fighter face, thick, strong, black eyebrows, and a pair of
     masterful black eyes which might, even without the aid of his very
     capable hands, clear a way for him through a hostile crowd. He
     neither rode nor shot, but spent his days in wandering round the old
     village with his pipe in his mouth, or in driving with his host, or
     in his absence with his hostess, over the beautiful countryside. "An
     easy-going, free-handed gentleman," said Ames, the butler. "But, my
     word! I had rather not be the man that crossed him!" He was cordial
     and intimate with Douglas, and he was no less friendly with his
     wife--a friendship which more than once seemed to cause some
     irritation to the husband, so that even the servants were able to
     perceive his annoyance. Such was the third person who was one of the
     family when the catastrophe occurred.

     As to the other denizens of the old building, it will suffice out of
     a large household to mention the prim, respectable, and capable Ames,
     and Mrs. Allen, a buxom and cheerful person, who relieved the lady of
     some of her household cares. The other six servants in the house bear
     no relation to the events of the night of January 6th.

     It was at eleven forty-five that the first alarm reached the small
     local police station, in charge of Sergeant Wilson of the Sussex
     Constabulary. Cecil Barker, much excited, had rushed up to the door
     and pealed furiously upon the bell. A terrible tragedy had occurred
     at the Manor House, and John Douglas had been murdered. That was the
     breathless burden of his message. He had hurried back to the house,
     followed within a few minutes by the police sergeant, who arrived at
     the scene of the crime a little after twelve o'clock, after taking
     prompt steps to warn the county authorities that something serious
     was afoot.

     On reaching the Manor House, the sergeant had found the drawbridge
     down, the windows lighted up, and the whole household in a state of
     wild confusion and alarm. The white-faced servants were huddling
     together in the hall, with the frightened butler wringing his hands
     in the doorway. Only Cecil Barker seemed to be master of himself and
     his emotions; he had opened the door which was nearest to the
     entrance and he had beckoned to the sergeant to follow him. At that
     moment there arrived Dr. Wood, a brisk and capable general
     practitioner from the village. The three men entered the fatal room
     together, while the horror-stricken butler followed at their heels,
     closing the door behind him to shut out the terrible scene from the
     maid servants.

     The dead man lay on his back, sprawling with outstretched limbs in
     the centre of the room. He was clad only in a pink dressing gown,
     which covered his night clothes. There were carpet slippers on his
     bare feet. The doctor knelt beside him and held down the hand lamp
     which had stood on the table. One glance at the victim was enough to
     show the healer that his presence could be dispensed with. The man
     had been horribly injured. Lying across his chest was a curious
     weapon, a shotgun with the barrel sawed off a foot in front of the
     triggers. It was clear that this had been fired at close range and
     that he had received the whole charge in the face, blowing his head
     almost to pieces. The triggers had been wired together, so as to make
     the simultaneous discharge more destructive.

     The country policeman was unnerved and troubled by the tremendous
     responsibility which had come so suddenly upon him. "We will touch
     nothing until my superiors arrive," he said in a hushed voice,
     staring in horror at the dreadful head.

     "Nothing has been touched up to now," said Cecil Barker. "I'll answer
     for that. You see it all exactly as I found it."

     "When was that?" The sergeant had drawn out his notebook.

     "It was just half-past eleven. I had not begun to undress, and I was
     sitting by the fire in my bedroom when I heard the report. It was not
     very loud--it seemed to be muffled. I rushed down--I don't suppose it
     was thirty seconds before I was in the room."

     "Was the door open?"

     "Yes, it was open. Poor Douglas was lying as you see him. His bedroom
     candle was burning on the table. It was I who lit the lamp some
     minutes afterward."

     "Did you see no one?"

     "No. I heard Mrs. Douglas coming down the stair behind me, and I
     rushed out to prevent her from seeing this dreadful sight. Mrs.
     Allen, the housekeeper, came and took her away. Ames had arrived, and
     we ran back into the room once more."

     "But surely I have heard that the drawbridge is kept up all night."

     "Yes, it was up until I lowered it."

     "Then how could any murderer have got away? It is out of the
     question! Mr. Douglas must have shot himself."

     "That was our first idea. But see!" Barker drew aside the curtain,
     and showed that the long, diamond-paned window was open to its full
     extent. "And look at this!" He held the lamp down and illuminated a
     smudge of blood like the mark of a boot-sole upon the wooden sill.
     "Someone has stood there in getting out."

     "You mean that someone waded across the moat?"

     "Exactly!"

     "Then if you were in the room within half a minute of the crime, he
     must have been in the water at that very moment."

     "I have not a doubt of it. I wish to heaven that I had rushed to the
     window! But the curtain screened it, as you can see, and so it never
     occurred to me. Then I heard the step of Mrs. Douglas, and I could
     not let her enter the room. It would have been too horrible."

     "Horrible enough!" said the doctor, looking at the shattered head and
     the terrible marks which surrounded it. "I've never seen such
     injuries since the Birlstone railway smash."

     "But, I say," remarked the police sergeant, whose slow, bucolic
     common sense was still pondering the open window. "It's all very well
     your saying that a man escaped by wading this moat, but what I ask
     you is, how did he ever get into the house at all if the bridge was
     up?"

     "Ah, that's the question," said Barker.

     "At what o'clock was it raised?"

     "It was nearly six o'clock," said Ames, the butler.

     "I've heard," said the sergeant, "that it was usually raised at
     sunset. That would be nearer half-past four than six at this time of
     year."

     "Mrs. Douglas had visitors to tea," said Ames. "I couldn't raise it
     until they went. Then I wound it up myself."

     "Then it comes to this," said the sergeant: "If anyone came from
     outside--if they did--they must have got in across the bridge before
     six and been in hiding ever since, until Mr. Douglas came into the
     room after eleven."

     "That is so! Mr. Douglas went round the house every night the last
     thing before he turned in to see that the lights were right. That
     brought him in here. The man was waiting and shot him. Then he got
     away through the window and left his gun behind him. That's how I
     read it; for nothing else will fit the facts."

     The sergeant picked up a card which lay beside the dead man on the
     floor. The initials V. V. and under them the number 341 were rudely
     scrawled in ink upon it.

     "What's this?" he asked, holding it up.

     Barker looked at it with curiosity. "I never noticed it before," he
     said. "The murderer must have left it behind him."

     "V. V.--341. I can make no sense of that."

     The sergeant kept turning it over in his big fingers. "What's V. V.?
     Somebody's initials, maybe. What have you got there, Dr. Wood?"

     It was a good-sized hammer which had been lying on the rug in front
     of the fireplace--a substantial, workmanlike hammer. Cecil Barker
     pointed to a box of brass-headed nails upon the mantelpiece.

     "Mr. Douglas was altering the pictures yesterday," he said. "I saw
     him myself, standing upon that chair and fixing the big picture above
     it. That accounts for the hammer."

     "We'd best put it back on the rug where we found it," said the
     sergeant, scratching his puzzled head in his perplexity. "It will
     want the best brains in the force to get to the bottom of this thing.
     It will be a London job before it is finished." He raised the hand
     lamp and walked slowly round the room. "Hullo!" he cried, excitedly,
     drawing the window curtain to one side. "What o'clock were those
     curtains drawn?"

     "When the lamps were lit," said the butler. "It would be shortly
     after four."

     "Someone had been hiding here, sure enough." He held down the light,
     and the marks of muddy boots were very visible in the corner. "I'm
     bound to say this bears out your theory, Mr. Barker. It looks as if
     the man got into the house after four when the curtains were drawn
     and before six when the bridge was raised. He slipped into this room,
     because it was the first that he saw. There was no other place where
     he could hide, so he popped in behind this curtain. That all seems
     clear enough. It is likely that his main idea was to burgle the
     house; but Mr. Douglas chanced to come upon him, so he murdered him
     and escaped."

     "That's how I read it," said Barker. "But, I say, aren't we wasting
     precious time? Couldn't we start out and scour the country before the
     fellow gets away?"

     The sergeant considered for a moment.

     "There are no trains before six in the morning; so he can't get away
     by rail. If he goes by road with his legs all dripping, it's odds
     that someone will notice him. Anyhow, I can't leave here myself until
     I am relieved. But I think none of you should go until we see more
     clearly how we all stand."

     The doctor had taken the lamp and was narrowly scrutinizing the body.
     "What's this mark?" he asked. "Could this have any connection with
     the crime?"

     The dead man's right arm was thrust out from his dressing gown, and
     exposed as high as the elbow. About halfway up the forearm was a
     curious brown design, a triangle inside a circle, standing out in
     vivid relief upon the lard-coloured skin.

     "It's not tattooed," said the doctor, peering through his glasses. "I
     never saw anything like it. The man has been branded at some time as
     they brand cattle. What is the meaning of this?"

     "I don't profess to know the meaning of it," said Cecil Barker; "but
     I have seen the mark on Douglas many times this last ten years."

     "And so have I," said the butler. "Many a time when the master has
     rolled up his sleeves I have noticed that very mark. I've often
     wondered what it could be."

     "Then it has nothing to do with the crime, anyhow," said the
     sergeant. "But it's a rum thing all the same. Everything about this
     case is rum. Well, what is it now?"

     The butler had given an exclamation of astonishment and was pointing
     at the dead man's outstretched hand.

     "They've taken his wedding ring!" he gasped.

     "What!"

     "Yes, indeed. Master always wore his plain gold wedding ring on the
     little finger of his left hand. That ring with the rough nugget on it
     was above it, and the twisted snake ring on the third finger. There's
     the nugget and there's the snake, but the wedding ring is gone."

     "He's right," said Barker.

     "Do you tell me," said the sergeant, "that the wedding ring was below
     the other?"

     "Always!"

     "Then the murderer, or whoever it was, first took off this ring you
     call the nugget ring, then the wedding ring, and afterwards put the
     nugget ring back again."

     "That is so!"

     The worthy country policeman shook his head. "Seems to me the sooner
     we get London on to this case the better," said he. "White Mason is a
     smart man. No local job has ever been too much for White Mason. It
     won't be long now before he is here to help us. But I expect we'll
     have to look to London before we are through. Anyhow, I'm not ashamed
     to say that it is a deal too thick for the likes of me."





          CHAPTER IV
          Darkness


     At three in the morning the chief Sussex detective, obeying the
     urgent call from Sergeant Wilson of Birlstone, arrived from
     headquarters in a light dog-cart behind a breathless trotter. By the
     five-forty train in the morning he had sent his message to Scotland
     Yard, and he was at the Birlstone station at twelve o'clock to
     welcome us. White Mason was a quiet, comfortable-looking person in a
     loose tweed suit, with a clean-shaved, ruddy face, a stoutish body,
     and powerful bandy legs adorned with gaiters, looking like a small
     farmer, a retired gamekeeper, or anything upon earth except a very
     favourable specimen of the provincial criminal officer.

     "A real downright snorter, Mr. MacDonald!" he kept repeating. "We'll
     have the pressmen down like flies when they understand it. I'm hoping
     we will get our work done before they get poking their noses into it
     and messing up all the trails. There has been nothing like this that
     I can remember. There are some bits that will come home to you, Mr.
     Holmes, or I am mistaken. And you also, Dr. Watson; for the medicos
     will have a word to say before we finish. Your room is at the
     Westville Arms. There's no other place; but I hear that it is clean
     and good. The man will carry your bags. This way, gentlemen, if you
     please."

     He was a very bustling and genial person, this Sussex detective. In
     ten minutes we had all found our quarters. In ten more we were seated
     in the parlour of the inn and being treated to a rapid sketch of
     those events which have been outlined in the previous chapter.
     MacDonald made an occasional note, while Holmes sat absorbed, with
     the expression of surprised and reverent admiration with which the
     botanist surveys the rare and precious bloom.

     "Remarkable!" he said, when the story was unfolded, "most remarkable!
     I can hardly recall any case where the features have been more
     peculiar."

     "I thought you would say so, Mr. Holmes," said White Mason in great
     delight. "We're well up with the times in Sussex. I've told you now
     how matters were, up to the time when I took over from Sergeant
     Wilson between three and four this morning. My word! I made the old
     mare go! But I need not have been in such a hurry, as it turned out;
     for there was nothing immediate that I could do. Sergeant Wilson had
     all the facts. I checked them and considered them and maybe added a
     few of my own."

     "What were they?" asked Holmes eagerly.

     "Well, I first had the hammer examined. There was Dr. Wood there to
     help me. We found no signs of violence upon it. I was hoping that if
     Mr. Douglas defended himself with the hammer, he might have left his
     mark upon the murderer before he dropped it on the mat. But there was
     no stain."

     "That, of course, proves nothing at all," remarked Inspector
     MacDonald. "There has been many a hammer murder and no trace on the
     hammer."

     "Quite so. It doesn't prove it wasn't used. But there might have been
     stains, and that would have helped us. As a matter of fact there were
     none. Then I examined the gun. They were buckshot cartridges, and, as
     Sergeant Wilson pointed out, the triggers were wired together so
     that, if you pulled on the hinder one, both barrels were discharged.
     Whoever fixed that up had made up his mind that he was going to take
     no chances of missing his man. The sawed gun was not more than two
     foot long--one could carry it easily under one's coat. There was no
     complete maker's name; but the printed letters P-E-N were on the
     fluting between the barrels, and the rest of the name had been cut
     off by the saw."

     "A big P with a flourish above it, E and N smaller?" asked Holmes.

     "Exactly."

     "Pennsylvania Small Arms Company--well-known American firm," said
     Holmes.

     White Mason gazed at my friend as the little village practitioner
     looks at the Harley Street specialist who by a word can solve the
     difficulties that perplex him.

     "That is very helpful, Mr. Holmes. No doubt you are right. Wonderful!
     Wonderful! Do you carry the names of all the gun makers in the world
     in your memory?"

     Holmes dismissed the subject with a wave.

     "No doubt it is an American shotgun," White Mason continued. "I seem
     to have read that a sawed-off shotgun is a weapon used in some parts
     of America. Apart from the name upon the barrel, the idea had
     occurred to me. There is some evidence then, that this man who
     entered the house and killed its master was an American."

     MacDonald shook his head. "Man, you are surely travelling overfast,"
     said he. "I have heard no evidence yet that any stranger was ever in
     the house at all."

     "The open window, the blood on the sill, the queer card, the marks of
     boots in the corner, the gun!"

     "Nothing there that could not have been arranged. Mr. Douglas was an
     American, or had lived long in America. So had Mr. Barker. You don't
     need to import an American from outside in order to account for
     American doings."

     "Ames, the butler--"

     "What about him? Is he reliable?"

     "Ten years with Sir Charles Chandos--as solid as a rock. He has been
     with Douglas ever since he took the Manor House five years ago. He
     has never seen a gun of this sort in the house."

     "The gun was made to conceal. That's why the barrels were sawed. It
     would fit into any box. How could he swear there was no such gun in
     the house?"

     "Well, anyhow, he had never seen one."

     MacDonald shook his obstinate Scotch head. "I'm not convinced yet
     that there was ever anyone in the house," said he. "I'm asking you to
     conseedar" (his accent became more Aberdonian as he lost himself in
     his argument) "I'm asking you to conseedar what it involves if you
     suppose that this gun was ever brought into the house, and that all
     these strange things were done by a person from outside. Oh, man,
     it's just inconceivable! It's clean against common sense! I put it to
     you, Mr. Holmes, judging it by what we have heard."

     "Well, state your case, Mr. Mac," said Holmes in his most judicial
     style.

     "The man is not a burglar, supposing that he ever existed. The ring
     business and the card point to premeditated murder for some private
     reason. Very good. Here is a man who slips into a house with the
     deliberate intention of committing murder. He knows, if he knows
     anything, that he will have a deeficulty in making his escape, as the
     house is surrounded with water. What weapon would he choose? You
     would say the most silent in the world. Then he could hope when the
     deed was done to slip quickly from the window, to wade the moat, and
     to get away at his leisure. That's understandable. But is it
     understandable that he should go out of his way to bring with him the
     most noisy weapon he could select, knowing well that it will fetch
     every human being in the house to the spot as quick as they can run,
     and that it is all odds that he will be seen before he can get across
     the moat? Is that credible, Mr. Holmes?"

     "Well, you put the case strongly," my friend replied thoughtfully.
     "It certainly needs a good deal of justification. May I ask, Mr.
     White Mason, whether you examined the farther side of the moat at
     once to see if there were any signs of the man having climbed out
     from the water?"

     "There were no signs, Mr. Holmes. But it is a stone ledge, and one
     could hardly expect them."

     "No tracks or marks?"

     "None."

     "Ha! Would there be any objection, Mr. White Mason, to our going down
     to the house at once? There may possibly be some small point which
     might be suggestive."

     "I was going to propose it, Mr. Holmes; but I thought it well to put
     you in touch with all the facts before we go. I suppose if anything
     should strike you--" White Mason looked doubtfully at the amateur.

     "I have worked with Mr. Holmes before," said Inspector MacDonald. "He
     plays the game."

     "My own idea of the game, at any rate," said Holmes, with a smile. "I
     go into a case to help the ends of justice and the work of the
     police. If I have ever separated myself from the official force, it
     is because they have first separated themselves from me. I have no
     wish ever to score at their expense. At the same time, Mr. White
     Mason, I claim the right to work in my own way and give my results at
     my own time--complete rather than in stages."

     "I am sure we are honoured by your presence and to show you all we
     know," said White Mason cordially. "Come along, Dr. Watson, and when
     the time comes we'll all hope for a place in your book."

     We walked down the quaint village street with a row of pollarded elms
     on each side of it. Just beyond were two ancient stone pillars,
     weather-stained and lichen-blotched bearing upon their summits a
     shapeless something which had once been the rampant lion of Capus of
     Birlstone. A short walk along the winding drive with such sward and
     oaks around it as one only sees in rural England, then a sudden turn,
     and the long, low Jacobean house of dingy, liver-coloured brick lay
     before us, with an old-fashioned garden of cut yews on each side of
     it. As we approached it, there was the wooden drawbridge and the
     beautiful broad moat as still and luminous as quicksilver in the
     cold, winter sunshine.

     Three centuries had flowed past the old Manor House, centuries of
     births and of homecomings, of country dances and of the meetings of
     fox hunters. Strange that now in its old age this dark business
     should have cast its shadow upon the venerable walls! And yet those
     strange, peaked roofs and quaint, overhung gables were a fitting
     covering to grim and terrible intrigue. As I looked at the deep-set
     windows and the long sweep of the dull-coloured, water-lapped front,
     I felt that no more fitting scene could be set for such a tragedy.

     "That's the window," said White Mason, "that one on the immediate
     right of the drawbridge. It's open just as it was found last night."

     "It looks rather narrow for a man to pass."

     "Well, it wasn't a fat man, anyhow. We don't need your deductions,
     Mr. Holmes, to tell us that. But you or I could squeeze through all
     right."

     Holmes walked to the edge of the moat and looked across. Then he
     examined the stone ledge and the grass border beyond it.

     "I've had a good look, Mr. Holmes," said White Mason. "There is
     nothing there, no sign that anyone has landed--but why should he
     leave any sign?"

     "Exactly. Why should he? Is the water always turbid?"

     "Generally about this colour. The stream brings down the clay."

     "How deep is it?"

     "About two feet at each side and three in the middle."

     "So we can put aside all idea of the man having been drowned in
     crossing."

     "No, a child could not be drowned in it."

     We walked across the drawbridge, and were admitted by a quaint,
     gnarled, dried-up person, who was the butler, Ames. The poor old
     fellow was white and quivering from the shock. The village sergeant,
     a tall, formal, melancholy man, still held his vigil in the room of
     Fate. The doctor had departed.

     "Anything fresh, Sergeant Wilson?" asked White Mason.

     "No, sir."

     "Then you can go home. You've had enough. We can send for you if we
     want you. The butler had better wait outside. Tell him to warn Mr.
     Cecil Barker, Mrs. Douglas, and the housekeeper that we may want a
     word with them presently. Now, gentlemen, perhaps you will allow me
     to give you the views I have formed first, and then you will be able
     to arrive at your own."

     He impressed me, this country specialist. He had a solid grip of fact
     and a cool, clear, common-sense brain, which should take him some way
     in his profession. Holmes listened to him intently, with no sign of
     that impatience which the official exponent too often produced.

     "Is it suicide, or is it murder--that's our first question,
     gentlemen, is it not? If it were suicide, then we have to believe
     that this man began by taking off his wedding ring and concealing it;
     that he then came down here in his dressing gown, trampled mud into a
     corner behind the curtain in order to give the idea someone had
     waited for him, opened the window, put blood on the--"

     "We can surely dismiss that," said MacDonald.

     "So I think. Suicide is out of the question. Then a murder has been
     done. What we have to determine is, whether it was done by someone
     outside or inside the house."

     "Well, let's hear the argument."

     "There are considerable difficulties both ways, and yet one or the
     other it must be. We will suppose first that some person or persons
     inside the house did the crime. They got this man down here at a time
     when everything was still and yet no one was asleep. They then did
     the deed with the queerest and noisiest weapon in the world so as to
     tell everyone what had happened--a weapon that was never seen in the
     house before. That does not seem a very likely start, does it?"

     "No, it does not."

     "Well, then, everyone is agreed that after the alarm was given only a
     minute at the most had passed before the whole household--not Mr.
     Cecil Barker alone, though he claims to have been the first, but Ames
     and all of them were on the spot. Do you tell me that in that time
     the guilty person managed to make footmarks in the corner, open the
     window, mark the sill with blood, take the wedding ring off the dead
     man's finger, and all the rest of it? It's impossible!"

     "You put it very clearly," said Holmes. "I am inclined to agree with
     you."

     "Well, then, we are driven back to the theory that it was done by
     someone from outside. We are still faced with some big difficulties;
     but anyhow they have ceased to be impossibilities. The man got into
     the house between four-thirty and six; that is to say, between dusk
     and the time when the bridge was raised. There had been some
     visitors, and the door was open; so there was nothing to prevent him.
     He may have been a common burglar, or he may have had some private
     grudge against Mr. Douglas. Since Mr. Douglas has spent most of his
     life in America, and this shotgun seems to be an American weapon, it
     would seem that the private grudge is the more likely theory. He
     slipped into this room because it was the first he came to, and he
     hid behind the curtain. There he remained until past eleven at night.
     At that time Mr. Douglas entered the room. It was a short interview,
     if there were any interview at all; for Mrs. Douglas declares that
     her husband had not left her more than a few minutes when she heard
     the shot."

     "The candle shows that," said Holmes.

     "Exactly. The candle, which was a new one, is not burned more than
     half an inch. He must have placed it on the table before he was
     attacked; otherwise, of course, it would have fallen when he fell.
     This shows that he was not attacked the instant that he entered the
     room. When Mr. Barker arrived the candle was lit and the lamp was
     out."

     "That's all clear enough."

     "Well, now, we can reconstruct things on those lines. Mr. Douglas
     enters the room. He puts down the candle. A man appears from behind
     the curtain. He is armed with this gun. He demands the wedding
     ring--Heaven only knows why, but so it must have been. Mr. Douglas
     gave it up. Then either in cold blood or in the course of a
     struggle--Douglas may have gripped the hammer that was found upon the
     mat--he shot Douglas in this horrible way. He dropped his gun and
     also it would seem this queer card--V. V. 341, whatever that may
     mean--and he made his escape through the window and across the moat
     at the very moment when Cecil Barker was discovering the crime. How's
     that, Mr. Holmes?"

     "Very interesting, but just a little unconvincing."

     "Man, it would be absolute nonsense if it wasn't that anything else
     is even worse!" cried MacDonald. "Somebody killed the man, and
     whoever it was I could clearly prove to you that he should have done
     it some other way. What does he mean by allowing his retreat to be
     cut off like that? What does he mean by using a shotgun when silence
     was his one chance of escape? Come, Mr. Holmes, it's up to you to
     give us a lead, since you say Mr. White Mason's theory is
     unconvincing."

     Holmes had sat intently observant during this long discussion,
     missing no word that was said, with his keen eyes darting to right
     and to left, and his forehead wrinkled with speculation.

     "I should like a few more facts before I get so far as a theory, Mr.
     Mac," said he, kneeling down beside the body. "Dear me! these
     injuries are really appalling. Can we have the butler in for a
     moment? ... Ames, I understand that you have often seen this very
     unusual mark--a branded triangle inside a circle--upon Mr. Douglas's
     forearm?"

     "Frequently, sir."

     "You never heard any speculation as to what it meant?"

     "No, sir."

     "It must have caused great pain when it was inflicted. It is
     undoubtedly a burn. Now, I observe, Ames, that there is a small piece
     of plaster at the angle of Mr. Douglas's jaw. Did you observe that in
     life?"

     "Yes, sir, he cut himself in shaving yesterday morning."

     "Did you ever know him to cut himself in shaving before?"

     "Not for a very long time, sir."

     "Suggestive!" said Holmes. "It may, of course, be a mere coincidence,
     or it may point to some nervousness which would indicate that he had
     reason to apprehend danger. Had you noticed anything unusual in his
     conduct, yesterday, Ames?"

     "It struck me that he was a little restless and excited, sir."

     "Ha! The attack may not have been entirely unexpected. We do seem to
     make a little progress, do we not? Perhaps you would rather do the
     questioning, Mr. Mac?"

     "No, Mr. Holmes, it's in better hands than mine."

     "Well, then, we will pass to this card--V. V. 341. It is rough
     cardboard. Have you any of the sort in the house?"

     "I don't think so."

     Holmes walked across to the desk and dabbed a little ink from each
     bottle on to the blotting paper. "It was not printed in this room,"
     he said; "this is black ink and the other purplish. It was done by a
     thick pen, and these are fine. No, it was done elsewhere, I should
     say. Can you make anything of the inscription, Ames?"

     "No, sir, nothing."

     "What do you think, Mr. Mac?"

     "It gives me the impression of a secret society of some sort; the
     same with his badge upon the forearm."

     "That's my idea, too," said White Mason.

     "Well, we can adopt it as a working hypothesis and then see how far
     our difficulties disappear. An agent from such a society makes his
     way into the house, waits for Mr. Douglas, blows his head nearly off
     with this weapon, and escapes by wading the moat, after leaving a
     card beside the dead man, which will when mentioned in the papers,
     tell other members of the society that vengeance has been done. That
     all hangs together. But why this gun, of all weapons?"

     "Exactly."

     "And why the missing ring?"

     "Quite so."

     "And why no arrest? It's past two now. I take it for granted that
     since dawn every constable within forty miles has been looking out
     for a wet stranger?"

     "That is so, Mr. Holmes."

     "Well, unless he has a burrow close by or a change of clothes ready,
     they can hardly miss him. And yet they have missed him up to now!"
     Holmes had gone to the window and was examining with his lens the
     blood mark on the sill. "It is clearly the tread of a shoe. It is
     remarkably broad; a splay-foot, one would say. Curious, because, so
     far as one can trace any footmark in this mud-stained corner, one
     would say it was a more shapely sole. However, they are certainly
     very indistinct. What's this under the side table?"

     "Mr. Douglas's dumb-bells," said Ames.

     "Dumb-bell--there's only one. Where's the other?"

     "I don't know, Mr. Holmes. There may have been only one. I have not
     noticed them for months."

     "One dumb-bell--" Holmes said seriously; but his remarks were
     interrupted by a sharp knock at the door.

     A tall, sunburned, capable-looking, clean-shaved man looked in at us.
     I had no difficulty in guessing that it was the Cecil Barker of whom
     I had heard. His masterful eyes travelled quickly with a questioning
     glance from face to face.

     "Sorry to interrupt your consultation," said he, "but you should hear
     the latest news."

     "An arrest?"

     "No such luck. But they've found his bicycle. The fellow left his
     bicycle behind him. Come and have a look. It is within a hundred
     yards of the hall door."

     We found three or four grooms and idlers standing in the drive
     inspecting a bicycle which had been drawn out from a clump of
     evergreens in which it had been concealed. It was a well used
     Rudge-Whitworth, splashed as from a considerable journey. There was a
     saddlebag with spanner and oilcan, but no clue as to the owner.

     "It would be a grand help to the police," said the inspector, "if
     these things were numbered and registered. But we must be thankful
     for what we've got. If we can't find where he went to, at least we
     are likely to get where he came from. But what in the name of all
     that is wonderful made the fellow leave it behind? And how in the
     world has he got away without it? We don't seem to get a gleam of
     light in the case, Mr. Holmes."

     "Don't we?" my friend answered thoughtfully. "I wonder!"





          CHAPTER V
          The People Of the Drama


     "Have you seen all you want of the study?" asked White Mason as we
     reentered the house.

     "For the time," said the inspector, and Holmes nodded.

     "Then perhaps you would now like to hear the evidence of some of the
     people in the house. We could use the dining-room, Ames. Please come
     yourself first and tell us what you know."

     The butler's account was a simple and a clear one, and he gave a
     convincing impression of sincerity. He had been engaged five years
     before, when Douglas first came to Birlstone. He understood that Mr.
     Douglas was a rich gentleman who had made his money in America. He
     had been a kind and considerate employer--not quite what Ames was
     used to, perhaps; but one can't have everything. He never saw any
     signs of apprehension in Mr. Douglas: on the contrary, he was the
     most fearless man he had ever known. He ordered the drawbridge to be
     pulled up every night because it was the ancient custom of the old
     house, and he liked to keep the old ways up.

     Mr. Douglas seldom went to London or left the village; but on the day
     before the crime he had been shopping at Tunbridge Wells. He (Ames)
     had observed some restlessness and excitement on the part of Mr.
     Douglas that day; for he had seemed impatient and irritable, which
     was unusual with him. He had not gone to bed that night; but was in
     the pantry at the back of the house, putting away the silver, when he
     heard the bell ring violently. He heard no shot; but it was hardly
     possible he would, as the pantry and kitchens were at the very back
     of the house and there were several closed doors and a long passage
     between. The housekeeper had come out of her room, attracted by the
     violent ringing of the bell. They had gone to the front of the house
     together.

     As they reached the bottom of the stair he had seen Mrs. Douglas
     coming down it. No, she was not hurrying; it did not seem to him that
     she was particularly agitated. Just as she reached the bottom of the
     stair Mr. Barker had rushed out of the study. He had stopped Mrs.
     Douglas and begged her to go back.

     "For God's sake, go back to your room!" he cried. "Poor Jack is dead!
     You can do nothing. For God's sake, go back!"

     After some persuasion upon the stairs Mrs. Douglas had gone back. She
     did not scream. She made no outcry whatever. Mrs. Allen, the
     housekeeper, had taken her upstairs and stayed with her in the
     bedroom. Ames and Mr. Barker had then returned to the study, where
     they had found everything exactly as the police had seen it. The
     candle was not lit at that time; but the lamp was burning. They had
     looked out of the window; but the night was very dark and nothing
     could be seen or heard. They had then rushed out into the hall, where
     Ames had turned the windlass which lowered the drawbridge. Mr. Barker
     had then hurried off to get the police.

     Such, in its essentials, was the evidence of the butler.

     The account of Mrs. Allen, the housekeeper, was, so far as it went, a
     corroboration of that of her fellow servant. The housekeeper's room
     was rather nearer to the front of the house than the pantry in which
     Ames had been working. She was preparing to go to bed when the loud
     ringing of the bell had attracted her attention. She was a little
     hard of hearing. Perhaps that was why she had not heard the shot; but
     in any case the study was a long way off. She remembered hearing some
     sound which she imagined to be the slamming of a door. That was a
     good deal earlier--half an hour at least before the ringing of the
     bell. When Mr. Ames ran to the front she went with him. She saw Mr.
     Barker, very pale and excited, come out of the study. He intercepted
     Mrs. Douglas, who was coming down the stairs. He entreated her to go
     back, and she answered him, but what she said could not be heard.

     "Take her up! Stay with her!" he had said to Mrs. Allen.

     She had therefore taken her to the bedroom, and endeavoured to soothe
     her. She was greatly excited, trembling all over, but made no other
     attempt to go downstairs. She just sat in her dressing gown by her
     bedroom fire, with her head sunk in her hands. Mrs. Allen stayed with
     her most of the night. As to the other servants, they had all gone to
     bed, and the alarm did not reach them until just before the police
     arrived. They slept at the extreme back of the house, and could not
     possibly have heard anything.

     So far the housekeeper could add nothing on cross-examination save
     lamentations and expressions of amazement.

     Cecil Barker succeeded Mrs. Allen as a witness. As to the occurrences
     of the night before, he had very little to add to what he had already
     told the police. Personally, he was convinced that the murderer had
     escaped by the window. The bloodstain was conclusive, in his opinion,
     on that point. Besides, as the bridge was up, there was no other
     possible way of escaping. He could not explain what had become of the
     assassin or why he had not taken his bicycle, if it were indeed his.
     He could not possibly have been drowned in the moat, which was at no
     place more than three feet deep.

     In his own mind he had a very definite theory about the murder.
     Douglas was a reticent man, and there were some chapters in his life
     of which he never spoke. He had emigrated to America when he was a
     very young man. He had prospered well, and Barker had first met him
     in California, where they had become partners in a successful mining
     claim at a place called Benito Canyon. They had done very well; but
     Douglas had suddenly sold out and started for England. He was a
     widower at that time. Barker had afterwards realized his money and
     come to live in London. Thus they had renewed their friendship.

     Douglas had given him the impression that some danger was hanging
     over his head, and he had always looked upon his sudden departure
     from California, and also his renting a house in so quiet a place in
     England, as being connected with this peril. He imagined that some
     secret society, some implacable organization, was on Douglas's track,
     which would never rest until it killed him. Some remarks of his had
     given him this idea; though he had never told him what the society
     was, nor how he had come to offend it. He could only suppose that the
     legend upon the placard had some reference to this secret society.

     "How long were you with Douglas in California?" asked Inspector
     MacDonald.

     "Five years altogether."

     "He was a bachelor, you say?"

     "A widower."

     "Have you ever heard where his first wife came from?"

     "No, I remember his saying that she was of German extraction, and I
     have seen her portrait. She was a very beautiful woman. She died of
     typhoid the year before I met him."

     "You don't associate his past with any particular part of America?"

     "I have heard him talk of Chicago. He knew that city well and had
     worked there. I have heard him talk of the coal and iron districts.
     He had travelled a good deal in his time."

     "Was he a politician? Had this secret society to do with politics?"

     "No, he cared nothing about politics."

     "You have no reason to think it was criminal?"

     "On the contrary, I never met a straighter man in my life."

     "Was there anything curious about his life in California?"

     "He liked best to stay and to work at our claim in the mountains. He
     would never go where other men were if he could help it. That's why I
     first thought that someone was after him. Then when he left so
     suddenly for Europe I made sure that it was so. I believe that he had
     a warning of some sort. Within a week of his leaving half a dozen men
     were inquiring for him."

     "What sort of men?"

     "Well, they were a mighty hard-looking crowd. They came up to the
     claim and wanted to know where he was. I told them that he was gone
     to Europe and that I did not know where to find him. They meant him
     no good--it was easy to see that."

     "Were these men Americans--Californians?"

     "Well, I don't know about Californians. They were Americans, all
     right. But they were not miners. I don't know what they were, and was
     very glad to see their backs."

     "That was six years ago?"

     "Nearer seven."

     "And then you were together five years in California, so that this
     business dates back not less than eleven years at the least?"

     "That is so."

     "It must be a very serious feud that would be kept up with such
     earnestness for as long as that. It would be no light thing that
     would give rise to it."

     "I think it shadowed his whole life. It was never quite out of his
     mind."

     "But if a man had a danger hanging over him, and knew what it was,
     don't you think he would turn to the police for protection?"

     "Maybe it was some danger that he could not be protected against.
     There's one thing you should know. He always went about armed. His
     revolver was never out of his pocket. But, by bad luck, he was in his
     dressing gown and had left it in the bedroom last night. Once the
     bridge was up, I guess he thought he was safe."

     "I should like these dates a little clearer," said MacDonald. "It is
     quite six years since Douglas left California. You followed him next
     year, did you not?"

     "That is so."

     "And he had been married five years. You must have returned about the
     time of his marriage."

     "About a month before. I was his best man."

     "Did you know Mrs. Douglas before her marriage?"

     "No, I did not. I had been away from England for ten years."

     "But you have seen a good deal of her since."

     Barker looked sternly at the detective. "I have seen a good deal of
     him since," he answered. "If I have seen her, it is because you
     cannot visit a man without knowing his wife. If you imagine there is
     any connection--"

     "I imagine nothing, Mr. Barker. I am bound to make every inquiry
     which can bear upon the case. But I mean no offense."

     "Some inquiries are offensive," Barker answered angrily.

     "It's only the facts that we want. It is in your interest and
     everyone's interest that they should be cleared up. Did Mr. Douglas
     entirely approve your friendship with his wife?"

     Barker grew paler, and his great, strong hands were clasped
     convulsively together. "You have no right to ask such questions!" he
     cried. "What has this to do with the matter you are investigating?"

     "I must repeat the question."

     "Well, I refuse to answer."

     "You can refuse to answer; but you must be aware that your refusal is
     in itself an answer, for you would not refuse if you had not
     something to conceal."

     Barker stood for a moment with his face set grimly and his strong
     black eyebrows drawn low in intense thought. Then he looked up with a
     smile. "Well, I guess you gentlemen are only doing your clear duty
     after all, and I have no right to stand in the way of it. I'd only
     ask you not to worry Mrs. Douglas over this matter; for she has
     enough upon her just now. I may tell you that poor Douglas had just
     one fault in the world, and that was his jealousy. He was fond of
     me--no man could be fonder of a friend. And he was devoted to his
     wife. He loved me to come here, and was forever sending for me. And
     yet if his wife and I talked together or there seemed any sympathy
     between us, a kind of wave of jealousy would pass over him, and he
     would be off the handle and saying the wildest things in a moment.
     More than once I've sworn off coming for that reason, and then he
     would write me such penitent, imploring letters that I just had to.
     But you can take it from me, gentlemen, if it was my last word, that
     no man ever had a more loving, faithful wife--and I can say also no
     friend could be more loyal than I!"

     It was spoken with fervour and feeling, and yet Inspector MacDonald
     could not dismiss the subject.

     "You are aware," said he, "that the dead man's wedding ring has been
     taken from his finger?"

     "So it appears," said Barker.

     "What do you mean by 'appears'? You know it as a fact."

     The man seemed confused and undecided. "When I said 'appears' I meant
     that it was conceivable that he had himself taken off the ring."

     "The mere fact that the ring should be absent, whoever may have
     removed it, would suggest to anyone's mind, would it not, that the
     marriage and the tragedy were connected?"

     Barker shrugged his broad shoulders. "I can't profess to say what it
     means." he answered. "But if you mean to hint that it could reflect
     in any way upon this lady's honour"--his eyes blazed for an instant,
     and then with an evident effort he got a grip upon his own
     emotions--"well, you are on the wrong track, that's all."

     "I don't know that I've anything else to ask you at present," said
     MacDonald, coldly.

     "There was one small point," remarked Sherlock Holmes. "When you
     entered the room there was only a candle lighted on the table, was
     there not?"

     "Yes, that was so."

     "By its light you saw that some terrible incident had occurred?"

     "Exactly."

     "You at once rang for help?"

     "Yes."

     "And it arrived very speedily?"

     "Within a minute or so."

     "And yet when they arrived they found that the candle was out and
     that the lamp had been lighted. That seems very remarkable."

     Again Barker showed some signs of indecision. "I don't see that it
     was remarkable, Mr. Holmes," he answered after a pause. "The candle
     threw a very bad light. My first thought was to get a better one. The
     lamp was on the table; so I lit it."

     "And blew out the candle?"

     "Exactly."

     Holmes asked no further question, and Barker, with a deliberate look
     from one to the other of us, which had, as it seemed to me, something
     of defiance in it, turned and left the room.

     Inspector MacDonald had sent up a note to the effect that he would
     wait upon Mrs. Douglas in her room; but she had replied that she
     would meet us in the dining room. She entered now, a tall and
     beautiful woman of thirty, reserved and self-possessed to a
     remarkable degree, very different from the tragic and distracted
     figure I had pictured. It is true that her face was pale and drawn,
     like that of one who has endured a great shock; but her manner was
     composed, and the finely moulded hand which she rested upon the edge
     of the table was as steady as my own. Her sad, appealing eyes
     travelled from one to the other of us with a curiously inquisitive
     expression. That questioning gaze transformed itself suddenly into
     abrupt speech.

     "Have you found anything out yet?" she asked.

     Was it my imagination that there was an undertone of fear rather than
     of hope in the question?

     "We have taken every possible step, Mrs. Douglas," said the
     inspector. "You may rest assured that nothing will be neglected."

     "Spare no money," she said in a dead, even tone. "It is my desire
     that every possible effort should be made."

     "Perhaps you can tell us something which may throw some light upon
     the matter."

     "I fear not; but all I know is at your service."

     "We have heard from Mr. Cecil Barker that you did not actually
     see--that you were never in the room where the tragedy occurred?"

     "No, he turned me back upon the stairs. He begged me to return to my
     room."

     "Quite so. You had heard the shot, and you had at once come down."

     "I put on my dressing gown and then came down."

     "How long was it after hearing the shot that you were stopped on the
     stair by Mr. Barker?"

     "It may have been a couple of minutes. It is so hard to reckon time
     at such a moment. He implored me not to go on. He assured me that I
     could do nothing. Then Mrs. Allen, the housekeeper, led me upstairs
     again. It was all like some dreadful dream."

     "Can you give us any idea how long your husband had been downstairs
     before you heard the shot?"

     "No, I cannot say. He went from his dressing room, and I did not hear
     him go. He did the round of the house every night, for he was nervous
     of fire. It is the only thing that I have ever known him nervous of."

     "That is just the point which I want to come to, Mrs. Douglas. You
     have known your husband only in England, have you not?"

     "Yes, we have been married five years."

     "Have you heard him speak of anything which occurred in America and
     might bring some danger upon him?"

     Mrs. Douglas thought earnestly before she answered. "Yes." she said
     at last, "I have always felt that there was a danger hanging over
     him. He refused to discuss it with me. It was not from want of
     confidence in me--there was the most complete love and confidence
     between us--but it was out of his desire to keep all alarm away from
     me. He thought I should brood over it if I knew all, and so he was
     silent."

     "How did you know it, then?"

     Mrs. Douglas's face lit with a quick smile. "Can a husband ever carry
     about a secret all his life and a woman who loves him have no
     suspicion of it? I knew it by his refusal to talk about some episodes
     in his American life. I knew it by certain precautions he took. I
     knew it by certain words he let fall. I knew it by the way he looked
     at unexpected strangers. I was perfectly certain that he had some
     powerful enemies, that he believed they were on his track, and that
     he was always on his guard against them. I was so sure of it that for
     years I have been terrified if ever he came home later than was
     expected."

     "Might I ask," asked Holmes, "what the words were which attracted
     your attention?"

     "The Valley of Fear," the lady answered. "That was an expression he
     has used when I questioned him. 'I have been in the Valley of Fear. I
     am not out of it yet.'--'Are we never to get out of the Valley of
     Fear?' I have asked him when I have seen him more serious than usual.
     'Sometimes I think that we never shall,' he has answered."

     "Surely you asked him what he meant by the Valley of Fear?"

     "I did; but his face would become very grave and he would shake his
     head. 'It is bad enough that one of us should have been in its
     shadow,' he said. 'Please God it shall never fall upon you!' It was
     some real valley in which he had lived and in which something
     terrible had occurred to him, of that I am certain; but I can tell
     you no more."

     "And he never mentioned any names?"

     "Yes, he was delirious with fever once when he had his hunting
     accident three years ago. Then I remember that there was a name that
     came continually to his lips. He spoke it with anger and a sort of
     horror. McGinty was the name--Bodymaster McGinty. I asked him when he
     recovered who Bodymaster McGinty was, and whose body he was master
     of. 'Never of mine, thank God!' he answered with a laugh, and that
     was all I could get from him. But there is a connection between
     Bodymaster McGinty and the Valley of Fear."

     "There is one other point," said Inspector MacDonald. "You met Mr.
     Douglas in a boarding house in London, did you not, and became
     engaged to him there? Was there any romance, anything secret or
     mysterious, about the wedding?"

     "There was romance. There is always romance. There was nothing
     mysterious."

     "He had no rival?"

     "No, I was quite free."

     "You have heard, no doubt, that his wedding ring has been taken. Does
     that suggest anything to you? Suppose that some enemy of his old life
     had tracked him down and committed this crime, what possible reason
     could he have for taking his wedding ring?"

     For an instant I could have sworn that the faintest shadow of a smile
     flickered over the woman's lips.

     "I really cannot tell," she answered. "It is certainly a most
     extraordinary thing."

     "Well, we will not detain you any longer, and we are sorry to have
     put you to this trouble at such a time," said the inspector. "There
     are some other points, no doubt; but we can refer to you as they
     arise."

     She rose, and I was again conscious of that quick, questioning glance
     with which she had just surveyed us. "What impression has my evidence
     made upon you?" The question might as well have been spoken. Then,
     with a bow, she swept from the room.

     "She's a beautiful woman--a very beautiful woman," said MacDonald
     thoughtfully, after the door had closed behind her. "This man Barker
     has certainly been down here a good deal. He is a man who might be
     attractive to a woman. He admits that the dead man was jealous, and
     maybe he knew best himself what cause he had for jealousy. Then
     there's that wedding ring. You can't get past that. The man who tears
     a wedding ring off a dead man's--What do you say to it, Mr. Holmes?"

     My friend had sat with his head upon his hands, sunk in the deepest
     thought. Now he rose and rang the bell. "Ames," he said, when the
     butler entered, "where is Mr. Cecil Barker now?"

     "I'll see, sir."

     He came back in a moment to say that Barker was in the garden.

     "Can you remember, Ames, what Mr. Barker had on his feet last night
     when you joined him in the study?"

     "Yes, Mr. Holmes. He had a pair of bedroom slippers. I brought him
     his boots when he went for the police."

     "Where are the slippers now?"

     "They are still under the chair in the hall."

     "Very good, Ames. It is, of course, important for us to know which
     tracks may be Mr. Barker's and which from outside."

     "Yes, sir. I may say that I noticed that the slippers were stained
     with blood--so indeed were my own."

     "That is natural enough, considering the condition of the room. Very
     good, Ames. We will ring if we want you."

     A few minutes later we were in the study. Holmes had brought with him
     the carpet slippers from the hall. As Ames had observed, the soles of
     both were dark with blood.

     "Strange!" murmured Holmes, as he stood in the light of the window
     and examined them minutely. "Very strange indeed!"

     Stooping with one of his quick feline pounces, he placed the slipper
     upon the blood mark on the sill. It exactly corresponded. He smiled
     in silence at his colleagues.

     The inspector was transfigured with excitement. His native accent
     rattled like a stick upon railings.

     "Man," he cried, "there's not a doubt of it! Barker has just marked
     the window himself. It's a good deal broader than any bootmark. I
     mind that you said it was a splay-foot, and here's the explanation.
     But what's the game, Mr. Holmes--what's the game?"

     "Ay, what's the game?" my friend repeated thoughtfully.

     White Mason chuckled and rubbed his fat hands together in his
     professional satisfaction. "I said it was a snorter!" he cried. "And
     a real snorter it is!"





          CHAPTER VI
          A Dawning Light


     The three detectives had many matters of detail into which to
     inquire; so I returned alone to our modest quarters at the village
     inn. But before doing so I took a stroll in the curious old-world
     garden which flanked the house. Rows of very ancient yew trees cut
     into strange designs girded it round. Inside was a beautiful stretch
     of lawn with an old sundial in the middle, the whole effect so
     soothing and restful that it was welcome to my somewhat jangled
     nerves.

     In that deeply peaceful atmosphere one could forget, or remember only
     as some fantastic nightmare, that darkened study with the sprawling,
     bloodstained figure on the floor. And yet, as I strolled round it and
     tried to steep my soul in its gentle balm, a strange incident
     occurred, which brought me back to the tragedy and left a sinister
     impression in my mind.

     I have said that a decoration of yew trees circled the garden. At the
     end farthest from the house they thickened into a continuous hedge.
     On the other side of this hedge, concealed from the eyes of anyone
     approaching from the direction of the house, there was a stone seat.
     As I approached the spot I was aware of voices, some remark in the
     deep tones of a man, answered by a little ripple of feminine
     laughter.

     An instant later I had come round the end of the hedge and my eyes
     lit upon Mrs. Douglas and the man Barker before they were aware of my
     presence. Her appearance gave me a shock. In the dining-room she had
     been demure and discreet. Now all pretense of grief had passed away
     from her. Her eyes shone with the joy of living, and her face still
     quivered with amusement at some remark of her companion. He sat
     forward, his hands clasped and his forearms on his knees, with an
     answering smile upon his bold, handsome face. In an instant--but it
     was just one instant too late--they resumed their solemn masks as my
     figure came into view. A hurried word or two passed between them, and
     then Barker rose and came towards me.

     "Excuse me, sir," said he, "but am I addressing Dr. Watson?"

     I bowed with a coldness which showed, I dare say, very plainly the
     impression which had been produced upon my mind.

     "We thought that it was probably you, as your friendship with Mr.
     Sherlock Holmes is so well known. Would you mind coming over and
     speaking to Mrs. Douglas for one instant?"

     I followed him with a dour face. Very clearly I could see in my
     mind's eye that shattered figure on the floor. Here within a few
     hours of the tragedy were his wife and his nearest friend laughing
     together behind a bush in the garden which had been his. I greeted
     the lady with reserve. I had grieved with her grief in the
     dining-room. Now I met her appealing gaze with an unresponsive eye.

     "I fear that you think me callous and hard-hearted," said she.

     I shrugged my shoulders. "It is no business of mine," said I.

     "Perhaps some day you will do me justice. If you only realized--"

     "There is no need why Dr. Watson should realize," said Barker
     quickly. "As he has himself said, it is no possible business of his."

     "Exactly," said I, "and so I will beg leave to resume my walk."

     "One moment, Dr. Watson," cried the woman in a pleading voice. "There
     is one question which you can answer with more authority than anyone
     else in the world, and it may make a very great difference to me. You
     know Mr. Holmes and his relations with the police better than anyone
     else can. Supposing that a matter were brought confidentially to his
     knowledge, is it absolutely necessary that he should pass it on to
     the detectives?"

     "Yes, that's it," said Barker eagerly. "Is he on his own or is he
     entirely in with them?"

     "I really don't know that I should be justified in discussing such a
     point."

     "I beg--I implore that you will, Dr. Watson! I assure you that you
     will be helping us--helping me greatly if you will guide us on that
     point."

     There was such a ring of sincerity in the woman's voice that for the
     instant I forgot all about her levity and was moved only to do her
     will.

     "Mr. Holmes is an independent investigator," I said. "He is his own
     master, and would act as his own judgment directed. At the same time,
     he would naturally feel loyalty towards the officials who were
     working on the same case, and he would not conceal from them anything
     which would help them in bringing a criminal to justice. Beyond this
     I can say nothing, and I would refer you to Mr. Holmes himself if you
     wanted fuller information."

     So saying I raised my hat and went upon my way, leaving them still
     seated behind that concealing hedge. I looked back as I rounded the
     far end of it, and saw that they were still talking very earnestly
     together, and, as they were gazing after me, it was clear that it was
     our interview that was the subject of their debate.

     "I wish none of their confidences," said Holmes, when I reported to
     him what had occurred. He had spent the whole afternoon at the Manor
     House in consultation with his two colleagues, and returned about
     five with a ravenous appetite for a high tea which I had ordered for
     him. "No confidences, Watson; for they are mighty awkward if it comes
     to an arrest for conspiracy and murder."

     "You think it will come to that?"

     He was in his most cheerful and debonair humour. "My dear Watson,
     when I have exterminated that fourth egg I shall be ready to put you
     in touch with the whole situation. I don't say that we have fathomed
     it--far from it--but when we have traced the missing dumb-bell--"

     "The dumb-bell!"

     "Dear me, Watson, is it possible that you have not penetrated the
     fact that the case hangs upon the missing dumb-bell? Well, well, you
     need not be downcast; for between ourselves I don't think that either
     Inspector Mac or the excellent local practitioner has grasped the
     overwhelming importance of this incident. One dumb-bell, Watson!
     Consider an athlete with one dumb-bell! Picture to yourself the
     unilateral development, the imminent danger of a spinal curvature.
     Shocking, Watson, shocking!"

     He sat with his mouth full of toast and his eyes sparkling with
     mischief, watching my intellectual entanglement. The mere sight of
     his excellent appetite was an assurance of success, for I had very
     clear recollections of days and nights without a thought of food,
     when his baffled mind had chafed before some problem while his thin,
     eager features became more attenuated with the asceticism of complete
     mental concentration. Finally he lit his pipe, and sitting in the
     inglenook of the old village inn he talked slowly and at random about
     his case, rather as one who thinks aloud than as one who makes a
     considered statement.

     "A lie, Watson--a great, big, thumping, obtrusive, uncompromising
     lie--that's what meets us on the threshold! There is our starting
     point. The whole story told by Barker is a lie. But Barker's story is
     corroborated by Mrs. Douglas. Therefore she is lying also. They are
     both lying, and in a conspiracy. So now we have the clear problem.
     Why are they lying, and what is the truth which they are trying so
     hard to conceal? Let us try, Watson, you and I, if we can get behind
     the lie and reconstruct the truth.

     "How do I know that they are lying? Because it is a clumsy
     fabrication which simply could not be true. Consider! According to
     the story given to us, the assassin had less than a minute after the
     murder had been committed to take that ring, which was under another
     ring, from the dead man's finger, to replace the other ring--a thing
     which he would surely never have done--and to put that singular card
     beside his victim. I say that this was obviously impossible.

     "You may argue--but I have too much respect for your judgment,
     Watson, to think that you will do so--that the ring may have been
     taken before the man was killed. The fact that the candle had been
     lit only a short time shows that there had been no lengthy interview.
     Was Douglas, from what we hear of his fearless character, a man who
     would be likely to give up his wedding ring at such short notice, or
     could we conceive of his giving it up at all? No, no, Watson, the
     assassin was alone with the dead man for some time with the lamp lit.
     Of that I have no doubt at all.

     "But the gunshot was apparently the cause of death. Therefore the
     shot must have been fired some time earlier than we are told. But
     there could be no mistake about such a matter as that. We are in the
     presence, therefore, of a deliberate conspiracy upon the part of the
     two people who heard the gunshot--of the man Barker and of the woman
     Douglas. When on the top of this I am able to show that the blood
     mark on the windowsill was deliberately placed there by Barker, in
     order to give a false clue to the police, you will admit that the
     case grows dark against him.

     "Now we have to ask ourselves at what hour the murder actually did
     occur. Up to half-past ten the servants were moving about the house;
     so it was certainly not before that time. At a quarter to eleven they
     had all gone to their rooms with the exception of Ames, who was in
     the pantry. I have been trying some experiments after you left us
     this afternoon, and I find that no noise which MacDonald can make in
     the study can penetrate to me in the pantry when the doors are all
     shut.

     "It is otherwise, however, from the housekeeper's room. It is not so
     far down the corridor, and from it I could vaguely hear a voice when
     it was very loudly raised. The sound from a shotgun is to some extent
     muffled when the discharge is at very close range, as it undoubtedly
     was in this instance. It would not be very loud, and yet in the
     silence of the night it should have easily penetrated to Mrs. Allen's
     room. She is, as she has told us, somewhat deaf; but none the less
     she mentioned in her evidence that she did hear something like a door
     slamming half an hour before the alarm was given. Half an hour before
     the alarm was given would be a quarter to eleven. I have no doubt
     that what she heard was the report of the gun, and that this was the
     real instant of the murder.

     "If this is so, we have now to determine what Barker and Mrs.
     Douglas, presuming that they are not the actual murderers, could have
     been doing from quarter to eleven, when the sound of the shot brought
     them down, until quarter past eleven, when they rang the bell and
     summoned the servants. What were they doing, and why did they not
     instantly give the alarm? That is the question which faces us, and
     when it has been answered we shall surely have gone some way to solve
     our problem."

     "I am convinced myself," said I, "that there is an understanding
     between those two people. She must be a heartless creature to sit
     laughing at some jest within a few hours of her husband's murder."

     "Exactly. She does not shine as a wife even in her own account of
     what occurred. I am not a whole-souled admirer of womankind, as you
     are aware, Watson, but my experience of life has taught me that there
     are few wives, having any regard for their husbands, who would let
     any man's spoken word stand between them and that husband's dead
     body. Should I ever marry, Watson, I should hope to inspire my wife
     with some feeling which would prevent her from being walked off by a
     housekeeper when my corpse was lying within a few yards of her. It
     was badly stage-managed; for even the rawest investigators must be
     struck by the absence of the usual feminine ululation. If there had
     been nothing else, this incident alone would have suggested a
     prearranged conspiracy to my mind."

     "You think then, definitely, that Barker and Mrs. Douglas are guilty
     of the murder?"

     "There is an appalling directness about your questions, Watson," said
     Holmes, shaking his pipe at me. "They come at me like bullets. If you
     put it that Mrs. Douglas and Barker know the truth about the murder,
     and are conspiring to conceal it, then I can give you a whole-souled
     answer. I am sure they do. But your more deadly proposition is not so
     clear. Let us for a moment consider the difficulties which stand in
     the way.

     "We will suppose that this couple are united by the bonds of a guilty
     love, and that they have determined to get rid of the man who stands
     between them. It is a large supposition; for discreet inquiry among
     servants and others has failed to corroborate it in any way. On the
     contrary, there is a good deal of evidence that the Douglases were
     very attached to each other."

     "That, I am sure, cannot he true." said I, thinking of the beautiful
     smiling face in the garden.

     "Well at least they gave that impression. However, we will suppose
     that they are an extraordinarily astute couple, who deceive everyone
     upon this point, and conspire to murder the husband. He happens to be
     a man over whose head some danger hangs--"

     "We have only their word for that."

     Holmes looked thoughtful. "I see, Watson. You are sketching out a
     theory by which everything they say from the beginning is false.
     According to your idea, there was never any hidden menace, or secret
     society, or Valley of Fear, or Boss MacSomebody, or anything else.
     Well, that is a good sweeping generalization. Let us see what that
     brings us to. They invent this theory to account for the crime. They
     then play up to the idea by leaving this bicycle in the park as proof
     of the existence of some outsider. The stain on the windowsill
     conveys the same idea. So does the card on the body, which might have
     been prepared in the house. That all fits into your hypothesis,
     Watson. But now we come on the nasty, angular, uncompromising bits
     which won't slip into their places. Why a cut-off shotgun of all
     weapons--and an American one at that? How could they be so sure that
     the sound of it would not bring someone on to them? It's a mere
     chance as it is that Mrs. Allen did not start out to inquire for the
     slamming door. Why did your guilty couple do all this, Watson?"

     "I confess that I can't explain it."

     "Then again, if a woman and her lover conspire to murder a husband,
     are they going to advertise their guilt by ostentatiously removing
     his wedding ring after his death? Does that strike you as very
     probable, Watson?"

     "No, it does not."

     "And once again, if the thought of leaving a bicycle concealed
     outside had occurred to you, would it really have seemed worth doing
     when the dullest detective would naturally say this is an obvious
     blind, as the bicycle is the first thing which the fugitive needed in
     order to make his escape."

     "I can conceive of no explanation."

     "And yet there should be no combination of events for which the wit
     of man cannot conceive an explanation. Simply as a mental exercise,
     without any assertion that it is true, let me indicate a possible
     line of thought. It is, I admit, mere imagination; but how often is
     imagination the mother of truth?

     "We will suppose that there was a guilty secret, a really shameful
     secret in the life of this man Douglas. This leads to his murder by
     someone who is, we will suppose, an avenger, someone from outside.
     This avenger, for some reason which I confess I am still at a loss to
     explain, took the dead man's wedding ring. The vendetta might
     conceivably date back to the man's first marriage, and the ring be
     taken for some such reason.

     "Before this avenger got away, Barker and the wife had reached the
     room. The assassin convinced them that any attempt to arrest him
     would lead to the publication of some hideous scandal. They were
     converted to this idea, and preferred to let him go. For this purpose
     they probably lowered the bridge, which can be done quite
     noiselessly, and then raised it again. He made his escape, and for
     some reason thought that he could do so more safely on foot than on
     the bicycle. He therefore left his machine where it would not be
     discovered until he had got safely away. So far we are within the
     bounds of possibility, are we not?"

     "Well, it is possible, no doubt," said I, with some reserve.

     "We have to remember, Watson, that whatever occurred is certainly
     something very extraordinary. Well, now, to continue our
     supposititious case, the couple--not necessarily a guilty
     couple--realize after the murderer is gone that they have placed
     themselves in a position in which it may be difficult for them to
     prove that they did not themselves either do the deed or connive at
     it. They rapidly and rather clumsily met the situation. The mark was
     put by Barker's bloodstained slipper upon the window-sill to suggest
     how the fugitive got away. They obviously were the two who must have
     heard the sound of the gun; so they gave the alarm exactly as they
     would have done, but a good half hour after the event."

     "And how do you propose to prove all this?"

     "Well, if there were an outsider, he may be traced and taken. That
     would be the most effective of all proofs. But if not--well, the
     resources of science are far from being exhausted. I think that an
     evening alone in that study would help me much."

     "An evening alone!"

     "I propose to go up there presently. I have arranged it with the
     estimable Ames, who is by no means whole-hearted about Barker. I
     shall sit in that room and see if its atmosphere brings me
     inspiration. I'm a believer in the genius loci. You smile, Friend
     Watson. Well, we shall see. By the way, you have that big umbrella of
     yours, have you not?"

     "It is here."

     "Well, I'll borrow that if I may."

     "Certainly--but what a wretched weapon! If there is danger--"

     "Nothing serious, my dear Watson, or I should certainly ask for your
     assistance. But I'll take the umbrella. At present I am only awaiting
     the return of our colleagues from Tunbridge Wells, where they are at
     present engaged in trying for a likely owner to the bicycle."

     It was nightfall before Inspector MacDonald and White Mason came back
     from their expedition, and they arrived exultant, reporting a great
     advance in our investigation.

     "Man, I'll admeet that I had my doubts if there was ever an
     outsider," said MacDonald, "but that's all past now. We've had the
     bicycle identified, and we have a description of our man; so that's a
     long step on our journey."

     "It sounds to me like the beginning of the end," said Holmes. "I'm
     sure I congratulate you both with all my heart."

     "Well, I started from the fact that Mr. Douglas had seemed disturbed
     since the day before, when he had been at Tunbridge Wells. It was at
     Tunbridge Wells then that he had become conscious of some danger. It
     was clear, therefore, that if a man had come over with a bicycle it
     was from Tunbridge Wells that he might be expected to have come. We
     took the bicycle over with us and showed it at the hotels. It was
     identified at once by the manager of the Eagle Commercial as
     belonging to a man named Hargrave, who had taken a room there two
     days before. This bicycle and a small valise were his whole
     belongings. He had registered his name as coming from London, but had
     given no address. The valise was London made, and the contents were
     British; but the man himself was undoubtedly an American."

     "Well, well," said Holmes gleefully, "you have indeed done some solid
     work while I have been sitting spinning theories with my friend! It's
     a lesson in being practical, Mr. Mac."

     "Ay, it's just that, Mr. Holmes," said the inspector with
     satisfaction.

     "But this may all fit in with your theories," I remarked.

     "That may or may not be. But let us hear the end, Mr. Mac. Was there
     nothing to identify this man?"

     "So little that it was evident that he had carefully guarded himself
     against identification. There were no papers or letters, and no
     marking upon the clothes. A cycle map of the county lay on his
     bedroom table. He had left the hotel after breakfast yesterday
     morning on his bicycle, and no more was heard of him until our
     inquiries."

     "That's what puzzles me, Mr. Holmes," said White Mason. "If the
     fellow did not want the hue and cry raised over him, one would
     imagine that he would have returned and remained at the hotel as an
     inoffensive tourist. As it is, he must know that he will be reported
     to the police by the hotel manager and that his disappearance will be
     connected with the murder."

     "So one would imagine. Still, he has been justified of his wisdom up
     to date, at any rate, since he has not been taken. But his
     description--what of that?"

     MacDonald referred to his notebook. "Here we have it so far as they
     could give it. They don't seem to have taken any very particular
     stock of him; but still the porter, the clerk, and the chambermaid
     are all agreed that this about covers the points. He was a man about
     five foot nine in height, fifty or so years of age, his hair slightly
     grizzled, a grayish moustache, a curved nose, and a face which all of
     them described as fierce and forbidding."

     "Well, bar the expression, that might almost be a description of
     Douglas himself," said Holmes. "He is just over fifty, with grizzled
     hair and moustache, and about the same height. Did you get anything
     else?"

     "He was dressed in a heavy gray suit with a reefer jacket, and he
     wore a short yellow overcoat and a soft cap."

     "What about the shotgun?"

     "It is less than two feet long. It could very well have fitted into
     his valise. He could have carried it inside his overcoat without
     difficulty."

     "And how do you consider that all this bears upon the general case?"

     "Well, Mr. Holmes," said MacDonald, "when we have got our man--and
     you may be sure that I had his description on the wires within five
     minutes of hearing it--we shall be better able to judge. But, even as
     it stands, we have surely gone a long way. We know that an American
     calling himself Hargrave came to Tunbridge Wells two days ago with
     bicycle and valise. In the latter was a sawed-off shotgun; so he came
     with the deliberate purpose of crime. Yesterday morning he set off
     for this place on his bicycle, with his gun concealed in his
     overcoat. No one saw him arrive, so far as we can learn; but he need
     not pass through the village to reach the park gates, and there are
     many cyclists upon the road. Presumably he at once concealed his
     cycle among the laurels where it was found, and possibly lurked there
     himself, with his eye on the house, waiting for Mr. Douglas to come
     out. The shotgun is a strange weapon to use inside a house; but he
     had intended to use it outside, and there it has very obvious
     advantages, as it would be impossible to miss with it, and the sound
     of shots is so common in an English sporting neighbourhood that no
     particular notice would be taken."

     "That is all very clear," said Holmes.

     "Well, Mr. Douglas did not appear. What was he to do next? He left
     his bicycle and approached the house in the twilight. He found the
     bridge down and no one about. He took his chance, intending, no
     doubt, to make some excuse if he met anyone. He met no one. He
     slipped into the first room that he saw, and concealed himself behind
     the curtain. Thence he could see the drawbridge go up, and he knew
     that his only escape was through the moat. He waited until
     quarter-past eleven, when Mr. Douglas upon his usual nightly round
     came into the room. He shot him and escaped, as arranged. He was
     aware that the bicycle would be described by the hotel people and be
     a clue against him; so he left it there and made his way by some
     other means to London or to some safe hiding place which he had
     already arranged. How is that, Mr. Holmes?"

     "Well, Mr. Mac, it is very good and very clear so far as it goes.
     That is your end of the story. My end is that the crime was committed
     half an hour earlier than reported; that Mrs. Douglas and Barker are
     both in a conspiracy to conceal something; that they aided the
     murderer's escape--or at least that they reached the room before he
     escaped--and that they fabricated evidence of his escape through the
     window, whereas in all probability they had themselves let him go by
     lowering the bridge. That's my reading of the first half."

     The two detectives shook their heads.

     "Well, Mr. Holmes, if this is true, we only tumble out of one mystery
     into another," said the London inspector.

     "And in some ways a worse one," added White Mason. "The lady has
     never been in America in all her life. What possible connection could
     she have with an American assassin which would cause her to shelter
     him?"

     "I freely admit the difficulties," said Holmes. "I propose to make a
     little investigation of my own to-night, and it is just possible that
     it may contribute something to the common cause."

     "Can we help you, Mr. Holmes?"

     "No, no! Darkness and Dr. Watson's umbrella--my wants are simple. And
     Ames, the faithful Ames, no doubt he will stretch a point for me. All
     my lines of thought lead me back invariably to the one basic
     question--why should an athletic man develop his frame upon so
     unnatural an instrument as a single dumb-bell?"

     It was late that night when Holmes returned from his solitary
     excursion. We slept in a double-bedded room, which was the best that
     the little country inn could do for us. I was already asleep when I
     was partly awakened by his entrance.

     "Well, Holmes," I murmured, "have you found anything out?"

     He stood beside me in silence, his candle in his hand. Then the tall,
     lean figure inclined towards me. "I say, Watson," he whispered,
     "would you be afraid to sleep in the same room with a lunatic, a man
     with softening of the brain, an idiot whose mind has lost its grip?"

     "Not in the least," I answered in astonishment.

     "Ah, that's lucky," he said, and not another word would he utter that
     night.





          CHAPTER VII
          The Solution


     Next morning, after breakfast, we found Inspector MacDonald and White
     Mason seated in close consultation in the small parlour of the local
     police sergeant. On the table in front of them were piled a number of
     letters and telegrams, which they were carefully sorting and
     docketing. Three had been placed on one side.

     "Still on the track of the elusive bicyclist?" Holmes asked
     cheerfully. "What is the latest news of the ruffian?"

     MacDonald pointed ruefully to his heap of correspondence.

     "He is at present reported from Leicester, Nottingham, Southampton,
     Derby, East Ham, Richmond, and fourteen other places. In three of
     them--East Ham, Leicester, and Liverpool--there is a clear case
     against him, and he has actually been arrested. The country seems to
     be full of the fugitives with yellow coats."

     "Dear me!" said Holmes sympathetically. "Now, Mr. Mac and you, Mr.
     White Mason, I wish to give you a very earnest piece of advice. When
     I went into this case with you I bargained, as you will no doubt
     remember, that I should not present you with half-proved theories,
     but that I should retain and work out my own ideas until I had
     satisfied myself that they were correct. For this reason I am not at
     the present moment telling you all that is in my mind. On the other
     hand, I said that I would play the game fairly by you, and I do not
     think it is a fair game to allow you for one unnecessary moment to
     waste your energies upon a profitless task. Therefore I am here to
     advise you this morning, and my advice to you is summed up in three
     words--abandon the case."

     MacDonald and White Mason stared in amazement at their celebrated
     colleague.

     "You consider it hopeless!" cried the inspector.

     "I consider your case to be hopeless. I do not consider that it is
     hopeless to arrive at the truth."

     "But this cyclist. He is not an invention. We have his description,
     his valise, his bicycle. The fellow must be somewhere. Why should we
     not get him?"

     "Yes, yes, no doubt he is somewhere, and no doubt we shall get him;
     but I would not have you waste your energies in East Ham or
     Liverpool. I am sure that we can find some shorter cut to a result."

     "You are holding something back. It's hardly fair of you, Mr.
     Holmes." The inspector was annoyed.

     "You know my methods of work, Mr. Mac. But I will hold it back for
     the shortest time possible. I only wish to verify my details in one
     way, which can very readily be done, and then I make my bow and
     return to London, leaving my results entirely at your service. I owe
     you too much to act otherwise; for in all my experience I cannot
     recall any more singular and interesting study."

     "This is clean beyond me, Mr. Holmes. We saw you when we returned
     from Tunbridge Wells last night, and you were in general agreement
     with our results. What has happened since then to give you a
     completely new idea of the case?"

     "Well, since you ask me, I spent, as I told you that I would, some
     hours last night at the Manor House."

     "Well, what happened?"

     "Ah, I can only give you a very general answer to that for the
     moment. By the way, I have been reading a short but clear and
     interesting account of the old building, purchasable at the modest
     sum of one penny from the local tobacconist."

     Here Holmes drew a small tract, embellished with a rude engraving of
     the ancient Manor House, from his waistcoat pocket.

     "It immensely adds to the zest of an investigation, my dear Mr. Mac,
     when one is in conscious sympathy with the historical atmosphere of
     one's surroundings. Don't look so impatient; for I assure you that
     even so bald an account as this raises some sort of picture of the
     past in one's mind. Permit me to give you a sample. 'Erected in the
     fifth year of the reign of James I, and standing upon the site of a
     much older building, the Manor House of Birlstone presents one of the
     finest surviving examples of the moated Jacobean residence--' "

     "You are making fools of us, Mr. Holmes!"

     "Tut, tut, Mr. Mac!--the first sign of temper I have detected in you.
     Well, I won't read it verbatim, since you feel so strongly upon the
     subject. But when I tell you that there is some account of the taking
     of the place by a parliamentary colonel in 1644, of the concealment
     of Charles for several days in the course of the Civil War, and
     finally of a visit there by the second George, you will admit that
     there are various associations of interest connected with this
     ancient house."

     "I don't doubt it, Mr. Holmes; but that is no business of ours."

     "Is it not? Is it not? Breadth of view, my dear Mr. Mac, is one of
     the essentials of our profession. The interplay of ideas and the
     oblique uses of knowledge are often of extraordinary interest. You
     will excuse these remarks from one who, though a mere connoisseur of
     crime, is still rather older and perhaps more experienced than
     yourself."

     "I'm the first to admit that," said the detective heartily. "You get
     to your point, I admit; but you have such a deuced round-the-corner
     way of doing it."

     "Well, well, I'll drop past history and get down to present-day
     facts. I called last night, as I have already said, at the Manor
     House. I did not see either Barker or Mrs. Douglas. I saw no
     necessity to disturb them; but I was pleased to hear that the lady
     was not visibly pining and that she had partaken of an excellent
     dinner. My visit was specially made to the good Mr. Ames, with whom I
     exchanged some amiabilities, which culminated in his allowing me,
     without reference to anyone else, to sit alone for a time in the
     study."

     "What! With that?" I ejaculated.

     "No, no, everything is now in order. You gave permission for that,
     Mr. Mac, as I am informed. The room was in its normal state, and in
     it I passed an instructive quarter of an hour."

     "What were you doing?"

     "Well, not to make a mystery of so simple a matter, I was looking for
     the missing dumb-bell. It has always bulked rather large in my
     estimate of the case. I ended by finding it."

     "Where?"

     "Ah, there we come to the edge of the unexplored. Let me go a little
     further, a very little further, and I will promise that you shall
     share everything that I know."

     "Well, we're bound to take you on your own terms," said the
     inspector; "but when it comes to telling us to abandon the case--why
     in the name of goodness should we abandon the case?"

     "For the simple reason, my dear Mr. Mac, that you have not got the
     first idea what it is that you are investigating."

     "We are investigating the murder of Mr. John Douglas of Birlstone
     Manor."

     "Yes, yes, so you are. But don't trouble to trace the mysterious
     gentleman upon the bicycle. I assure you that it won't help you."

     "Then what do you suggest that we do?"

     "I will tell you exactly what to do, if you will do it."

     "Well, I'm bound to say I've always found you had reason behind all
     your queer ways. I'll do what you advise."

     "And you, Mr. White Mason?"

     The country detective looked helplessly from one to the other. Holmes
     and his methods were new to him. "Well, if it is good enough for the
     inspector, it is good enough for me," he said at last.

     "Capital!" said Holmes. "Well, then, I should recommend a nice,
     cheery country walk for both of you. They tell me that the views from
     Birlstone Ridge over the Weald are very remarkable. No doubt lunch
     could be got at some suitable hostelry; though my ignorance of the
     country prevents me from recommending one. In the evening, tired but
     happy--"

     "Man, this is getting past a joke!" cried MacDonald, rising angrily
     from his chair.

     "Well, well, spend the day as you like," said Holmes, patting him
     cheerfully upon the shoulder. "Do what you like and go where you
     will, but meet me here before dusk without fail--without fail, Mr.
     Mac."

     "That sounds more like sanity."

     "All of it was excellent advice; but I don't insist, so long as you
     are here when I need you. But now, before we part, I want you to
     write a note to Mr. Barker."

     "Well?"

     "I'll dictate it, if you like. Ready?

     "Dear Sir:
     "It has struck me that it is our duty to drain the moat, in the hope
     that we may find some--"

     "It's impossible," said the inspector. "I've made inquiry."

     "Tut, tut! My dear sir, please do what I ask you."

     "Well, go on."

     "--in the hope that we may find something which may bear upon our
     investigation. I have made arrangements, and the workmen will be at
     work early to-morrow morning diverting the stream--"

     "Impossible!"

     "--diverting the stream; so I thought it best to explain matters
     beforehand.

     "Now sign that, and send it by hand about four o'clock. At that hour
     we shall meet again in this room. Until then we may each do what we
     like; for I can assure you that this inquiry has come to a definite
     pause."

     Evening was drawing in when we reassembled. Holmes was very serious
     in his manner, myself curious, and the detectives obviously critical
     and annoyed.

     "Well, gentlemen," said my friend gravely, "I am asking you now to
     put everything to the test with me, and you will judge for yourselves
     whether the observations I have made justify the conclusions to which
     I have come. It is a chill evening, and I do not know how long our
     expedition may last; so I beg that you will wear your warmest coats.
     It is of the first importance that we should be in our places before
     it grows dark; so with your permission we shall get started at once."

     We passed along the outer bounds of the Manor House park until we
     came to a place where there was a gap in the rails which fenced it.
     Through this we slipped, and then in the gathering gloom we followed
     Holmes until we had reached a shrubbery which lies nearly opposite to
     the main door and the drawbridge. The latter had not been raised.
     Holmes crouched down behind the screen of laurels, and we all three
     followed his example.

     "Well, what are we to do now?" asked MacDonald with some gruffness.

     "Possess our souls in patience and make as little noise as possible,"
     Holmes answered.

     "What are we here for at all? I really think that you might treat us
     with more frankness."

     Holmes laughed. "Watson insists that I am the dramatist in real
     life," said he. "Some touch of the artist wells up within me, and
     calls insistently for a well-staged performance. Surely our
     profession, Mr. Mac, would be a drab and sordid one if we did not
     sometimes set the scene so as to glorify our results. The blunt
     accusation, the brutal tap upon the shoulder--what can one make of
     such a dénouement? But the quick inference, the subtle trap, the
     clever forecast of coming events, the triumphant vindication of bold
     theories--are these not the pride and the justification of our life's
     work? At the present moment you thrill with the glamour of the
     situation and the anticipation of the hunt. Where would be that
     thrill if I had been as definite as a timetable? I only ask a little
     patience, Mr. Mac, and all will be clear to you."

     "Well, I hope the pride and justification and the rest of it will
     come before we all get our death of cold," said the London detective
     with comic resignation.

     We all had good reason to join in the aspiration; for our vigil was a
     long and bitter one. Slowly the shadows darkened over the long,
     sombre face of the old house. A cold, damp reek from the moat chilled
     us to the bones and set our teeth chattering. There was a single lamp
     over the gateway and a steady globe of light in the fatal study.
     Everything else was dark and still.

     "How long is this to last?" asked the inspector finally. "And what is
     it we are watching for?"

     "I have no more notion than you how long it is to last," Holmes
     answered with some asperity. "If criminals would always schedule
     their movements like railway trains, it would certainly be more
     convenient for all of us. As to what it is we--Well, that's what we
     are watching for!"

     As he spoke the bright, yellow light in the study was obscured by
     somebody passing to and fro before it. The laurels among which we lay
     were immediately opposite the window and not more than a hundred feet
     from it. Presently it was thrown open with a whining of hinges, and
     we could dimly see the dark outline of a man's head and shoulders
     looking out into the gloom. For some minutes he peered forth in
     furtive, stealthy fashion, as one who wishes to be assured that he is
     unobserved. Then he leaned forward, and in the intense silence we
     were aware of the soft lapping of agitated water. He seemed to be
     stirring up the moat with something which he held in his hand. Then
     suddenly he hauled something in as a fisherman lands a fish--some
     large, round object which obscured the light as it was dragged
     through the open casement.

     "Now!" cried Holmes. "Now!"

     We were all upon our feet, staggering after him with our stiffened
     limbs, while he ran swiftly across the bridge and rang violently at
     the bell. There was the rasping of bolts from the other side, and the
     amazed Ames stood in the entrance. Holmes brushed him aside without a
     word and, followed by all of us, rushed into the room which had been
     occupied by the man whom we had been watching.

     The oil lamp on the table represented the glow which we had seen from
     outside. It was now in the hand of Cecil Barker, who held it towards
     us as we entered. Its light shone upon his strong, resolute,
     clean-shaved face and his menacing eyes.

     "What the devil is the meaning of all this?" he cried. "What are you
     after, anyhow?"

     Holmes took a swift glance round, and then pounced upon a sodden
     bundle tied together with cord which lay where it had been thrust
     under the writing table.

     "This is what we are after, Mr. Barker--this bundle, weighted with a
     dumb-bell, which you have just raised from the bottom of the moat."

     Barker stared at Holmes with amazement in his face. "How in thunder
     came you to know anything about it?" he asked.

     "Simply that I put it there."

     "You put it there! You!"

     "Perhaps I should have said 'replaced it there,'" said Holmes. "You
     will remember, Inspector MacDonald, that I was somewhat struck by the
     absence of a dumb-bell. I drew your attention to it; but with the
     pressure of other events you had hardly the time to give it the
     consideration which would have enabled you to draw deductions from
     it. When water is near and a weight is missing it is not a very
     far-fetched supposition that something has been sunk in the water.
     The idea was at least worth testing; so with the help of Ames, who
     admitted me to the room, and the crook of Dr. Watson's umbrella, I
     was able last night to fish up and inspect this bundle.

     "It was of the first importance, however, that we should be able to
     prove who placed it there. This we accomplished by the very obvious
     device of announcing that the moat would be dried to-morrow, which
     had, of course, the effect that whoever had hidden the bundle would
     most certainly withdraw it the moment that darkness enabled him to do
     so. We have no less than four witnesses as to who it was who took
     advantage of the opportunity, and so, Mr. Barker, I think the word
     lies now with you."

     Sherlock Holmes put the sopping bundle upon the table beside the lamp
     and undid the cord which bound it. From within he extracted a
     dumb-bell, which he tossed down to its fellow in the corner. Next he
     drew forth a pair of boots. "American, as you perceive," he remarked,
     pointing to the toes. Then he laid upon the table a long, deadly,
     sheathed knife. Finally he unravelled a bundle of clothing,
     comprising a complete set of underclothes, socks, a gray tweed suit,
     and a short yellow overcoat.

     "The clothes are commonplace," remarked Holmes, "save only the
     overcoat, which is full of suggestive touches." He held it tenderly
     towards the light. "Here, as you perceive, is the inner pocket
     prolonged into the lining in such fashion as to give ample space for
     the truncated fowling piece. The tailor's tab is on the neck--'Neal,
     Outfitter, Vermissa, U. S. A.' I have spent an instructive afternoon
     in the rector's library, and have enlarged my knowledge by adding the
     fact that Vermissa is a flourishing little town at the head of one of
     the best known coal and iron valleys in the United States. I have
     some recollection, Mr. Barker, that you associated the coal districts
     with Mr. Douglas's first wife, and it would surely not be too
     far-fetched an inference that the V. V. upon the card by the dead
     body might stand for Vermissa Valley, or that this very valley which
     sends forth emissaries of murder may be that Valley of Fear of which
     we have heard. So much is fairly clear. And now, Mr. Barker, I seem
     to be standing rather in the way of your explanation."

     It was a sight to see Cecil Barker's expressive face during this
     exposition of the great detective. Anger, amazement, consternation,
     and indecision swept over it in turn. Finally he took refuge in a
     somewhat acrid irony.

     "You know such a lot, Mr. Holmes, perhaps you had better tell us some
     more," he sneered.

     "I have no doubt that I could tell you a great deal more, Mr. Barker;
     but it would come with a better grace from you."

     "Oh, you think so, do you? Well, all I can say is that if there's any
     secret here it is not my secret, and I am not the man to give it
     away."

     "Well, if you take that line, Mr. Barker," said the inspector
     quietly, "we must just keep you in sight until we have the warrant
     and can hold you."

     "You can do what you damn please about that," said Barker defiantly.

     The proceedings seemed to have come to a definite end so far as he
     was concerned; for one had only to look at that granite face to
     realize that no peine forte et dure would ever force him to plead
     against his will. The deadlock was broken, however, by a woman's
     voice. Mrs. Douglas had been standing listening at the half opened
     door, and now she entered the room.

     "You have done enough for now, Cecil," said she. "Whatever comes of
     it in the future, you have done enough."

     "Enough and more than enough," remarked Sherlock Holmes gravely. "I
     have every sympathy with you, madam, and should strongly urge you to
     have some confidence in the common sense of our jurisdiction and to
     take the police voluntarily into your complete confidence. It may be
     that I am myself at fault for not following up the hint which you
     conveyed to me through my friend, Dr. Watson; but, at that time I had
     every reason to believe that you were directly concerned in the
     crime. Now I am assured that this is not so. At the same time, there
     is much that is unexplained, and I should strongly recommend that you
     ask Mr. Douglas to tell us his own story."

     Mrs. Douglas gave a cry of astonishment at Holmes's words. The
     detectives and I must have echoed it, when we were aware of a man who
     seemed to have emerged from the wall, who advanced now from the gloom
     of the corner in which he had appeared. Mrs. Douglas turned, and in
     an instant her arms were round him. Barker had seized his
     outstretched hand.

     "It's best this way, Jack," his wife repeated; "I am sure that it is
     best."

     "Indeed, yes, Mr. Douglas," said Sherlock Holmes, "I am sure that you
     will find it best."

     The man stood blinking at us with the dazed look of one who comes
     from the dark into the light. It was a remarkable face, bold gray
     eyes, a strong, short-clipped, grizzled moustache, a square,
     projecting chin, and a humorous mouth. He took a good look at us all,
     and then to my amazement he advanced to me and handed me a bundle of
     paper.

     "I've heard of you," said he in a voice which was not quite English
     and not quite American, but was altogether mellow and pleasing. "You
     are the historian of this bunch. Well, Dr. Watson, you've never had
     such a story as that pass through your hands before, and I'll lay my
     last dollar on that. Tell it your own way; but there are the facts,
     and you can't miss the public so long as you have those. I've been
     cooped up two days, and I've spent the daylight hours--as much
     daylight as I could get in that rat trap--in putting the thing into
     words. You're welcome to them--you and your public. There's the story
     of the Valley of Fear."

     "That's the past, Mr. Douglas," said Sherlock Holmes quietly. "What
     we desire now is to hear your story of the present."

     "You'll have it, sir," said Douglas. "May I smoke as I talk? Well,
     thank you, Mr. Holmes. You're a smoker yourself, if I remember right,
     and you'll guess what it is to be sitting for two days with tobacco
     in your pocket and afraid that the smell will give you away." He
     leaned against the mantelpiece and sucked at the cigar which Holmes
     had handed him. "I've heard of you, Mr. Holmes. I never guessed that
     I should meet you. But before you are through with that," he nodded
     at my papers, "you will say I've brought you something fresh."

     Inspector MacDonald had been staring at the newcomer with the
     greatest amazement. "Well, this fairly beats me!" he cried at last.
     "If you are Mr. John Douglas of Birlstone Manor, then whose death
     have we been investigating for these two days, and where in the world
     have you sprung from now? You seemed to me to come out of the floor
     like a jack-in-a-box."

     "Ah, Mr. Mac," said Holmes, shaking a reproving forefinger, "you
     would not read that excellent local compilation which described the
     concealment of King Charles. People did not hide in those days
     without excellent hiding places, and the hiding place that has once
     been used may be again. I had persuaded myself that we should find
     Mr. Douglas under this roof."

     "And how long have you been playing this trick upon us, Mr. Holmes?"
     said the inspector angrily. "How long have you allowed us to waste
     ourselves upon a search that you knew to be an absurd one?"

     "Not one instant, my dear Mr. Mac. Only last night did I form my
     views of the case. As they could not be put to the proof until this
     evening, I invited you and your colleague to take a holiday for the
     day. Pray what more could I do? When I found the suit of clothes in
     the moat, it at once became apparent to me that the body we had found
     could not have been the body of Mr. John Douglas at all, but must be
     that of the bicyclist from Tunbridge Wells. No other conclusion was
     possible. Therefore I had to determine where Mr. John Douglas himself
     could be, and the balance of probability was that with the connivance
     of his wife and his friend he was concealed in a house which had such
     conveniences for a fugitive, and awaiting quieter times when he could
     make his final escape."

     "Well, you figured it out about right," said Douglas approvingly. "I
     thought I'd dodge your British law; for I was not sure how I stood
     under it, and also I saw my chance to throw these hounds once for all
     off my track. Mind you, from first to last I have done nothing to be
     ashamed of, and nothing that I would not do again; but you'll judge
     that for yourselves when I tell you my story. Never mind warning me,
     Inspector: I'm ready to stand pat upon the truth.

     "I'm not going to begin at the beginning. That's all there," he
     indicated my bundle of papers, "and a mighty queer yarn you'll find
     it. It all comes down to this: That there are some men that have good
     cause to hate me and would give their last dollar to know that they
     had got me. So long as I am alive and they are alive, there is no
     safety in this world for me. They hunted me from Chicago to
     California, then they chased me out of America; but when I married
     and settled down in this quiet spot I thought my last years were
     going to be peaceable.

     "I never explained to my wife how things were. Why should I pull her
     into it? She would never have a quiet moment again; but would always
     be imagining trouble. I fancy she knew something, for I may have
     dropped a word here or a word there; but until yesterday, after you
     gentlemen had seen her, she never knew the rights of the matter. She
     told you all she knew, and so did Barker here; for on the night when
     this thing happened there was mighty little time for explanations.
     She knows everything now, and I would have been a wiser man if I had
     told her sooner. But it was a hard question, dear," he took her hand
     for an instant in his own, "and I acted for the best.

     "Well, gentlemen, the day before these happenings I was over in
     Tunbridge Wells, and I got a glimpse of a man in the street. It was
     only a glimpse; but I have a quick eye for these things, and I never
     doubted who it was. It was the worst enemy I had among them all--one
     who has been after me like a hungry wolf after a caribou all these
     years. I knew there was trouble coming, and I came home and made
     ready for it. I guessed I'd fight through it all right on my own, my
     luck was a proverb in the States about '76. I never doubted that it
     would be with me still.

     "I was on my guard all that next day, and never went out into the
     park. It's as well, or he'd have had the drop on me with that
     buckshot gun of his before ever I could draw on him. After the bridge
     was up--my mind was always more restful when that bridge was up in
     the evenings--I put the thing clear out of my head. I never dreamed
     of his getting into the house and waiting for me. But when I made my
     round in my dressing gown, as was my habit, I had no sooner entered
     the study than I scented danger. I guess when a man has had dangers
     in his life--and I've had more than most in my time--there is a kind
     of sixth sense that waves the red flag. I saw the signal clear
     enough, and yet I couldn't tell you why. Next instant I spotted a
     boot under the window curtain, and then I saw why plain enough.

     "I'd just the one candle that was in my hand; but there was a good
     light from the hall lamp through the open door. I put down the candle
     and jumped for a hammer that I'd left on the mantel. At the same
     moment he sprang at me. I saw the glint of a knife, and I lashed at
     him with the hammer. I got him somewhere; for the knife tinkled down
     on the floor. He dodged round the table as quick as an eel, and a
     moment later he'd got his gun from under his coat. I heard him cock
     it; but I had got hold of it before he could fire. I had it by the
     barrel, and we wrestled for it all ends up for a minute or more. It
     was death to the man that lost his grip.

     "He never lost his grip; but he got it butt downward for a moment too
     long. Maybe it was I that pulled the trigger. Maybe we just jolted it
     off between us. Anyhow, he got both barrels in the face, and there I
     was, staring down at all that was left of Ted Baldwin. I'd recognized
     him in the township, and again when he sprang for me; but his own
     mother wouldn't recognize him as I saw him then. I'm used to rough
     work; but I fairly turned sick at the sight of him.

     "I was hanging on the side of the table when Barker came hurrying
     down. I heard my wife coming, and I ran to the door and stopped her.
     It was no sight for a woman. I promised I'd come to her soon. I said
     a word or two to Barker--he took it all in at a glance--and we waited
     for the rest to come along. But there was no sign of them. Then we
     understood that they could hear nothing, and that all that had
     happened was known only to ourselves.

     "It was at that instant that the idea came to me. I was fairly
     dazzled by the brilliance of it. The man's sleeve had slipped up and
     there was the branded mark of the lodge upon his forearm. See here!"

     The man whom we had known as Douglas turned up his own coat and cuff
     to show a brown triangle within a circle exactly like that which we
     had seen upon the dead man.

     "It was the sight of that which started me on it. I seemed to see it
     all clear at a glance. There were his height and hair and figure,
     about the same as my own. No one could swear to his face, poor devil!
     I brought down this suit of clothes, and in a quarter of an hour
     Barker and I had put my dressing gown on him and he lay as you found
     him. We tied all his things into a bundle, and I weighted them with
     the only weight I could find and put them through the window. The
     card he had meant to lay upon my body was lying beside his own.

     "My rings were put on his finger; but when it came to the wedding
     ring," he held out his muscular hand, "you can see for yourselves
     that I had struck the limit. I have not moved it since the day I was
     married, and it would have taken a file to get it off. I don't know,
     anyhow, that I should have cared to part with it; but if I had wanted
     to I couldn't. So we just had to leave that detail to take care of
     itself. On the other hand, I brought a bit of plaster down and put it
     where I am wearing one myself at this instant. You slipped up there,
     Mr. Holmes, clever as you are; for if you had chanced to take off
     that plaster you would have found no cut underneath it.

     "Well, that was the situation. If I could lie low for a while and
     then get away where I could be joined by my 'widow' we should have a
     chance at last of living in peace for the rest of our lives. These
     devils would give me no rest so long as I was above ground; but if
     they saw in the papers that Baldwin had got his man, there would be
     an end of all my troubles. I hadn't much time to make it all clear to
     Barker and to my wife; but they understood enough to be able to help
     me. I knew all about this hiding place, so did Ames; but it never
     entered his head to connect it with the matter. I retired into it,
     and it was up to Barker to do the rest.

     "I guess you can fill in for yourselves what he did. He opened the
     window and made the mark on the sill to give an idea of how the
     murderer escaped. It was a tall order, that; but as the bridge was up
     there was no other way. Then, when everything was fixed, he rang the
     bell for all he was worth. What happened afterward you know. And so,
     gentlemen, you can do what you please; but I've told you the truth
     and the whole truth, so help me God! What I ask you now is how do I
     stand by the English law?"

     There was a silence which was broken by Sherlock Holmes.

     "The English law is in the main a just law. You will get no worse
     than your deserts from that, Mr. Douglas. But I would ask you how did
     this man know that you lived here, or how to get into your house, or
     where to hide to get you?"

     "I know nothing of this."

     Holmes's face was very white and grave. "The story is not over yet, I
     fear," said he. "You may find worse dangers than the English law, or
     even than your enemies from America. I see trouble before you, Mr.
     Douglas. You'll take my advice and still be on your guard."

     And now, my long-suffering readers, I will ask you to come away with
     me for a time, far from the Sussex Manor House of Birlstone, and far
     also from the year of grace in which we made our eventful journey
     which ended with the strange story of the man who had been known as
     John Douglas. I wish you to journey back some twenty years in time,
     and westward some thousands of miles in space, that I may lay before
     you a singular and terrible narrative--so singular and so terrible
     that you may find it hard to believe that even as I tell it, even so
     did it occur.

     Do not think that I intrude one story before another is finished. As
     you read on you will find that this is not so. And when I have
     detailed those distant events and you have solved this mystery of the
     past, we shall meet once more in those rooms on Baker Street, where
     this, like so many other wonderful happenings, will find its end.









                                      PART II

                                  The Scowrers





          CHAPTER I
          The Man


     It was the fourth of February in the year 1875. It had been a severe
     winter, and the snow lay deep in the gorges of the Gilmerton
     Mountains. The steam ploughs had, however, kept the railroad open,
     and the evening train which connects the long line of coal-mining and
     iron-working settlements was slowly groaning its way up the steep
     gradients which lead from Stagville on the plain to Vermissa, the
     central township which lies at the head of Vermissa Valley. From this
     point the track sweeps downward to Bartons Crossing, Helmdale, and
     the purely agricultural county of Merton. It was a single-track
     railroad; but at every siding--and they were numerous--long lines of
     trucks piled with coal and iron ore told of the hidden wealth which
     had brought a rude population and a bustling life to this most
     desolate corner of the United States of America.

     For desolate it was! Little could the first pioneer who had traversed
     it have ever imagined that the fairest prairies and the most lush
     water pastures were valueless compared to this gloomy land of black
     crag and tangled forest. Above the dark and often scarcely penetrable
     woods upon their flanks, the high, bare crowns of the mountains,
     white snow, and jagged rock towered upon each flank, leaving a long,
     winding, tortuous valley in the centre. Up this the little train was
     slowly crawling.

     The oil lamps had just been lit in the leading passenger car, a long,
     bare carriage in which some twenty or thirty people were seated. The
     greater number of these were workmen returning from their day's toil
     in the lower part of the valley. At least a dozen, by their grimed
     faces and the safety lanterns which they carried, proclaimed
     themselves miners. These sat smoking in a group and conversed in low
     voices, glancing occasionally at two men on the opposite side of the
     car, whose uniforms and badges showed them to be policemen.

     Several women of the labouring class and one or two travellers who
     might have been small local storekeepers made up the rest of the
     company, with the exception of one young man in a corner by himself.
     It is with this man that we are concerned. Take a good look at him,
     for he is worth it.

     He is a fresh-complexioned, middle-sized young man, not far, one
     would guess, from his thirtieth year. He has large, shrewd, humorous
     gray eyes which twinkle inquiringly from time to time as he looks
     round through his spectacles at the people about him. It is easy to
     see that he is of a sociable and possibly simple disposition, anxious
     to be friendly to all men. Anyone could pick him at once as
     gregarious in his habits and communicative in his nature, with a
     quick wit and a ready smile. And yet the man who studied him more
     closely might discern a certain firmness of jaw and grim tightness
     about the lips which would warn him that there were depths beyond,
     and that this pleasant, brown-haired young Irishman might conceivably
     leave his mark for good or evil upon any society to which he was
     introduced.

     Having made one or two tentative remarks to the nearest miner, and
     receiving only short, gruff replies, the traveller resigned himself
     to uncongenial silence, staring moodily out of the window at the
     fading landscape.

     It was not a cheering prospect. Through the growing gloom there
     pulsed the red glow of the furnaces on the sides of the hills. Great
     heaps of slag and dumps of cinders loomed up on each side, with the
     high shafts of the collieries towering above them. Huddled groups of
     mean, wooden houses, the windows of which were beginning to outline
     themselves in light, were scattered here and there along the line,
     and the frequent halting places were crowded with their swarthy
     inhabitants.

     The iron and coal valleys of the Vermissa district were no resorts
     for the leisured or the cultured. Everywhere there were stern signs
     of the crudest battle of life, the rude work to be done, and the
     rude, strong workers who did it.

     The young traveller gazed out into this dismal country with a face of
     mingled repulsion and interest, which showed that the scene was new
     to him. At intervals he drew from his pocket a bulky letter to which
     he referred, and on the margins of which he scribbled some notes.
     Once from the back of his waist he produced something which one would
     hardly have expected to find in the possession of so mild-mannered a
     man. It was a navy revolver of the largest size. As he turned it
     slantwise to the light, the glint upon the rims of the copper shells
     within the drum showed that it was fully loaded. He quickly restored
     it to his secret pocket, but not before it had been observed by a
     working man who had seated himself upon the adjoining bench.

     "Hullo, mate!" said he. "You seem heeled and ready."

     The young man smiled with an air of embarrassment.

     "Yes," said he, "we need them sometimes in the place I come from."

     "And where may that be?"

     "I'm last from Chicago."

     "A stranger in these parts?"

     "Yes."

     "You may find you need it here," said the workman.

     "Ah! is that so?" The young man seemed interested.

     "Have you heard nothing of doings hereabouts?"

     "Nothing out of the way."

     "Why, I thought the country was full of it. You'll hear quick enough.
     What made you come here?"

     "I heard there was always work for a willing man."

     "Are you a member of the union?"

     "Sure."

     "Then you'll get your job, I guess. Have you any friends?"

     "Not yet; but I have the means of making them."

     "How's that, then?"

     "I am one of the Eminent Order of Freemen. There's no town without a
     lodge, and where there is a lodge I'll find my friends."

     The remark had a singular effect upon his companion. He glanced round
     suspiciously at the others in the car. The miners were still
     whispering among themselves. The two police officers were dozing. He
     came across, seated himself close to the young traveller, and held
     out his hand.

     "Put it there," he said.

     A hand-grip passed between the two.

     "I see you speak the truth," said the workman. "But it's well to make
     certain." He raised his right hand to his right eyebrow. The
     traveller at once raised his left hand to his left eyebrow.

     "Dark nights are unpleasant," said the workman.

     "Yes, for strangers to travel," the other answered.

     "That's good enough. I'm Brother Scanlan, Lodge 341, Vermissa Valley.
     Glad to see you in these parts."

     "Thank you. I'm Brother John McMurdo, Lodge 29, Chicago. Bodymaster
     J. H. Scott. But I am in luck to meet a brother so early."

     "Well, there are plenty of us about. You won't find the order more
     flourishing anywhere in the States than right here in Vermissa
     Valley. But we could do with some lads like you. I can't understand a
     spry man of the union finding no work to do in Chicago."

     "I found plenty of work to do," said McMurdo.

     "Then why did you leave?"

     McMurdo nodded towards the policemen and smiled. "I guess those chaps
     would be glad to know," he said.

     Scanlan groaned sympathetically. "In trouble?" he asked in a whisper.

     "Deep."

     "A penitentiary job?"

     "And the rest."

     "Not a killing!"

     "It's early days to talk of such things," said McMurdo with the air
     of a man who had been surprised into saying more than he intended.
     "I've my own good reasons for leaving Chicago, and let that be enough
     for you. Who are you that you should take it on yourself to ask such
     things?" His gray eyes gleamed with sudden and dangerous anger from
     behind his glasses.

     "All right, mate, no offense meant. The boys will think none the
     worse of you, whatever you may have done. Where are you bound for
     now?"

     "Vermissa."

     "That's the third halt down the line. Where are you staying?"

     McMurdo took out an envelope and held it close to the murky oil lamp.
     "Here is the address--Jacob Shafter, Sheridan Street. It's a boarding
     house that was recommended by a man I knew in Chicago."

     "Well, I don't know it; but Vermissa is out of my beat. I live at
     Hobson's Patch, and that's here where we are drawing up. But, say,
     there's one bit of advice I'll give you before we part: If you're in
     trouble in Vermissa, go straight to the Union House and see Boss
     McGinty. He is the Bodymaster of Vermissa Lodge, and nothing can
     happen in these parts unless Black Jack McGinty wants it. So long,
     mate! Maybe we'll meet in lodge one of these evenings. But mind my
     words: If you are in trouble, go to Boss McGinty."

     Scanlan descended, and McMurdo was left once again to his thoughts.
     Night had now fallen, and the flames of the frequent furnaces were
     roaring and leaping in the darkness. Against their lurid background
     dark figures were bending and straining, twisting and turning, with
     the motion of winch or of windlass, to the rhythm of an eternal clank
     and roar.

     "I guess hell must look something like that," said a voice.

     McMurdo turned and saw that one of the policemen had shifted in his
     seat and was staring out into the fiery waste.

     "For that matter," said the other policeman, "I allow that hell must
     be something like that. If there are worse devils down yonder than
     some we could name, it's more than I'd expect. I guess you are new to
     this part, young man?"

     "Well, what if I am?" McMurdo answered in a surly voice.

     "Just this, mister, that I should advise you to be careful in
     choosing your friends. I don't think I'd begin with Mike Scanlan or
     his gang if I were you."

     "What the hell is it to you who are my friends?" roared McMurdo in a
     voice which brought every head in the carriage round to witness the
     altercation. "Did I ask you for your advice, or did you think me such
     a sucker that I couldn't move without it? You speak when you are
     spoken to, and by the Lord you'd have to wait a long time if it was
     me!" He thrust out his face and grinned at the patrolmen like a
     snarling dog.

     The two policemen, heavy, good-natured men, were taken aback by the
     extraordinary vehemence with which their friendly advances had been
     rejected.

     "No offense, stranger," said one. "It was a warning for your own
     good, seeing that you are, by your own showing, new to the place."

     "I'm new to the place; but I'm not new to you and your kind!" cried
     McMurdo in cold fury. "I guess you're the same in all places, shoving
     your advice in when nobody asks for it."

     "Maybe we'll see more of you before very long," said one of the
     patrolmen with a grin. "You're a real hand-picked one, if I am a
     judge."

     "I was thinking the same," remarked the other. "I guess we may meet
     again."

     "I'm not afraid of you, and don't you think it!" cried McMurdo. "My
     name's Jack McMurdo--see? If you want me, you'll find me at Jacob
     Shafter's on Sheridan Street, Vermissa; so I'm not hiding from you,
     am I? Day or night I dare to look the like of you in the face--don't
     make any mistake about that!"

     There was a murmur of sympathy and admiration from the miners at the
     dauntless demeanour of the newcomer, while the two policemen shrugged
     their shoulders and renewed a conversation between themselves.

     A few minutes later the train ran into the ill-lit station, and there
     was a general clearing; for Vermissa was by far the largest town on
     the line. McMurdo picked up his leather gripsack and was about to
     start off into the darkness, when one of the miners accosted him.

     "By Gar, mate! you know how to speak to the cops," he said in a voice
     of awe. "It was grand to hear you. Let me carry your grip and show
     you the road. I'm passing Shafter's on the way to my own shack."

     There was a chorus of friendly "Good-nights" from the other miners as
     they passed from the platform. Before ever he had set foot in it,
     McMurdo the turbulent had become a character in Vermissa.

     The country had been a place of terror; but the town was in its way
     even more depressing. Down that long valley there was at least a
     certain gloomy grandeur in the huge fires and the clouds of drifting
     smoke, while the strength and industry of man found fitting monuments
     in the hills which he had spilled by the side of his monstrous
     excavations. But the town showed a dead level of mean ugliness and
     squalor. The broad street was churned up by the traffic into a
     horrible rutted paste of muddy snow. The sidewalks were narrow and
     uneven. The numerous gas-lamps served only to show more clearly a
     long line of wooden houses, each with its veranda facing the street,
     unkempt and dirty.

     As they approached the centre of the town the scene was brightened by
     a row of well-lit stores, and even more by a cluster of saloons and
     gaming houses, in which the miners spent their hard-earned but
     generous wages.

     "That's the Union House," said the guide, pointing to one saloon
     which rose almost to the dignity of being a hotel. "Jack McGinty is
     the boss there."

     "What sort of a man is he?" McMurdo asked.

     "What! have you never heard of the boss?"

     "How could I have heard of him when you know that I am a stranger in
     these parts?"

     "Well, I thought his name was known clear across the country. It's
     been in the papers often enough."

     "What for?"

     "Well," the miner lowered his voice--"over the affairs."

     "What affairs?"

     "Good Lord, mister! you are queer, if I must say it without offense.
     There's only one set of affairs that you'll hear of in these parts,
     and that's the affairs of the Scowrers."

     "Why, I seem to have read of the Scowrers in Chicago. A gang of
     murderers, are they not?"

     "Hush, on your life!" cried the miner, standing still in alarm, and
     gazing in amazement at his companion. "Man, you won't live long in
     these parts if you speak in the open street like that. Many a man has
     had the life beaten out of him for less."

     "Well, I know nothing about them. It's only what I have read."

     "And I'm not saying that you have not read the truth." The man looked
     nervously round him as he spoke, peering into the shadows as if he
     feared to see some lurking danger. "If killing is murder, then God
     knows there is murder and to spare. But don't you dare to breathe the
     name of Jack McGinty in connection with it, stranger; for every
     whisper goes back to him, and he is not one that is likely to let it
     pass. Now, that's the house you're after, that one standing back from
     the street. You'll find old Jacob Shafter that runs it as honest a
     man as lives in this township."

     "I thank you," said McMurdo, and shaking hands with his new
     acquaintance he plodded, gripsack in hand, up the path which led to
     the dwelling house, at the door of which he gave a resounding knock.

     It was opened at once by someone very different from what he had
     expected. It was a woman, young and singularly beautiful. She was of
     the German type, blonde and fair-haired, with the piquant contrast of
     a pair of beautiful dark eyes with which she surveyed the stranger
     with surprise and a pleasing embarrassment which brought a wave of
     colour over her pale face. Framed in the bright light of the open
     doorway, it seemed to McMurdo that he had never seen a more beautiful
     picture; the more attractive for its contrast with the sordid and
     gloomy surroundings. A lovely violet growing upon one of those black
     slag-heaps of the mines would not have seemed more surprising. So
     entranced was he that he stood staring without a word, and it was she
     who broke the silence.

     "I thought it was father," said she with a pleasing little touch of a
     German accent. "Did you come to see him? He is downtown. I expect him
     back every minute."

     McMurdo continued to gaze at her in open admiration until her eyes
     dropped in confusion before this masterful visitor.

     "No, miss," he said at last, "I'm in no hurry to see him. But your
     house was recommended to me for board. I thought it might suit
     me--and now I know it will."

     "You are quick to make up your mind," said she with a smile.

     "Anyone but a blind man could do as much," the other answered.

     She laughed at the compliment. "Come right in, sir," she said. "I'm
     Miss Ettie Shafter, Mr. Shafter's daughter. My mother's dead, and I
     run the house. You can sit down by the stove in the front room until
     father comes along--Ah, here he is! So you can fix things with him
     right away."

     A heavy, elderly man came plodding up the path. In a few words
     McMurdo explained his business. A man of the name of Murphy had given
     him the address in Chicago. He in turn had had it from someone else.
     Old Shafter was quite ready. The stranger made no bones about terms,
     agreed at once to every condition, and was apparently fairly flush of
     money. For seven dollars a week paid in advance he was to have board
     and lodging.

     So it was that McMurdo, the self-confessed fugitive from justice,
     took up his abode under the roof of the Shafters, the first step
     which was to lead to so long and dark a train of events, ending in a
     far distant land.





          CHAPTER II
          The Bodymaster


     McMurdo was a man who made his mark quickly. Wherever he was the folk
     around soon knew it. Within a week he had become infinitely the most
     important person at Shafter's. There were ten or a dozen boarders
     there; but they were honest foremen or commonplace clerks from the
     stores, of a very different calibre from the young Irishman. Of an
     evening when they gathered together his joke was always the readiest,
     his conversation the brightest, and his song the best. He was a born
     boon companion, with a magnetism which drew good humour from all
     around him.

     And yet he showed again and again, as he had shown in the railway
     carriage, a capacity for sudden, fierce anger, which compelled the
     respect and even the fear of those who met him. For the law, too, and
     all who were connected with it, he exhibited a bitter contempt which
     delighted some and alarmed others of his fellow boarders.

     From the first he made it evident, by his open admiration, that the
     daughter of the house had won his heart from the instant that he had
     set eyes upon her beauty and her grace. He was no backward suitor. On
     the second day he told her that he loved her, and from then onward he
     repeated the same story with an absolute disregard of what she might
     say to discourage him.

     "Someone else?" he would cry. "Well, the worse luck for someone else!
     Let him look out for himself! Am I to lose my life's chance and all
     my heart's desire for someone else? You can keep on saying no, Ettie:
     the day will come when you will say yes, and I'm young enough to
     wait."

     He was a dangerous suitor, with his glib Irish tongue, and his
     pretty, coaxing ways. There was about him also that glamour of
     experience and of mystery which attracts a woman's interest, and
     finally her love. He could talk of the sweet valleys of County
     Monaghan from which he came, of the lovely, distant island, the low
     hills and green meadows of which seemed the more beautiful when
     imagination viewed them from this place of grime and snow.

     Then he was versed in the life of the cities of the North, of
     Detroit, and the lumber camps of Michigan, and finally of Chicago,
     where he had worked in a planing mill. And afterwards came the hint
     of romance, the feeling that strange things had happened to him in
     that great city, so strange and so intimate that they might not be
     spoken of. He spoke wistfully of a sudden leaving, a breaking of old
     ties, a flight into a strange world, ending in this dreary valley,
     and Ettie listened, her dark eyes gleaming with pity and with
     sympathy--those two qualities which may turn so rapidly and so
     naturally to love.

     McMurdo had obtained a temporary job as bookkeeper; for he was a
     well-educated man. This kept him out most of the day, and he had not
     found occasion yet to report himself to the head of the lodge of the
     Eminent Order of Freemen. He was reminded of his omission, however,
     by a visit one evening from Mike Scanlan, the fellow member whom he
     had met in the train. Scanlan, the small, sharp-faced, nervous,
     black-eyed man, seemed glad to see him once more. After a glass or
     two of whisky he broached the object of his visit.

     "Say, McMurdo," said he, "I remembered your address, so l made bold
     to call. I'm surprised that you've not reported to the Bodymaster.
     Why haven't you seen Boss McGinty yet?"

     "Well, I had to find a job. I have been busy."

     "You must find time for him if you have none for anything else. Good
     Lord, man! you're a fool not to have been down to the Union House and
     registered your name the first morning after you came here! If you
     run against him--well, you mustn't, that's all!"

     McMurdo showed mild surprise. "I've been a member of the lodge for
     over two years, Scanlan, but I never heard that duties were so
     pressing as all that."

     "Maybe not in Chicago."

     "Well, it's the same society here."

     "Is it?"

     Scanlan looked at him long and fixedly. There was something sinister
     in his eyes.

     "Isn't it?"

     "You'll tell me that in a month's time. I hear you had a talk with
     the patrolmen after I left the train."

     "How did you know that?"

     "Oh, it got about--things do get about for good and for bad in this
     district."

     "Well, yes. I told the hounds what I thought of them."

     "By the Lord, you'll be a man after McGinty's heart!"

     "What, does he hate the police too?"

     Scanlan burst out laughing. "You go and see him, my lad," said he as
     he took his leave. "It's not the police but you that he'll hate if
     you don't! Now, take a friend's advice and go at once!"

     It chanced that on the same evening McMurdo had another more pressing
     interview which urged him in the same direction. It may have been
     that his attentions to Ettie had been more evident than before, or
     that they had gradually obtruded themselves into the slow mind of his
     good German host; but, whatever the cause, the boarding-house keeper
     beckoned the young man into his private room and started on the
     subject without any circumlocution.

     "It seems to me, mister," said he, "that you are gettin' set on my
     Ettie. Ain't that so, or am I wrong?"

     "Yes, that is so," the young man answered.

     "Vell, I vant to tell you right now that it ain't no manner of use.
     There's someone slipped in afore you."

     "She told me so."

     "Vell, you can lay that she told you truth. But did she tell you who
     it vas?"

     "No, I asked her; but she wouldn't tell."

     "I dare say not, the leetle baggage! Perhaps she did not vish to
     frighten you avay."

     "Frighten!" McMurdo was on fire in a moment.

     "Ah, yes, my friend! You need not be ashamed to be frightened of him.
     It is Teddy Baldwin."

     "And who the devil is he?"

     "He is a boss of Scowrers."

     "Scowrers! I've heard of them before. It's Scowrers here and Scowrers
     there, and always in a whisper! What are you all afraid of? Who are
     the Scowrers?"

     The boarding-house keeper instinctively sank his voice, as everyone
     did who talked about that terrible society. "The Scowrers," said he,
     "are the Eminent Order of Freemen!"

     The young man stared. "Why, I am a member of that order myself."

     "You! I vould never have had you in my house if I had known it--not
     if you vere to pay me a hundred dollar a week."

     "What's wrong with the order? It's for charity and good fellowship.
     The rules say so."

     "Maybe in some places. Not here!"

     "What is it here?"

     "It's a murder society, that's vat it is."

     McMurdo laughed incredulously. "How can you prove that?" he asked.

     "Prove it! Are there not fifty murders to prove it? Vat about Milman
     and Van Shorst, and the Nicholson family, and old Mr. Hyam, and
     little Billy James, and the others? Prove it! Is there a man or a
     voman in this valley vat does not know it?"

     "See here!" said McMurdo earnestly. "I want you to take back what
     you've said, or else make it good. One or the other you must do
     before I quit this room. Put yourself in my place. Here am I, a
     stranger in the town. I belong to a society that I know only as an
     innocent one. You'll find it through the length and breadth of the
     States, but always as an innocent one. Now, when I am counting upon
     joining it here, you tell me that it is the same as a murder society
     called the Scowrers. I guess you owe me either an apology or else an
     explanation, Mr. Shafter."

     "I can but tell you vat the whole vorld knows, mister. The bosses of
     the one are the bosses of the other. If you offend the one, it is the
     other vat vill strike you. We have proved it too often."

     "That's just gossip--I want proof!" said McMurdo.

     "If you live here long you vill get your proof. But I forget that you
     are yourself one of them. You vill soon be as bad as the rest. But
     you vill find other lodgings, mister. I cannot have you here. Is it
     not bad enough that one of these people come courting my Ettie, and
     that I dare not turn him down, but that I should have another for my
     boarder? Yes, indeed, you shall not sleep here after to-night!"

     McMurdo found himself under sentence of banishment both from his
     comfortable quarters and from the girl whom he loved. He found her
     alone in the sitting-room that same evening, and he poured his
     troubles into her ear.

     "Sure, your father is after giving me notice," he said. "It's little
     I would care if it was just my room, but indeed, Ettie, though it's
     only a week that I've known you, you are the very breath of life to
     me, and I can't live without you!"

     "Oh, hush, Mr. McMurdo, don't speak so!" said the girl. "I have told
     you, have I not, that you are too late? There is another, and if I
     have not promised to marry him at once, at least I can promise no one
     else."

     "Suppose I had been first, Ettie, would I have had a chance?"

     The girl sank her face into her hands. "I wish to heaven that you had
     been first!" she sobbed.

     McMurdo was down on his knees before her in an instant. "For God's
     sake, Ettie, let it stand at that!" he cried. "Will you ruin your
     life and my own for the sake of this promise? Follow your heart,
     acushla! 'Tis a safer guide than any promise before you knew what it
     was that you were saying."

     He had seized Ettie's white hand between his own strong brown ones.

     "Say that you will be mine, and we will face it out together!"

     "Not here?"

     "Yes, here."

     "No, no, Jack!" His arms were round her now. "It could not be here.
     Could you take me away?"

     A struggle passed for a moment over McMurdo's face; but it ended by
     setting like granite. "No, here," he said. "I'll hold you against the
     world, Ettie, right here where we are!"

     "Why should we not leave together?"

     "No, Ettie, I can't leave here."

     "But why?"

     "I'd never hold my head up again if I felt that I had been driven
     out. Besides, what is there to be afraid of? Are we not free folks in
     a free country? If you love me, and I you, who will dare to come
     between?"

     "You don't know, Jack. You've been here too short a time. You don't
     know this Baldwin. You don't know McGinty and his Scowrers."

     "No, I don't know them, and I don't fear them, and I don't believe in
     them!" said McMurdo. "I've lived among rough men, my darling, and
     instead of fearing them it has always ended that they have feared
     me--always, Ettie. It's mad on the face of it! If these men, as your
     father says, have done crime after crime in the valley, and if
     everyone knows them by name, how comes it that none are brought to
     justice? You answer me that, Ettie!"

     "Because no witness dares to appear against them. He would not live a
     month if he did. Also because they have always their own men to swear
     that the accused one was far from the scene of the crime. But surely,
     Jack, you must have read all this. I had understood that every paper
     in the United States was writing about it."

     "Well, I have read something, it is true; but I had thought it was a
     story. Maybe these men have some reason in what they do. Maybe they
     are wronged and have no other way to help themselves."

     "Oh, Jack, don't let me hear you speak so! That is how he speaks--the
     other one!"

     "Baldwin--he speaks like that, does he?"

     "And that is why I loathe him so. Oh, Jack, now I can tell you the
     truth. I loathe him with all my heart; but I fear him also. I fear
     him for myself; but above all I fear him for father. I know that some
     great sorrow would come upon us if I dared to say what I really felt.
     That is why I have put him off with half-promises. It was in real
     truth our only hope. But if you would fly with me, Jack, we could
     take father with us and live forever far from the power of these
     wicked men."

     Again there was the struggle upon McMurdo's face, and again it set
     like granite. "No harm shall come to you, Ettie--nor to your father
     either. As to wicked men, I expect you may find that I am as bad as
     the worst of them before we're through."

     "No, no, Jack! I would trust you anywhere."

     McMurdo laughed bitterly. "Good Lord! how little you know of me! Your
     innocent soul, my darling, could not even guess what is passing in
     mine. But, hullo, who's the visitor?"

     The door had opened suddenly, and a young fellow came swaggering in
     with the air of one who is the master. He was a handsome, dashing
     young man of about the same age and build as McMurdo himself. Under
     his broad-brimmed black felt hat, which he had not troubled to
     remove, a handsome face with fierce, domineering eyes and a curved
     hawk-bill of a nose looked savagely at the pair who sat by the stove.

     Ettie had jumped to her feet full of confusion and alarm. "I'm glad
     to see you, Mr. Baldwin," said she. "You're earlier than I had
     thought. Come and sit down."

     Baldwin stood with his hands on his hips looking at McMurdo. "Who is
     this?" he asked curtly.

     "It's a friend of mine, Mr. Baldwin, a new boarder here. Mr. McMurdo,
     may I introduce you to Mr. Baldwin?"

     The young men nodded in surly fashion to each other.

     "Maybe Miss Ettie has told you how it is with us?" said Baldwin.

     "I didn't understand that there was any relation between you."

     "Didn't you? Well, you can understand it now. You can take it from me
     that this young lady is mine, and you'll find it a very fine evening
     for a walk."

     "Thank you, I am in no humour for a walk."

     "Aren't you?" The man's savage eyes were blazing with anger. "Maybe
     you are in a humour for a fight, Mr. Boarder!"

     "That I am!" cried McMurdo, springing to his feet. "You never said a
     more welcome word."

     "For God's sake, Jack! Oh, for God's sake!" cried poor, distracted
     Ettie. "Oh, Jack, Jack, he will hurt you!"

     "Oh, it's Jack, is it?" said Baldwin with an oath. "You've come to
     that already, have you?"

     "Oh, Ted, be reasonable--be kind! For my sake, Ted, if ever you loved
     me, be big-hearted and forgiving!"

     "I think, Ettie, that if you were to leave us alone we could get this
     thing settled," said McMurdo quietly. "Or maybe, Mr. Baldwin, you
     will take a turn down the street with me. It's a fine evening, and
     there's some open ground beyond the next block."

     "I'll get even with you without needing to dirty my hands," said his
     enemy. "You'll wish you had never set foot in this house before I am
     through with you!"

     "No time like the present," cried McMurdo.

     "I'll choose my own time, mister. You can leave the time to me. See
     here!" He suddenly rolled up his sleeve and showed upon his forearm a
     peculiar sign which appeared to have been branded there. It was a
     circle with a triangle within it. "D'you know what that means?"

     "I neither know nor care!"

     "Well, you will know, I'll promise you that. You won't be much older,
     either. Perhaps Miss Ettie can tell you something about it. As to
     you, Ettie, you'll come back to me on your knees--d'ye hear,
     girl?--on your knees--and then I'll tell you what your punishment may
     be. You've sowed--and by the Lord, I'll see that you reap!" He
     glanced at them both in fury. Then he turned upon his heel, and an
     instant later the outer door had banged behind him.

     For a few moments McMurdo and the girl stood in silence. Then she
     threw her arms around him.

     "Oh, Jack, how brave you were! But it is no use, you must fly!
     To-night--Jack--to-night! It's your only hope. He will have your
     life. I read it in his horrible eyes. What chance have you against a
     dozen of them, with Boss McGinty and all the power of the lodge
     behind them?"

     McMurdo disengaged her hands, kissed her, and gently pushed her back
     into a chair. "There, acushla, there! Don't be disturbed or fear for
     me. I'm a Freeman myself. I'm after telling your father about it.
     Maybe I am no better than the others; so don't make a saint of me.
     Perhaps you hate me too, now that I've told you as much?"

     "Hate you, Jack? While life lasts I could never do that! I've heard
     that there is no harm in being a Freeman anywhere but here; so why
     should I think the worse of you for that? But if you are a Freeman,
     Jack, why should you not go down and make a friend of Boss McGinty?
     Oh, hurry, Jack, hurry! Get your word in first, or the hounds will be
     on your trail."

     "I was thinking the same thing," said McMurdo. "I'll go right now and
     fix it. You can tell your father that I'll sleep here to-night and
     find some other quarters in the morning."

     The bar of McGinty's saloon was crowded as usual, for it was the
     favourite loafing place of all the rougher elements of the town. The
     man was popular; for he had a rough, jovial disposition which formed
     a mask, covering a great deal which lay behind it. But apart from
     this popularity, the fear in which he was held throughout the
     township, and indeed down the whole thirty miles of the valley and
     past the mountains on each side of it, was enough in itself to fill
     his bar; for none could afford to neglect his good will.

     Besides those secret powers which it was universally believed that he
     exercised in so pitiless a fashion, he was a high public official, a
     municipal councillor, and a commissioner of roads, elected to the
     office through the votes of the ruffians who in turn expected to
     receive favours at his hands. Assessments and taxes were enormous;
     the public works were notoriously neglected, the accounts were
     slurred over by bribed auditors, and the decent citizen was
     terrorized into paying public blackmail, and holding his tongue lest
     some worse thing befall him.

     Thus it was that, year by year, Boss McGinty's diamond pins became
     more obtrusive, his gold chains more weighty across a more gorgeous
     vest, and his saloon stretched farther and farther, until it
     threatened to absorb one whole side of the Market Square.

     McMurdo pushed open the swinging door of the saloon and made his way
     amid the crowd of men within, through an atmosphere blurred with
     tobacco smoke and heavy with the smell of spirits. The place was
     brilliantly lighted, and the huge, heavily gilt mirrors upon every
     wall reflected and multiplied the garish illumination. There were
     several bartenders in their shirt sleeves, hard at work mixing drinks
     for the loungers who fringed the broad, brass-trimmed counter.

     At the far end, with his body resting upon the bar and a cigar stuck
     at an acute angle from the corner of his mouth, stood a tall, strong,
     heavily built man who could be none other than the famous McGinty
     himself. He was a black-maned giant, bearded to the cheek-bones, and
     with a shock of raven hair which fell to his collar. His complexion
     was as swarthy as that of an Italian, and his eyes were of a strange
     dead black, which, combined with a slight squint, gave them a
     particularly sinister appearance.

     All else in the man--his noble proportions, his fine features, and
     his frank bearing--fitted in with that jovial, man-to-man manner
     which he affected. Here, one would say, is a bluff, honest fellow,
     whose heart would be sound however rude his outspoken words might
     seem. It was only when those dead, dark eyes, deep and remorseless,
     were turned upon a man that he shrank within himself, feeling that he
     was face to face with an infinite possibility of latent evil, with a
     strength and courage and cunning behind it which made it a thousand
     times more deadly.

     Having had a good look at his man, McMurdo elbowed his way forward
     with his usual careless audacity, and pushed himself through the
     little group of courtiers who were fawning upon the powerful boss,
     laughing uproariously at the smallest of his jokes. The young
     stranger's bold gray eyes looked back fearlessly through their
     glasses at the deadly black ones which turned sharply upon him.

     "Well, young man, I can't call your face to mind."

     "I'm new here, Mr. McGinty."

     "You are not so new that you can't give a gentleman his proper
     title."

     "He's Councillor McGinty, young man," said a voice from the group.

     "I'm sorry, Councillor. I'm strange to the ways of the place. But I
     was advised to see you."

     "Well, you see me. This is all there is. What d'you think of me?"

     "Well, it's early days. If your heart is as big as your body, and
     your soul as fine as your face, then I'd ask for nothing better,"
     said McMurdo.

     "By Gar! you've got an Irish tongue in your head anyhow," cried the
     saloon-keeper, not quite certain whether to humour this audacious
     visitor or to stand upon his dignity.

     "So you are good enough to pass my appearance?"

     "Sure," said McMurdo.

     "And you were told to see me?"

     "I was."

     "And who told you?"

     "Brother Scanlan of Lodge 341, Vermissa. I drink your health
     Councillor, and to our better acquaintance." He raised a glass with
     which he had been served to his lips and elevated his little finger
     as he drank it.

     McGinty, who had been watching him narrowly, raised his thick black
     eyebrows. "Oh, it's like that, is it?" said he. "I'll have to look a
     bit closer into this, Mister--"

     "McMurdo."

     "A bit closer, Mr. McMurdo; for we don't take folk on trust in these
     parts, nor believe all we're told neither. Come in here for a moment,
     behind the bar."

     There was a small room there, lined with barrels. McGinty carefully
     closed the door, and then seated himself on one of them, biting
     thoughtfully on his cigar and surveying his companion with those
     disquieting eyes. For a couple of minutes he sat in complete silence.
     McMurdo bore the inspection cheerfully, one hand in his coat pocket,
     the other twisting his brown moustache. Suddenly McGinty stooped and
     produced a wicked-looking revolver.

     "See here, my joker," said he, "if I thought you were playing any
     game on us, it would be short work for you."

     "This is a strange welcome," McMurdo answered with some dignity, "for
     the Bodymaster of a lodge of Freemen to give to a stranger brother."

     "Ay, but it's just that same that you have to prove," said McGinty,
     "and God help you if you fail! Where were you made?"

     "Lodge 29, Chicago."

     "When?"

     "June 24, 1872."

     "What Bodymaster?"

     "James H. Scott."

     "Who is your district ruler?"

     "Bartholomew Wilson."

     "Hum! You seem glib enough in your tests. What are you doing here?"

     "Working, the same as you--but a poorer job."

     "You have your back answer quick enough."

     "Yes, I was always quick of speech."

     "Are you quick of action?"

     "I have had that name among those that knew me best."

     "Well, we may try you sooner than you think. Have you heard anything
     of the lodge in these parts?"

     "I've heard that it takes a man to be a brother."

     "True for you, Mr. McMurdo. Why did you leave Chicago?"

     "I'm damned if I tell you that!"

     McGinty opened his eyes. He was not used to being answered in such
     fashion, and it amused him. "Why won't you tell me?"

     "Because no brother may tell another a lie."

     "Then the truth is too bad to tell?"

     "You can put it that way if you like."

     "See here, mister, you can't expect me, as Bodymaster, to pass into
     the lodge a man for whose past he can't answer."

     McMurdo looked puzzled. Then he took a worn newspaper cutting from an
     inner pocket.

     "You wouldn't squeal on a fellow?" said he.

     "I'll wipe my hand across your face if you say such words to me!"
     cried McGinty hotly.

     "You are right, Councillor," said McMurdo meekly. "I should
     apologize. I spoke without thought. Well, I know that I am safe in
     your hands. Look at that clipping."

     McGinty glanced his eyes over the account of the shooting of one
     Jonas Pinto, in the Lake Saloon, Market Street, Chicago, in the New
     Year week of 1874.

     "Your work?" he asked, as he handed back the paper.

     McMurdo nodded.

     "Why did you shoot him?"

     "I was helping Uncle Sam to make dollars. Maybe mine were not as good
     gold as his, but they looked as well and were cheaper to make. This
     man Pinto helped me to shove the queer--"

     "To do what?"

     "Well, it means to pass the dollars out into circulation. Then he
     said he would split. Maybe he did split. I didn't wait to see. I just
     killed him and lighted out for the coal country."

     "Why the coal country?"

     "'Cause I'd read in the papers that they weren't too particular in
     those parts."

     McGinty laughed. "You were first a coiner and then a murderer, and
     you came to these parts because you thought you'd be welcome."

     "That's about the size of it," McMurdo answered.

     "Well, I guess you'll go far. Say, can you make those dollars yet?"

     McMurdo took half a dozen from his pocket. "Those never passed the
     Philadelphia mint," said he.

     "You don't say!" McGinty held them to the light in his enormous hand,
     which was hairy as a gorilla's. "I can see no difference. Gar! you'll
     be a mighty useful brother, I'm thinking! We can do with a bad man or
     two among us, Friend McMurdo: for there are times when we have to
     take our own part. We'd soon be against the wall if we didn't shove
     back at those that were pushing us."

     "Well, I guess I'll do my share of shoving with the rest of the
     boys."

     "You seem to have a good nerve. You didn't squirm when I shoved this
     gun at you."

     "It was not me that was in danger."

     "Who then?"

     "It was you, Councillor." McMurdo drew a cocked pistol from the side
     pocket of his peajacket. "I was covering you all the time. I guess my
     shot would have been as quick as yours."

     "By Gar!" McGinty flushed an angry red and then burst into a roar of
     laughter. "Say, we've had no such holy terror come to hand this many
     a year. I reckon the lodge will learn to be proud of you ... Well,
     what the hell do you want? And can't I speak alone with a gentleman
     for five minutes but you must butt in on us?"

     The bartender stood abashed. "I'm sorry, Councillor, but it's Ted
     Baldwin. He says he must see you this very minute."

     The message was unnecessary; for the set, cruel face of the man
     himself was looking over the servant's shoulder. He pushed the
     bartender out and closed the door on him.

     "So," said he with a furious glance at McMurdo, "you got here first,
     did you? I've a word to say to you, Councillor, about this man."

     "Then say it here and now before my face," cried McMurdo.

     "I'll say it at my own time, in my own way."

     "Tut! Tut!" said McGinty, getting off his barrel. "This will never
     do. We have a new brother here, Baldwin, and it's not for us to greet
     him in such fashion. Hold out your hand, man, and make it up!"

     "Never!" cried Baldwin in a fury.

     "I've offered to fight him if he thinks I have wronged him," said
     McMurdo. "I'll fight him with fists, or, if that won't satisfy him,
     I'll fight him any other way he chooses. Now, I'll leave it to you,
     Councillor, to judge between us as a Bodymaster should."

     "What is it, then?"

     "A young lady. She's free to choose for herself."

     "Is she?" cried Baldwin.

     "As between two brothers of the lodge I should say that she was,"
     said the Boss.

     "Oh, that's your ruling, is it?"

     "Yes, it is, Ted Baldwin," said McGinty, with a wicked stare. "Is it
     you that would dispute it?"

     "You would throw over one that has stood by you this five years in
     favour of a man that you never saw before in your life? You're not
     Bodymaster for life, Jack McGinty, and by God! when next it comes to
     a vote--"

     The Councillor sprang at him like a tiger. His hand closed round the
     other's neck, and he hurled him back across one of the barrels. In
     his mad fury he would have squeezed the life out of him if McMurdo
     had not interfered.

     "Easy, Councillor! For heaven's sake, go easy!" he cried, as he
     dragged him back.

     McGinty released his hold, and Baldwin, cowed and shaken gasping for
     breath, and shivering in every limb, as one who has looked over the
     very edge of death, sat up on the barrel over which he had been
     hurled.

     "You've been asking for it this many a day, Ted Baldwin--now you've
     got it!" cried McGinty, his huge chest rising and falling. "Maybe you
     think if I was voted down from Bodymaster you would find yourself in
     my shoes. It's for the lodge to say that. But so long as I am the
     chief I'll have no man lift his voice against me or my rulings."

     "I have nothing against you," mumbled Baldwin, feeling his throat.

     "Well, then," cried the other, relapsing in a moment into a bluff
     joviality, "we are all good friends again and there's an end of the
     matter."

     He took a bottle of champagne down from the shelf and twisted out the
     cork.

     "See now," he continued, as he filled three high glasses. "Let us
     drink the quarrelling toast of the lodge. After that, as you know,
     there can be no bad blood between us. Now, then the left hand on the
     apple of my throat. I say to you, Ted Baldwin, what is the offense,
     sir?"

     "The clouds are heavy," answered Baldwin.

     "But they will forever brighten."

     "And this I swear!"

     The men drank their glasses, and the same ceremony was performed
     between Baldwin and McMurdo

     "There!" cried McGinty, rubbing his hands. "That's the end of the
     black blood. You come under lodge discipline if it goes further, and
     that's a heavy hand in these parts, as Brother Baldwin knows--and as
     you will damn soon find out, Brother McMurdo, if you ask for
     trouble!"

     "Faith, I'd be slow to do that," said McMurdo. He held out his hand
     to Baldwin. "I'm quick to quarrel and quick to forgive. It's my hot
     Irish blood, they tell me. But it's over for me, and I bear no
     grudge."

     Baldwin had to take the proffered hand, for the baleful eye of the
     terrible Boss was upon him. But his sullen face showed how little the
     words of the other had moved him.

     McGinty clapped them both on the shoulders. "Tut! These girls! These
     girls!" he cried. "To think that the same petticoats should come
     between two of my boys! It's the devil's own luck! Well, it's the
     colleen inside of them that must settle the question for it's outside
     the jurisdiction of a Bodymaster--and the Lord be praised for that!
     We have enough on us, without the women as well. You'll have to be
     affiliated to Lodge 341, Brother McMurdo. We have our own ways and
     methods, different from Chicago. Saturday night is our meeting, and
     if you come then, we'll make you free forever of the Vermissa
     Valley."





          CHAPTER III
          Lodge 341, Vermissa


     On the day following the evening which had contained so many exciting
     events, McMurdo moved his lodgings from old Jacob Shafter's and took
     up his quarters at the Widow MacNamara's on the extreme outskirts of
     the town. Scanlan, his original acquaintance aboard the train, had
     occasion shortly afterwards to move into Vermissa, and the two lodged
     together. There was no other boarder, and the hostess was an
     easy-going old Irishwoman who left them to themselves; so that they
     had a freedom for speech and action welcome to men who had secrets in
     common.

     Shafter had relented to the extent of letting McMurdo come to his
     meals there when he liked; so that his intercourse with Ettie was by
     no means broken. On the contrary, it drew closer and more intimate as
     the weeks went by.

     In his bedroom at his new abode McMurdo felt it safe to take out the
     coining moulds, and under many a pledge of secrecy a number of
     brothers from the lodge were allowed to come in and see them, each
     carrying away in his pocket some examples of the false money, so
     cunningly struck that there was never the slightest difficulty or
     danger in passing it. Why, with such a wonderful art at his command,
     McMurdo should condescend to work at all was a perpetual mystery to
     his companions; though he made it clear to anyone who asked him that
     if he lived without any visible means it would very quickly bring the
     police upon his track.

     One policeman was indeed after him already; but the incident, as luck
     would have it, did the adventurer a great deal more good than harm.
     After the first introduction there were few evenings when he did not
     find his way to McGinty's saloon, there to make closer acquaintance
     with "the boys," which was the jovial title by which the dangerous
     gang who infested the place were known to one another. His dashing
     manner and fearlessness of speech made him a favourite with them all;
     while the rapid and scientific way in which he polished off his
     antagonist in an "all in" bar-room scrap earned the respect of that
     rough community. Another incident, however, raised him even higher in
     their estimation.

     Just at the crowded hour one night, the door opened and a man entered
     with the quiet blue uniform and peaked cap of the mine police. This
     was a special body raised by the railways and colliery owners to
     supplement the efforts of the ordinary civil police, who were
     perfectly helpless in the face of the organized ruffianism which
     terrorized the district. There was a hush as he entered, and many a
     curious glance was cast at him; but the relations between policemen
     and criminals are peculiar in some parts of the States, and McGinty
     himself standing behind his counter, showed no surprise when the
     policeman enrolled himself among his customers.

     "A straight whisky, for the night is bitter," said the police
     officer. "I don't think we have met before, Councillor?"

     "You'll be the new captain?" said McGinty.

     "That's so. We're looking to you, Councillor, and to the other
     leading citizens, to help us in upholding law and order in this
     township. Captain Marvin is my name."

     "We'd do better without you, Captain Marvin," said McGinty coldly;
     "for we have our own police of the township, and no need for any
     imported goods. What are you but the paid tool of the capitalists,
     hired by them to club or shoot your poorer fellow citizen?"

     "Well, well, we won't argue about that," said the police officer
     good-humouredly. "I expect we all do our duty same as we see it; but
     we can't all see it the same." He had drunk off his glass and had
     turned to go, when his eyes fell upon the face of Jack McMurdo, who
     was scowling at his elbow. "Hullo! Hullo!" he cried, looking him up
     and down. "Here's an old acquaintance!"

     McMurdo shrank away from him. "I was never a friend to you nor any
     other cursed copper in my life," said he.

     "An acquaintance isn't always a friend," said the police captain,
     grinning. "You're Jack McMurdo of Chicago, right enough, and don't
     you deny it!"

     McMurdo shrugged his shoulders. "I'm not denying it," said he. "D'ye
     think I'm ashamed of my own name?"

     "You've got good cause to be, anyhow."

     "What the devil d'you mean by that?" he roared with his fists
     clenched.

     "No, no, Jack, bluster won't do with me. I was an officer in Chicago
     before ever I came to this darned coal bunker, and I know a Chicago
     crook when I see one."

     McMurdo's face fell. "Don't tell me that you're Marvin of the Chicago
     Central!" he cried.

     "Just the same old Teddy Marvin, at your service. We haven't
     forgotten the shooting of Jonas Pinto up there."

     "I never shot him."

     "Did you not? That's good impartial evidence, ain't it? Well, his
     death came in uncommon handy for you, or they would have had you for
     shoving the queer. Well, we can let that be bygones; for, between you
     and me--and perhaps I'm going further than my duty in saying it--they
     could get no clear case against you, and Chicago's open to you
     to-morrow."

     "I'm very well where I am."

     "Well, I've given you the pointer, and you're a sulky dog not to
     thank me for it."

     "Well, I suppose you mean well, and I do thank you," said McMurdo in
     no very gracious manner.

     "It's mum with me so long as I see you living on the straight," said
     the captain. "But, by the Lord! if you get off after this, it's
     another story! So good-night to you--and goodnight, Councillor."

     He left the bar-room; but not before he had created a local hero.
     McMurdo's deeds in far Chicago had been whispered before. He had put
     off all questions with a smile, as one who did not wish to have
     greatness thrust upon him. But now the thing was officially
     confirmed. The bar loafers crowded round him and shook him heartily
     by the hand. He was free of the community from that time on. He could
     drink hard and show little trace of it; but that evening, had his
     mate Scanlan not been at hand to lead him home, the feted hero would
     surely have spent his night under the bar.

     On a Saturday night McMurdo was introduced to the lodge. He had
     thought to pass in without ceremony as being an initiate of Chicago;
     but there were particular rites in Vermissa of which they were proud,
     and these had to be undergone by every postulant. The assembly met in
     a large room reserved for such purposes at the Union House. Some
     sixty members assembled at Vermissa; but that by no means represented
     the full strength of the organization, for there were several other
     lodges in the valley, and others across the mountains on each side,
     who exchanged members when any serious business was afoot, so that a
     crime might be done by men who were strangers to the locality.
     Altogether there were not less than five hundred scattered over the
     coal district.

     In the bare assembly room the men were gathered round a long table.
     At the side was a second one laden with bottles and glasses, on which
     some members of the company were already turning their eyes. McGinty
     sat at the head with a flat black velvet cap upon his shock of
     tangled black hair, and a coloured purple stole round his neck, so
     that he seemed to be a priest presiding over some diabolical ritual.
     To right and left of him were the higher lodge officials, the cruel,
     handsome face of Ted Baldwin among them. Each of these wore some
     scarf or medallion as emblem of his office.

     They were, for the most part, men of mature age; but the rest of the
     company consisted of young fellows from eighteen to twenty-five, the
     ready and capable agents who carried out the commands of their
     seniors. Among the older men were many whose features showed the
     tigerish, lawless souls within; but looking at the rank and file it
     was difficult to believe that these eager and open-faced young
     fellows were in very truth a dangerous gang of murderers, whose minds
     had suffered such complete moral perversion that they took a horrible
     pride in their proficiency at the business, and looked with deepest
     respect at the man who had the reputation of making what they called
     "a clean job."

     To their contorted natures it had become a spirited and chivalrous
     thing to volunteer for service against some man who had never injured
     them, and whom in many cases they had never seen in their lives. The
     crime committed, they quarrelled as to who had actually struck the
     fatal blow, and amused one another and the company by describing the
     cries and contortions of the murdered man.

     At first they had shown some secrecy in their arrangements; but at
     the time which this narrative describes their proceedings were
     extraordinarily open, for the repeated failures of the law had proved
     to them that, on the one hand, no one would dare to witness against
     them, and on the other they had an unlimited number of stanch
     witnesses upon whom they could call, and a well-filled treasure chest
     from which they could draw the funds to engage the best legal talent
     in the state. In ten long years of outrage there had been no single
     conviction, and the only danger that ever threatened the Scowrers lay
     in the victim himself--who, however outnumbered and taken by
     surprise, might and occasionally did leave his mark upon his
     assailants.

     McMurdo had been warned that some ordeal lay before him; but no one
     would tell him in what it consisted. He was led now into an outer
     room by two solemn brothers. Through the plank partition he could
     hear the murmur of many voices from the assembly within. Once or
     twice he caught the sound of his own name, and he knew that they were
     discussing his candidacy. Then there entered an inner guard with a
     green and gold sash across his chest.

     "The Bodymaster orders that he shall be trussed, blinded, and
     entered," said he.

     The three of them removed his coat, turned up the sleeve of his right
     arm, and finally passed a rope round above the elbows and made it
     fast. They next placed a thick black cap right over his head and the
     upper part of his face, so that he could see nothing. He was then led
     into the assembly hall.

     It was pitch dark and very oppressive under his hood. He heard the
     rustle and murmur of the people round him, and then the voice of
     McGinty sounded dull and distant through the covering of his ears.

     "John McMurdo," said the voice, "are you already a member of the
     Ancient Order of Freemen?"

     He bowed in assent.

     "Is your lodge No. 29, Chicago?"

     He bowed again.

     "Dark nights are unpleasant," said the voice.

     "Yes, for strangers to travel," he answered.

     "The clouds are heavy."

     "Yes, a storm is approaching."

     "Are the brethren satisfied?" asked the Bodymaster.

     There was a general murmur of assent.

     "We know, Brother, by your sign and by your countersign that you are
     indeed one of us," said McGinty. "We would have you know, however,
     that in this county and in other counties of these parts we have
     certain rites, and also certain duties of our own which call for good
     men. Are you ready to be tested?"

     "I am."

     "Are you of stout heart?"

     "I am."

     "Take a stride forward to prove it."

     As the words were said he felt two hard points in front of his eyes,
     pressing upon them so that it appeared as if he could not move
     forward without a danger of losing them. None the less, he nerved
     himself to step resolutely out, and as he did so the pressure melted
     away. There was a low murmur of applause.

     "He is of stout heart," said the voice. "Can you bear pain?"

     "As well as another," he answered.

     "Test him!"

     It was all he could do to keep himself from screaming out, for an
     agonizing pain shot through his forearm. He nearly fainted at the
     sudden shock of it; but he bit his lip and clenched his hands to hide
     his agony.

     "I can take more than that," said he.

     This time there was loud applause. A finer first appearance had never
     been made in the lodge. Hands clapped him on the back, and the hood
     was plucked from his head. He stood blinking and smiling amid the
     congratulations of the brothers.

     "One last word, Brother McMurdo," said McGinty. "You have already
     sworn the oath of secrecy and fidelity, and you are aware that the
     punishment for any breach of it is instant and inevitable death?"

     "I am," said McMurdo.

     "And you accept the rule of the Bodymaster for the time being under
     all circumstances?"

     "I do."

     "Then in the name of Lodge 341, Vermissa, I welcome you to its
     privileges and debates. You will put the liquor on the table, Brother
     Scanlan, and we will drink to our worthy brother."

     McMurdo's coat had been brought to him; but before putting it on he
     examined his right arm, which still smarted heavily. There on the
     flesh of the forearm was a circle with a triangle within it, deep and
     red, as the branding iron had left it. One or two of his neighbours
     pulled up their sleeves and showed their own lodge marks.

     "We've all had it," said one; "but not all as brave as you over it."

     "Tut! It was nothing," said he; but it burned and ached all the same.

     When the drinks which followed the ceremony of initiation had all
     been disposed of, the business of the lodge proceeded. McMurdo,
     accustomed only to the prosaic performances of Chicago, listened with
     open ears and more surprise than he ventured to show to what
     followed.

     "The first business on the agenda paper," said McGinty, "is to read
     the following letter from Division Master Windle of Merton County
     Lodge 249. He says:

     "Dear Sir:
     "There is a job to be done on Andrew Rae of Rae & Sturmash, coal
     owners near this place. You will remember that your lodge owes us a
     return, having had the service of two brethren in the matter of the
     patrolman last fall. You will send two good men, they will be taken
     charge of by Treasurer Higgins of this lodge, whose address you know.
     He will show them when to act and where. Yours in freedom,
     "J. W. Windle D. M. A. O. F.

     "Windle has never refused us when we have had occasion to ask for the
     loan of a man or two, and it is not for us to refuse him." McGinty
     paused and looked round the room with his dull, malevolent eyes. "Who
     will volunteer for the job?"

     Several young fellows held up their hands. The Bodymaster looked at
     them with an approving smile.

     "You'll do, Tiger Cormac. If you handle it as well as you did the
     last, you won't be wrong. And you, Wilson."

     "I've no pistol," said the volunteer, a mere boy in his teens.

     "It's your first, is it not? Well, you have to be blooded some time.
     It will be a great start for you. As to the pistol, you'll find it
     waiting for you, or I'm mistaken. If you report yourselves on Monday,
     it will be time enough. You'll get a great welcome when you return."

     "Any reward this time?" asked Cormac, a thick-set, dark-faced,
     brutal-looking young man, whose ferocity had earned him the nickname
     of "Tiger."

     "Never mind the reward. You just do it for the honour of the thing.
     Maybe when it is done there will be a few odd dollars at the bottom
     of the box."

     "What has the man done?" asked young Wilson.

     "Sure, it's not for the likes of you to ask what the man has done. He
     has been judged over there. That's no business of ours. All we have
     to do is to carry it out for them, same as they would for us.
     Speaking of that, two brothers from the Merton lodge are coming over
     to us next week to do some business in this quarter."

     "Who are they?" asked someone.

     "Faith, it is wiser not to ask. If you know nothing, you can testify
     nothing, and no trouble can come of it. But they are men who will
     make a clean job when they are about it."

     "And time, too!" cried Ted Baldwin. "Folk are gettin' out of hand in
     these parts. It was only last week that three of our men were turned
     off by Foreman Blaker. It's been owing him a long time, and he'll get
     it full and proper."

     "Get what?" McMurdo whispered to his neighbour.

     "The business end of a buckshot cartridge!" cried the man with a loud
     laugh. "What think you of our ways, Brother?"

     McMurdo's criminal soul seemed to have already absorbed the spirit of
     the vile association of which he was now a member. "I like it well,"
     said he. "'Tis a proper place for a lad of mettle."

     Several of those who sat around heard his words and applauded them.

     "What's that?" cried the black-maned Bodymaster from the end of the
     table.

     "'Tis our new brother, sir, who finds our ways to his taste."

     McMurdo rose to his feet for an instant. "I would say, Eminent
     Bodymaster, that if a man should be wanted I should take it as an
     honour to be chosen to help the lodge."

     There was great applause at this. It was felt that a new sun was
     pushing its rim above the horizon. To some of the elders it seemed
     that the progress was a little too rapid.

     "I would move," said the secretary, Harraway, a vulture-faced old
     graybeard who sat near the chairman, "that Brother McMurdo should
     wait until it is the good pleasure of the lodge to employ him."

     "Sure, that was what I meant; I'm in your hands," said McMurdo.

     "Your time will come, Brother," said the chairman. "We have marked
     you down as a willing man, and we believe that you will do good work
     in these parts. There is a small matter to-night in which you may
     take a hand if it so please you."

     "I will wait for something that is worth while."

     "You can come to-night, anyhow, and it will help you to know what we
     stand for in this community. I will make the announcement later.
     Meanwhile," he glanced at his agenda paper, "I have one or two more
     points to bring before the meeting. First of all, I will ask the
     treasurer as to our bank balance. There is the pension to Jim
     Carnaway's widow. He was struck down doing the work of the lodge, and
     it is for us to see that she is not the loser."

     "Jim was shot last month when they tried to kill Chester Wilcox of
     Marley Creek," McMurdo's neighbour informed him.

     "The funds are good at the moment," said the treasurer, with the
     bankbook in front of him. "The firms have been generous of late. Max
     Linder & Co. paid five hundred to be left alone. Walker Brothers sent
     in a hundred; but I took it on myself to return it and ask for five.
     If I do not hear by Wednesday, their winding gear may get out of
     order. We had to burn their breaker last year before they became
     reasonable. Then the West Section Coaling Company has paid its annual
     contribution. We have enough on hand to meet any obligations."

     "What about Archie Swindon?" asked a brother.

     "He has sold out and left the district. The old devil left a note for
     us to say that he had rather be a free crossing sweeper in New York
     than a large mine owner under the power of a ring of blackmailers. By
     Gar! it was as well that he made a break for it before the note
     reached us! I guess he won't show his face in this valley again."

     An elderly, clean-shaved man with a kindly face and a good brow rose
     from the end of the table which faced the chairman. "Mr. Treasurer,"
     he asked, "may I ask who has bought the property of this man that we
     have driven out of the district?"

     "Yes, Brother Morris. It has been bought by the State & Merton County
     Railroad Company."

     "And who bought the mines of Todman and of Lee that came into the
     market in the same way last year?"

     "The same company, Brother Morris."

     "And who bought the ironworks of Manson and of Shuman and of Van
     Deher and of Atwood, which have all been given up of late?"

     "They were all bought by the West Gilmerton General Mining Company."

     "I don't see, Brother Morris," said the chairman, "that it matters to
     us who buys them, since they can't carry them out of the district."

     "With all respect to you, Eminent Bodymaster, I think it may matter
     very much to us. This process has been going on now for ten long
     years. We are gradually driving all the small men out of trade. What
     is the result? We find in their places great companies like the
     Railroad or the General Iron, who have their directors in New York or
     Philadelphia, and care nothing for our threats. We can take it out of
     their local bosses, but it only means that others will be sent in
     their stead. And we are making it dangerous for ourselves. The small
     men could not harm us. They had not the money nor the power. So long
     as we did not squeeze them too dry, they would stay on under our
     power. But if these big companies find that we stand between them and
     their profits, they will spare no pains and no expense to hunt us
     down and bring us to court."

     There was a hush at these ominous words, and every face darkened as
     gloomy looks were exchanged. So omnipotent and unchallenged had they
     been that the very thought that there was possible retribution in the
     background had been banished from their minds. And yet the idea
     struck a chill to the most reckless of them.

     "It is my advice," the speaker continued, "that we go easier upon the
     small men. On the day that they have all been driven out the power of
     this society will have been broken."

     Unwelcome truths are not popular. There were angry cries as the
     speaker resumed his seat. McGinty rose with gloom upon his brow.

     "Brother Morris," said he, "you were always a croaker. So long as the
     members of this lodge stand together there is no power in the United
     States that can touch them. Sure, have we not tried it often enough
     in the law courts? I expect the big companies will find it easier to
     pay than to fight, same as the little companies do. And now,
     Brethren," McGinty took off his black velvet cap and his stole as he
     spoke, "this lodge has finished its business for the evening, save
     for one small matter which may be mentioned when we are parting. The
     time has now come for fraternal refreshment and for harmony."

     Strange indeed is human nature. Here were these men, to whom murder
     was familiar, who again and again had struck down the father of the
     family, some man against whom they had no personal feeling, without
     one thought of compunction or of compassion for his weeping wife or
     helpless children, and yet the tender or pathetic in music could move
     them to tears. McMurdo had a fine tenor voice, and if he had failed
     to gain the good will of the lodge before, it could no longer have
     been withheld after he had thrilled them with "I'm Sitting on the
     Stile, Mary," and "On the Banks of Allan Water."

     In his very first night the new recruit had made himself one of the
     most popular of the brethren, marked already for advancement and high
     office. There were other qualities needed, however, besides those of
     good fellowship, to make a worthy Freeman, and of these he was given
     an example before the evening was over. The whisky bottle had passed
     round many times, and the men were flushed and ripe for mischief when
     their Bodymaster rose once more to address them.

     "Boys," said he, "there's one man in this town that wants trimming
     up, and it's for you to see that he gets it. I'm speaking of James
     Stanger of the Herald. You've seen how he's been opening his mouth
     against us again?"

     There was a murmur of assent, with many a muttered oath. McGinty took
     a slip of paper from his waistcoat pocket.

                                 Law and Order!

     That's how he heads it.

                 "Reign of terror in the coal and iron district
     "Twelve years have now elapsed since the first assassinations which
     proved the existence of a criminal organization in our midst. From
     that day these outrages have never ceased, until now they have
     reached a pitch which makes us the opprobrium of the civilized world.
     Is it for such results as this that our great country welcomes to its
     bosom the alien who flies from the despotisms of Europe? Is it that
     they shall themselves become tyrants over the very men who have given
     them shelter, and that a state of terrorism and lawlessness should be
     established under the very shadow of the sacred folds of the starry
     Flag of Freedom which would raise horror in our minds if we read of
     it as existing under the most effete monarchy of the East? The men
     are known. The organization is patent and public. How long are we to
     endure it? Can we forever live--

     Sure, I've read enough of the slush!" cried the chairman, tossing the
     paper down upon the table. "That's what he says of us. The question
     I'm asking you is what shall we say to him?"

     "Kill him!" cried a dozen fierce voices.

     "I protest against that," said Brother Morris, the man of the good
     brow and shaved face. "I tell you, Brethren, that our hand is too
     heavy in this valley, and that there will come a point where in
     self-defense every man will unite to crush us out. James Stanger is
     an old man. He is respected in the township and the district. His
     paper stands for all that is solid in the valley. If that man is
     struck down, there will be a stir through this state that will only
     end with our destruction."

     "And how would they bring about our destruction, Mr. Standback?"
     cried McGinty. "Is it by the police? Sure, half of them are in our
     pay and half of them afraid of us. Or is it by the law courts and the
     judge? Haven't we tried that before now, and what ever came of it?"

     "There is a Judge Lynch that might try the case," said Brother
     Morris.

     A general shout of anger greeted the suggestion.

     "I have but to raise my finger," cried McGinty, "and I could put two
     hundred men into this town that would clear it out from end to end."
     Then suddenly raising his voice and bending his huge black brows into
     a terrible frown, "See here, Brother Morris, I have my eye on you,
     and have had for some time! You've no heart yourself, and you try to
     take the heart out of others. It will be an ill day for you, Brother
     Morris, when your own name comes on our agenda paper, and I'm
     thinking that it's just there that I ought to place it."

     Morris had turned deadly pale, and his knees seemed to give way under
     him as he fell back into his chair. He raised his glass in his
     trembling hand and drank before he could answer. "I apologize,
     Eminent Bodymaster, to you and to every brother in this lodge if I
     have said more than I should. I am a faithful member--you all know
     that--and it is my fear lest evil come to the lodge which makes me
     speak in anxious words. But I have greater trust in your judgment
     than in my own, Eminent Bodymaster, and I promise you that I will not
     offend again."

     The Bodymaster's scowl relaxed as he listened to the humble words.
     "Very good, Brother Morris. It's myself that would be sorry if it
     were needful to give you a lesson. But so long as I am in this chair
     we shall be a united lodge in word and in deed. And now, boys," he
     continued, looking round at the company, "I'll say this much, that if
     Stanger got his full deserts there would be more trouble than we need
     ask for. These editors hang together, and every journal in the state
     would be crying out for police and troops. But I guess you can give
     him a pretty severe warning. Will you fix it, Brother Baldwin?"

     "Sure!" said the young man eagerly.

     "How many will you take?"

     "Half a dozen, and two to guard the door. You'll come, Gower, and
     you, Mansel, and you, Scanlan, and the two Willabys."

     "I promised the new brother he should go," said the chairman.

     Ted Baldwin looked at McMurdo with eyes which showed that he had not
     forgotten nor forgiven. "Well, he can come if he wants," he said in a
     surly voice. "That's enough. The sooner we get to work the better."

     The company broke up with shouts and yells and snatches of drunken
     song. The bar was still crowded with revellers, and many of the
     brethren remained there. The little band who had been told off for
     duty passed out into the street, proceeding in twos and threes along
     the sidewalk so as not to provoke attention. It was a bitterly cold
     night, with a half-moon shining brilliantly in a frosty,
     star-spangled sky. The men stopped and gathered in a yard which faced
     a high building. The words "Vermissa Herald" were printed in gold
     lettering between the brightly lit windows. From within came the
     clanking of the printing press.

     "Here, you," said Baldwin to McMurdo, "you can stand below at the
     door and see that the road is kept open for us. Arthur Willaby can
     stay with you. You others come with me. Have no fears, boys; for we
     have a dozen witnesses that we are in the Union Bar at this very
     moment."

     It was nearly midnight, and the street was deserted save for one or
     two revellers upon their way home. The party crossed the road, and,
     pushing open the door of the newspaper office, Baldwin and his men
     rushed in and up the stair which faced them. McMurdo and another
     remained below. From the room above came a shout, a cry for help, and
     then the sound of trampling feet and of falling chairs. An instant
     later a gray-haired man rushed out on the landing.

     He was seized before he could get farther, and his spectacles came
     tinkling down to McMurdo's feet. There was a thud and a groan. He was
     on his face, and half a dozen sticks were clattering together as they
     fell upon him. He writhed, and his long, thin limbs quivered under
     the blows. The others ceased at last; but Baldwin, his cruel face set
     in an infernal smile, was hacking at the man's head, which he vainly
     endeavoured to defend with his arms. His white hair was dabbled with
     patches of blood. Baldwin was still stooping over his victim, putting
     in a short, vicious blow whenever he could see a part exposed, when
     McMurdo dashed up the stair and pushed him back.

     "You'll kill the man," said he. "Drop it!"

     Baldwin looked at him in amazement. "Curse you!" he cried. "Who are
     you to interfere--you that are new to the lodge? Stand back!" He
     raised his stick; but McMurdo had whipped his pistol out of his hip
     pocket.

     "Stand back yourself!" he cried. "I'll blow your face in if you lay a
     hand on me. As to the lodge, wasn't it the order of the Bodymaster
     that the man was not to be killed--and what are you doing but killing
     him?"

     "It's truth he says," remarked one of the men.

     "By Gar! you'd best hurry yourselves!" cried the man below. "The
     windows are all lighting up, and you'll have the whole town here
     inside of five minutes."

     There was indeed the sound of shouting in the street, and a little
     group of compositors and pressmen was forming in the hall below and
     nerving itself to action. Leaving the limp and motionless body of the
     editor at the head of the stair, the criminals rushed down and made
     their way swiftly along the street. Having reached the Union House,
     some of them mixed with the crowd in McGinty's saloon, whispering
     across the bar to the Boss that the job had been well carried
     through. Others, and among them McMurdo, broke away into side
     streets, and so by devious paths to their own homes.





          CHAPTER IV
          The Valley of Fear


     When McMurdo awoke next morning he had good reason to remember his
     initiation into the lodge. His head ached with the effect of the
     drink, and his arm, where he had been branded, was hot and swollen.
     Having his own peculiar source of income, he was irregular in his
     attendance at his work; so he had a late breakfast, and remained at
     home for the morning writing a long letter to a friend. Afterwards he
     read the Daily Herald. In a special column put in at the last moment
     he read:

            Outrage at the herald office -- Editor seriously injured

     It was a short account of the facts with which he was himself more
     familiar than the writer could have been. It ended with the
     statement:

     The matter is now in the hands of the police; but it can hardly be
     hoped that their exertions will be attended by any better results
     than in the past. Some of the men were recognized, and there is hope
     that a conviction may be obtained. The source of the outrage was, it
     need hardly be said, that infamous society which has held this
     community in bondage for so long a period, and against which the
     Herald has taken so uncompromising a stand. Mr. Stanger's many
     friends will rejoice to hear that, though he has been cruelly and
     brutally beaten, and though he has sustained severe injuries about
     the head, there is no immediate danger to his life.

     Below it stated that a guard of police, armed with Winchester rifles,
     had been requisitioned for the defense of the office.

     McMurdo had laid down the paper, and was lighting his pipe with a
     hand which was shaky from the excesses of the previous evening, when
     there was a knock outside, and his landlady brought to him a note
     which had just been handed in by a lad. It was unsigned, and ran
     thus:

     I should wish to speak to you, but would rather not do so in your
     house. You will find me beside the flagstaff upon Miller Hill. If you
     will come there now, I have something which it is important for you
     to hear and for me to say.

     McMurdo read the note twice with the utmost surprise; for he could
     not imagine what it meant or who was the author of it. Had it been in
     a feminine hand, he might have imagined that it was the beginning of
     one of those adventures which had been familiar enough in his past
     life. But it was the writing of a man, and of a well educated one,
     too. Finally, after some hesitation, he determined to see the matter
     through.

     Miller Hill is an ill-kept public park in the very centre of the
     town. In summer it is a favourite resort of the people; but in winter
     it is desolate enough. From the top of it one has a view not only of
     the whole straggling, grimy town, but of the winding valley beneath,
     with its scattered mines and factories blackening the snow on each
     side of it, and of the wooded and white-capped ranges flanking it.

     McMurdo strolled up the winding path hedged in with evergreens until
     he reached the deserted restaurant which forms the centre of summer
     gaiety. Beside it was a bare flagstaff, and underneath it a man, his
     hat drawn down and the collar of his overcoat turned up. When he
     turned his face McMurdo saw that it was Brother Morris, he who had
     incurred the anger of the Bodymaster the night before. The lodge sign
     was given and exchanged as they met.

     "I wanted to have a word with you, Mr. McMurdo," said the older man,
     speaking with a hesitation which showed that he was on delicate
     ground. "It was kind of you to come."

     "Why did you not put your name to the note?"

     "One has to be cautious, mister. One never knows in times like these
     how a thing may come back to one. One never knows either who to trust
     or who not to trust."

     "Surely one may trust brothers of the lodge."

     "No, no, not always," cried Morris with vehemence. "Whatever we say,
     even what we think, seems to go back to that man McGinty."

     "Look here!" said McMurdo sternly. "It was only last night, as you
     know well, that I swore good faith to our Bodymaster. Would you be
     asking me to break my oath?"

     "If that is the view you take," said Morris sadly, "I can only say
     that I am sorry I gave you the trouble to come and meet me. Things
     have come to a bad pass when two free citizens cannot speak their
     thoughts to each other."

     McMurdo, who had been watching his companion very narrowly, relaxed
     somewhat in his bearing. "Sure I spoke for myself only," said he. "I
     am a newcomer, as you know, and I am strange to it all. It is not for
     me to open my mouth, Mr. Morris, and if you think well to say
     anything to me I am here to hear it."

     "And to take it back to Boss McGinty!" said Morris bitterly.

     "Indeed, then, you do me injustice there," cried McMurdo. "For myself
     I am loyal to the lodge, and so I tell you straight; but I would be a
     poor creature if I were to repeat to any other what you might say to
     me in confidence. It will go no further than me; though I warn you
     that you may get neither help nor sympathy."

     "I have given up looking for either the one or the other," said
     Morris. "I may be putting my very life in your hands by what I say;
     but, bad as you are--and it seemed to me last night that you were
     shaping to be as bad as the worst--still you are new to it, and your
     conscience cannot yet be as hardened as theirs. That was why I
     thought to speak with you."

     "Well, what have you to say?"

     "If you give me away, may a curse be on you!"

     "Sure, I said I would not."

     "I would ask you, then, when you joined the Freeman's society in
     Chicago and swore vows of charity and fidelity, did ever it cross
     your mind that you might find it would lead you to crime?"

     "If you call it crime," McMurdo answered.

     "Call it crime!" cried Morris, his voice vibrating with passion. "You
     have seen little of it if you can call it anything else. Was it crime
     last night when a man old enough to be your father was beaten till
     the blood dripped from his white hairs? Was that crime--or what else
     would you call it?"

     "There are some would say it was war," said McMurdo, "a war of two
     classes with all in, so that each struck as best it could."

     "Well, did you think of such a thing when you joined the Freeman's
     society at Chicago?"

     "No, I'm bound to say I did not."

     "Nor did I when I joined it at Philadelphia. It was just a benefit
     club and a meeting place for one's fellows. Then I heard of this
     place--curse the hour that the name first fell upon my ears!--and I
     came to better myself! My God! to better myself! My wife and three
     children came with me. I started a dry goods store on Market Square,
     and I prospered well. The word had gone round that I was a Freeman,
     and I was forced to join the local lodge, same as you did last night.
     I've the badge of shame on my forearm and something worse branded on
     my heart. I found that I was under the orders of a black villain and
     caught in a meshwork of crime. What could I do? Every word I said to
     make things better was taken as treason, same as it was last night. I
     can't get away; for all I have in the world is in my store. If I
     leave the society, I know well that it means murder to me, and God
     knows what to my wife and children. Oh, man, it is awful--awful!" He
     put his hands to his face, and his body shook with convulsive sobs.

     McMurdo shrugged his shoulders. "You were too soft for the job," said
     he. "You are the wrong sort for such work."

     "I had a conscience and a religion; but they made me a criminal among
     them. I was chosen for a job. If I backed down I knew well what would
     come to me. Maybe I'm a coward. Maybe it's the thought of my poor
     little woman and the children that makes me one. Anyhow I went. I
     guess it will haunt me forever.

     "It was a lonely house, twenty miles from here, over the range
     yonder. I was told off for the door, same as you were last night.
     They could not trust me with the job. The others went in. When they
     came out their hands were crimson to the wrists. As we turned away a
     child was screaming out of the house behind us. It was a boy of five
     who had seen his father murdered. I nearly fainted with the horror of
     it, and yet I had to keep a bold and smiling face; for well I knew
     that if I did not it would be out of my house that they would come
     next with their bloody hands and it would be my little Fred that
     would be screaming for his father.

     "But I was a criminal then, part sharer in a murder, lost forever in
     this world, and lost also in the next. I am a good Catholic; but the
     priest would have no word with me when he heard I was a Scowrer, and
     I am excommunicated from my faith. That's how it stands with me. And
     I see you going down the same road, and I ask you what the end is to
     be. Are you ready to be a cold-blooded murderer also, or can we do
     anything to stop it?"

     "What would you do?" asked McMurdo abruptly. "You would not inform?"

     "God forbid!" cried Morris. "Sure, the very thought would cost me my
     life."

     "That's well," said McMurdo. "I'm thinking that you are a weak man
     and that you make too much of the matter."

     "Too much! Wait till you have lived here longer. Look down the
     valley! See the cloud of a hundred chimneys that overshadows it! I
     tell you that the cloud of murder hangs thicker and lower than that
     over the heads of the people. It is the Valley of Fear, the Valley of
     Death. The terror is in the hearts of the people from the dusk to the
     dawn. Wait, young man, and you will learn for yourself."

     "Well, I'll let you know what I think when I have seen more," said
     McMurdo carelessly. "What is very clear is that you are not the man
     for the place, and that the sooner you sell out--if you only get a
     dime a dollar for what the business is worth--the better it will be
     for you. What you have said is safe with me; but, by Gar! if I
     thought you were an informer--"

     "No, no!" cried Morris piteously.

     "Well, let it rest at that. I'll bear what you have said in mind, and
     maybe some day I'll come back to it. I expect you meant kindly by
     speaking to me like this. Now I'll be getting home."

     "One word before you go," said Morris. "We may have been seen
     together. They may want to know what we have spoken about."

     "Ah! that's well thought of."

     "I offer you a clerkship in my store."

     "And I refuse it. That's our business. Well, so long, Brother Morris,
     and may you find things go better with you in the future."

     That same afternoon, as McMurdo sat smoking, lost in thought beside
     the stove of his sitting-room, the door swung open and its framework
     was filled with the huge figure of Boss McGinty. He passed the sign,
     and then seating himself opposite to the young man he looked at him
     steadily for some time, a look which was as steadily returned.

     "I'm not much of a visitor, Brother McMurdo," he said at last. "I
     guess I am too busy over the folk that visit me. But I thought I'd
     stretch a point and drop down to see you in your own house."

     "I'm proud to see you here, Councillor," McMurdo answered heartily,
     bringing his whisky bottle out of the cupboard. "It's an honour that
     I had not expected."

     "How's the arm?" asked the Boss.

     McMurdo made a wry face. "Well, I'm not forgetting it," he said; "but
     it's worth it."

     "Yes, it's worth it," the other answered, "to those that are loyal
     and go through with it and are a help to the lodge. What were you
     speaking to Brother Morris about on Miller Hill this morning?"

     The question came so suddenly that it was well that he had his answer
     prepared. He burst into a hearty laugh. "Morris didn't know I could
     earn a living here at home. He shan't know either; for he has got too
     much conscience for the likes of me. But he's a good-hearted old
     chap. It was his idea that I was at a loose end, and that he would do
     me a good turn by offering me a clerkship in a dry goods store."

     "Oh, that was it?"

     "Yes, that was it."

     "And you refused it?"

     "Sure. Couldn't I earn ten times as much in my own bedroom with four
     hours' work?"

     "That's so. But I wouldn't get about too much with Morris."

     "Why not?"

     "Well, I guess because I tell you not. That's enough for most folk in
     these parts."

     "It may be enough for most folk; but it ain't enough for me,
     Councillor," said McMurdo boldly. "If you are a judge of men, you'll
     know that."

     The swarthy giant glared at him, and his hairy paw closed for an
     instant round the glass as though he would hurl it at the head of his
     companion. Then he laughed in his loud, boisterous, insincere
     fashion.

     "You're a queer card, for sure," said he. "Well, if you want reasons,
     I'll give them. Did Morris say nothing to you against the lodge?"

     "No."

     "Nor against me?"

     "No."

     "Well, that's because he daren't trust you. But in his heart he is
     not a loyal brother. We know that well. So we watch him and we wait
     for the time to admonish him. I'm thinking that the time is drawing
     near. There's no room for scabby sheep in our pen. But if you keep
     company with a disloyal man, we might think that you were disloyal,
     too. See?"

     "There's no chance of my keeping company with him; for I dislike the
     man," McMurdo answered. "As to being disloyal, if it was any man but
     you he would not use the word to me twice."

     "Well, that's enough," said McGinty, draining off his glass. "I came
     down to give you a word in season, and you've had it."

     "I'd like to know," said McMurdo, "how you ever came to learn that I
     had spoken with Morris at all?"

     McGinty laughed. "It's my business to know what goes on in this
     township," said he. "I guess you'd best reckon on my hearing all that
     passes. Well, time's up, and I'll just say--"

     But his leavetaking was cut short in a very unexpected fashion. With
     a sudden crash the door flew open, and three frowning, intent faces
     glared in at them from under the peaks of police caps. McMurdo sprang
     to his feet and half drew his revolver; but his arm stopped midway as
     he became conscious that two Winchester rifles were levelled at his
     head. A man in uniform advanced into the room, a six-shooter in his
     hand. It was Captain Marvin, once of Chicago, and now of the Mine
     Constabulary. He shook his head with a half-smile at McMurdo.

     "I thought you'd be getting into trouble, Mr. Crooked McMurdo of
     Chicago," said he. "Can't keep out of it, can you? Take your hat and
     come along with us."

     "I guess you'll pay for this, Captain Marvin," said McGinty. "Who are
     you, I'd like to know, to break into a house in this fashion and
     molest honest, law-abiding men?"

     "You're standing out in this deal, Councillor McGinty," said the
     police captain. "We are not out after you, but after this man
     McMurdo. It is for you to help, not to hinder us in our duty,"

     "He is a friend of mine, and I'll answer for his conduct," said the
     Boss.

     "By all accounts, Mr. McGinty, you may have to answer for your own
     conduct some of these days," the captain answered. "This man McMurdo
     was a crook before ever he came here, and he's a crook still. Cover
     him, Patrolman, while I disarm him."

     "There's my pistol," said McMurdo coolly. "Maybe, Captain Marvin, if
     you and I were alone and face to face you would not take me so
     easily."

     "Where's your warrant?" asked McGinty. "By Gar! a man might as well
     live in Russia as in Vermissa while folk like you are running the
     police. It's a capitalist outrage, and you'll hear more of it, I
     reckon."

     "You do what you think is your duty the best way you can, Councillor.
     We'll look after ours."

     "What am I accused of?" asked McMurdo.

     "Of being concerned in the beating of old Editor Stanger at the
     Herald office. It wasn't your fault that it isn't a murder charge."

     "Well, if that's all you have against him," cried McGinty with a
     laugh, "you can save yourself a deal of trouble by dropping it right
     now. This man was with me in my saloon playing poker up to midnight,
     and I can bring a dozen to prove it."

     "That's your affair, and I guess you can settle it in court
     to-morrow. Meanwhile, come on, McMurdo, and come quietly if you don't
     want a gun across your head. You stand wide, Mr. McGinty; for I warn
     you I will stand no resistance when I am on duty!"

     So determined was the appearance of the captain that both McMurdo and
     his boss were forced to accept the situation. The latter managed to
     have a few whispered words with the prisoner before they parted.

     "What about--" he jerked his thumb upward to signify the coining
     plant.

     "All right," whispered McMurdo, who had devised a safe hiding place
     under the floor.

     "I'll bid you good-bye," said the Boss, shaking hands. "I'll see
     Reilly the lawyer and take the defense upon myself. Take my word for
     it that they won't be able to hold you."

     "I wouldn't bet on that. Guard the prisoner, you two, and shoot him
     if he tries any games. I'll search the house before I leave."

     He did so; but apparently found no trace of the concealed plant. When
     he had descended he and his men escorted McMurdo to headquarters.
     Darkness had fallen, and a keen blizzard was blowing so that the
     streets were nearly deserted; but a few loiterers followed the group,
     and emboldened by invisibility shouted imprecations at the prisoner.

     "Lynch the cursed Scowrer!" they cried. "Lynch him!" They laughed and
     jeered as he was pushed into the police station. After a short,
     formal examination from the inspector in charge he was put into the
     common cell. Here he found Baldwin and three other criminals of the
     night before, all arrested that afternoon and waiting their trial
     next morning.

     But even within this inner fortress of the law the long arm of the
     Freemen was able to extend. Late at night there came a jailer with a
     straw bundle for their bedding, out of which he extracted two bottles
     of whisky, some glasses, and a pack of cards. They spent a hilarious
     night, without an anxious thought as to the ordeal of the morning.

     Nor had they cause, as the result was to show. The magistrate could
     not possibly, on the evidence, have held them for a higher court. On
     the one hand the compositors and pressmen were forced to admit that
     the light was uncertain, that they were themselves much perturbed,
     and that it was difficult for them to swear to the identity of the
     assailants; although they believed that the accused were among them.
     Cross examined by the clever attorney who had been engaged by
     McGinty, they were even more nebulous in their evidence.

     The injured man had already deposed that he was so taken by surprise
     by the suddenness of the attack that he could state nothing beyond
     the fact that the first man who struck him wore a moustache. He added
     that he knew them to be Scowrers, since no one else in the community
     could possibly have any enmity to him, and he had long been
     threatened on account of his outspoken editorials. On the other hand,
     it was clearly shown by the united and unfaltering evidence of six
     citizens, including that high municipal official, Councillor McGinty,
     that the men had been at a card party at the Union House until an
     hour very much later than the commission of the outrage.

     Needless to say that they were discharged with something very near to
     an apology from the bench for the inconvenience to which they had
     been put, together with an implied censure of Captain Marvin and the
     police for their officious zeal.

     The verdict was greeted with loud applause by a court in which
     McMurdo saw many familiar faces. Brothers of the lodge smiled and
     waved. But there were others who sat with compressed lips and
     brooding eyes as the men filed out of the dock. One of them, a
     little, dark-bearded, resolute fellow, put the thoughts of himself
     and comrades into words as the ex-prisoners passed him.

     "You damned murderers!" he said. "We'll fix you yet!"





          CHAPTER V
          The Darkest Hour


     If anything had been needed to give an impetus to Jack McMurdo's
     popularity among his fellows it would have been his arrest and
     acquittal. That a man on the very night of joining the lodge should
     have done something which brought him before the magistrate was a new
     record in the annals of the society. Already he had earned the
     reputation of a good boon companion, a cheery reveller, and withal a
     man of high temper, who would not take an insult even from the
     all-powerful Boss himself. But in addition to this he impressed his
     comrades with the idea that among them all there was not one whose
     brain was so ready to devise a bloodthirsty scheme, or whose hand
     would be more capable of carrying it out. "He'll be the boy for the
     clean job," said the oldsters to one another, and waited their time
     until they could set him to his work.

     McGinty had instruments enough already; but he recognized that this
     was a supremely able one. He felt like a man holding a fierce
     bloodhound in leash. There were curs to do the smaller work; but some
     day he would slip this creature upon its prey. A few members of the
     lodge, Ted Baldwin among them, resented the rapid rise of the
     stranger and hated him for it; but they kept clear of him, for he was
     as ready to fight as to laugh.

     But if he gained favour with his fellows, there was another quarter,
     one which had become even more vital to him, in which he lost it.
     Ettie Shafter's father would have nothing more to do with him, nor
     would he allow him to enter the house. Ettie herself was too deeply
     in love to give him up altogether, and yet her own good sense warned
     her of what would come from a marriage with a man who was regarded as
     a criminal.

     One morning after a sleepless night she determined to see him,
     possibly for the last time, and make one strong endeavour to draw him
     from those evil influences which were sucking him down. She went to
     his house, as he had often begged her to do, and made her way into
     the room which he used as his sitting-room. He was seated at a table,
     with his back turned and a letter in front of him. A sudden spirit of
     girlish mischief came over her--she was still only nineteen. He had
     not heard her when she pushed open the door. Now she tiptoed forward
     and laid her hand lightly upon his bended shoulders.

     If she had expected to startle him, she certainly succeeded; but only
     in turn to be startled herself. With a tiger spring he turned on her,
     and his right hand was feeling for her throat. At the same instant
     with the other hand he crumpled up the paper that lay before him. For
     an instant he stood glaring. Then astonishment and joy took the place
     of the ferocity which had convulsed his features--a ferocity which
     had sent her shrinking back in horror as from something which had
     never before intruded into her gentle life.

     "It's you!" said he, mopping his brow. "And to think that you should
     come to me, heart of my heart, and I should find nothing better to do
     than to want to strangle you! Come then, darling," and he held out
     his arms, "let me make it up to you."

     But she had not recovered from that sudden glimpse of guilty fear
     which she had read in the man's face. All her woman's instinct told
     her that it was not the mere fright of a man who is startled.
     Guilt--that was it--guilt and fear!

     "What's come over you, Jack?" she cried. "Why were you so scared of
     me? Oh, Jack, if your conscience was at ease, you would not have
     looked at me like that!"

     "Sure, I was thinking of other things, and when you came tripping so
     lightly on those fairy feet of yours--"

     "No, no, it was more than that, Jack." Then a sudden suspicion seized
     her. "Let me see that letter you were writing."

     "Ah, Ettie, I couldn't do that."

     Her suspicions became certainties. "It's to another woman," she
     cried. "I know it! Why else should you hold it from me? Was it to
     your wife that you were writing? How am I to know that you are not a
     married man--you, a stranger, that nobody knows?"

     "I am not married, Ettie. See now, I swear it! You're the only one
     woman on earth to me. By the cross of Christ I swear it!"

     He was so white with passionate earnestness that she could not but
     believe him.

     "Well, then," she cried, "why will you not show me the letter?"

     "I'll tell you, acushla," said he. "I'm under oath not to show it,
     and just as I wouldn't break my word to you so I would keep it to
     those who hold my promise. It's the business of the lodge, and even
     to you it's secret. And if I was scared when a hand fell on me, can't
     you understand it when it might have been the hand of a detective?"

     She felt that he was telling the truth. He gathered her into his arms
     and kissed away her fears and doubts.

     "Sit here by me, then. It's a queer throne for such a queen; but it's
     the best your poor lover can find. He'll do better for you some of
     these days, I'm thinking. Now your mind is easy once again, is it
     not?"

     "How can it ever be at ease, Jack, when I know that you are a
     criminal among criminals, when I never know the day that I may hear
     you are in court for murder? 'McMurdo the Scowrer,' that's what one
     of our boarders called you yesterday. It went through my heart like a
     knife."

     "Sure, hard words break no bones."

     "But they were true."

     "Well, dear, it's not so bad as you think. We are but poor men that
     are trying in our own way to get our rights."

     Ettie threw her arms round her lover's neck. "Give it up, Jack! For
     my sake, for God's sake, give it up! It was to ask you that I came
     here to-day. Oh, Jack, see--I beg it of you on my bended knees!
     Kneeling here before you I implore you to give it up!"

     He raised her and soothed her with her head against his breast.

     "Sure, my darlin', you don't know what it is you are asking. How
     could I give it up when it would be to break my oath and to desert my
     comrades? If you could see how things stand with me you could never
     ask it of me. Besides, if I wanted to, how could I do it? You don't
     suppose that the lodge would let a man go free with all its secrets?"

     "I've thought of that, Jack. I've planned it all. Father has saved
     some money. He is weary of this place where the fear of these people
     darkens our lives. He is ready to go. We would fly together to
     Philadelphia or New York, where we would be safe from them."

     McMurdo laughed. "The lodge has a long arm. Do you think it could not
     stretch from here to Philadelphia or New York?"

     "Well, then, to the West, or to England, or to Germany, where father
     came from--anywhere to get away from this Valley of Fear!"

     McMurdo thought of old Brother Morris. "Sure, it is the second time I
     have heard the valley so named," said he. "The shadow does indeed
     seem to lie heavy on some of you."

     "It darkens every moment of our lives. Do you suppose that Ted
     Baldwin has ever forgiven us? If it were not that he fears you, what
     do you suppose our chances would be? If you saw the look in those
     dark, hungry eyes of his when they fall on me!"

     "By Gar! I'd teach him better manners if I caught him at it! But see
     here, little girl. I can't leave here. I can't--take that from me
     once and for all. But if you will leave me to find my own way, I will
     try to prepare a way of getting honourably out of it."

     "There is no honour in such a matter."

     "Well, well, it's just how you look at it. But if you'll give me six
     months, I'll work it so that I can leave without being ashamed to
     look others in the face."

     The girl laughed with joy. "Six months!" she cried. "Is it a
     promise?"

     "Well, it may be seven or eight. But within a year at the furthest we
     will leave the valley behind us."

     It was the most that Ettie could obtain, and yet it was something.
     There was this distant light to illuminate the gloom of the immediate
     future. She returned to her father's house more light-hearted than
     she had ever been since Jack McMurdo had come into her life.

     It might be thought that as a member, all the doings of the society
     would be told to him; but he was soon to discover that the
     organization was wider and more complex than the simple lodge. Even
     Boss McGinty was ignorant as to many things; for there was an
     official named the County Delegate, living at Hobson's Patch farther
     down the line, who had power over several different lodges which he
     wielded in a sudden and arbitrary way. Only once did McMurdo see him,
     a sly, little gray-haired rat of a man, with a slinking gait and a
     sidelong glance which was charged with malice. Evans Pott was his
     name, and even the great Boss of Vermissa felt towards him something
     of the repulsion and fear which the huge Danton may have felt for the
     puny but dangerous Robespierre.

     One day Scanlan, who was McMurdo's fellow boarder, received a note
     from McGinty inclosing one from Evans Pott, which informed him that
     he was sending over two good men, Lawler and Andrews, who had
     instructions to act in the neighbourhood; though it was best for the
     cause that no particulars as to their objects should be given. Would
     the Bodymaster see to it that suitable arrangements be made for their
     lodgings and comfort until the time for action should arrive? McGinty
     added that it was impossible for anyone to remain secret at the Union
     House, and that, therefore, he would be obliged if McMurdo and
     Scanlan would put the strangers up for a few days in their boarding
     house.

     The same evening the two men arrived, each carrying his gripsack.
     Lawler was an elderly man, shrewd, silent, and self-contained, clad
     in an old black frock coat, which with his soft felt hat and ragged,
     grizzled beard gave him a general resemblance to an itinerant
     preacher. His companion Andrews was little more than a boy,
     frank-faced and cheerful, with the breezy manner of one who is out
     for a holiday and means to enjoy every minute of it. Both men were
     total abstainers, and behaved in all ways as exemplary members of the
     society, with the one simple exception that they were assassins who
     had often proved themselves to be most capable instruments for this
     association of murder. Lawler had already carried out fourteen
     commissions of the kind, and Andrews three.

     They were, as McMurdo found, quite ready to converse about their
     deeds in the past, which they recounted with the half-bashful pride
     of men who had done good and unselfish service for the community.
     They were reticent, however, as to the immediate job in hand.

     "They chose us because neither I nor the boy here drink," Lawler
     explained. "They can count on us saying no more than we should. You
     must not take it amiss, but it is the orders of the County Delegate
     that we obey."

     "Sure, we are all in it together," said Scanlan, McMurdo's mate, as
     the four sat together at supper.

     "That's true enough, and we'll talk till the cows come home of the
     killing of Charlie Williams or of Simon Bird, or any other job in the
     past. But till the work is done we say nothing."

     "There are half a dozen about here that I have a word to say to,"
     said McMurdo, with an oath. "I suppose it isn't Jack Knox of Ironhill
     that you are after. I'd go some way to see him get his deserts."

     "No, it's not him yet."

     "Or Herman Strauss?"

     "No, nor him either."

     "Well, if you won't tell us we can't make you; but I'd be glad to
     know."

     Lawler smiled and shook his head. He was not to be drawn.

     In spite of the reticence of their guests, Scanlan and McMurdo were
     quite determined to be present at what they called "the fun." When,
     therefore, at an early hour one morning McMurdo heard them creeping
     down the stairs he awakened Scanlan, and the two hurried on their
     clothes. When they were dressed they found that the others had stolen
     out, leaving the door open behind them. It was not yet dawn, and by
     the light of the lamps they could see the two men some distance down
     the street. They followed them warily, treading noiselessly in the
     deep snow.

     The boarding house was near the edge of the town, and soon they were
     at the crossroads which is beyond its boundary. Here three men were
     waiting, with whom Lawler and Andrews held a short, eager
     conversation. Then they all moved on together. It was clearly some
     notable job which needed numbers. At this point there are several
     trails which lead to various mines. The strangers took that which led
     to the Crow Hill, a huge business which was in strong hands which had
     been able, thanks to their energetic and fearless New England
     manager, Josiah H. Dunn, to keep some order and discipline during the
     long reign of terror.

     Day was breaking now, and a line of workmen were slowly making their
     way, singly and in groups, along the blackened path.

     McMurdo and Scanlan strolled on with the others, keeping in sight of
     the men whom they followed. A thick mist lay over them, and from the
     heart of it there came the sudden scream of a steam whistle. It was
     the ten-minute signal before the cages descended and the day's labour
     began.

     When they reached the open space round the mine shaft there were a
     hundred miners waiting, stamping their feet and blowing on their
     fingers; for it was bitterly cold. The strangers stood in a little
     group under the shadow of the engine house. Scanlan and McMurdo
     climbed a heap of slag from which the whole scene lay before them.
     They saw the mine engineer, a great bearded Scotchman named Menzies,
     come out of the engine house and blow his whistle for the cages to be
     lowered.

     At the same instant a tall, loose-framed young man with a
     clean-shaved, earnest face advanced eagerly towards the pit head. As
     he came forward his eyes fell upon the group, silent and motionless,
     under the engine house. The men had drawn down their hats and turned
     up their collars to screen their faces. For a moment the presentiment
     of Death laid its cold hand upon the manager's heart. At the next he
     had shaken it off and saw only his duty towards intrusive strangers.

     "Who are you?" he asked as he advanced. "What are you loitering there
     for?"

     There was no answer; but the lad Andrews stepped forward and shot him
     in the stomach. The hundred waiting miners stood as motionless and
     helpless as if they were paralyzed. The manager clapped his two hands
     to the wound and doubled himself up. Then he staggered away; but
     another of the assassins fired, and he went down sidewise, kicking
     and clawing among a heap of clinkers. Menzies, the Scotchman, gave a
     roar of rage at the sight and rushed with an iron spanner at the
     murderers; but was met by two balls in the face which dropped him
     dead at their very feet.

     There was a surge forward of some of the miners, and an inarticulate
     cry of pity and of anger; but a couple of the strangers emptied their
     six-shooters over the heads of the crowd, and they broke and
     scattered, some of them rushing wildly back to their homes in
     Vermissa.

     When a few of the bravest had rallied, and there was a return to the
     mine, the murderous gang had vanished in the mists of morning,
     without a single witness being able to swear to the identity of these
     men who in front of a hundred spectators had wrought this double
     crime.

     Scanlan and McMurdo made their way back; Scanlan somewhat subdued,
     for it was the first murder job that he had seen with his own eyes,
     and it appeared less funny than he had been led to believe. The
     horrible screams of the dead manager's wife pursued them as they
     hurried to the town. McMurdo was absorbed and silent; but he showed
     no sympathy for the weakening of his companion.

     "Sure, it is like a war," he repeated. "What is it but a war between
     us and them, and we hit back where we best can."

     There was high revel in the lodge room at the Union House that night,
     not only over the killing of the manager and engineer of the Crow
     Hill mine, which would bring this organization into line with the
     other blackmailed and terror-stricken companies of the district, but
     also over a distant triumph which had been wrought by the hands of
     the lodge itself.

     It would appear that when the County Delegate had sent over five good
     men to strike a blow in Vermissa, he had demanded that in return
     three Vermissa men should be secretly selected and sent across to
     kill William Hales of Stake Royal, one of the best known and most
     popular mine owners in the Gilmerton district, a man who was believed
     not to have an enemy in the world; for he was in all ways a model
     employer. He had insisted, however, upon efficiency in the work, and
     had, therefore, paid off certain drunken and idle employees who were
     members of the all-powerful society. Coffin notices hung outside his
     door had not weakened his resolution, and so in a free, civilized
     country he found himself condemned to death.

     The execution had now been duly carried out. Ted Baldwin, who
     sprawled now in the seat of honour beside the Bodymaster, had been
     chief of the party. His flushed face and glazed, blood-shot eyes told
     of sleeplessness and drink. He and his two comrades had spent the
     night before among the mountains. They were unkempt and
     weather-stained. But no heroes, returning from a forlorn hope, could
     have had a warmer welcome from their comrades.

     The story was told and retold amid cries of delight and shouts of
     laughter. They had waited for their man as he drove home at
     nightfall, taking their station at the top of a steep hill, where his
     horse must be at a walk. He was so furred to keep out the cold that
     he could not lay his hand on his pistol. They had pulled him out and
     shot him again and again. He had screamed for mercy. The screams were
     repeated for the amusement of the lodge.

     "Let's hear again how he squealed," they cried.

     None of them knew the man; but there is eternal drama in a killing,
     and they had shown the Scowrers of Gilmerton that the Vermissa men
     were to be relied upon.

     There had been one contretemps; for a man and his wife had driven up
     while they were still emptying their revolvers into the silent body.
     It had been suggested that they should shoot them both; but they were
     harmless folk who were not connected with the mines, so they were
     sternly bidden to drive on and keep silent, lest a worse thing befall
     them. And so the blood-mottled figure had been left as a warning to
     all such hard-hearted employers, and the three noble avengers had
     hurried off into the mountains where unbroken nature comes down to
     the very edge of the furnaces and the slag heaps. Here they were,
     safe and sound, their work well done, and the plaudits of their
     companions in their ears.

     It had been a great day for the Scowrers. The shadow had fallen even
     darker over the valley. But as the wise general chooses the moment of
     victory in which to redouble his efforts, so that his foes may have
     no time to steady themselves after disaster, so Boss McGinty, looking
     out upon the scene of his operations with his brooding and malicious
     eyes, had devised a new attack upon those who opposed him. That very
     night, as the half-drunken company broke up, he touched McMurdo on
     the arm and led him aside into that inner room where they had their
     first interview.

     "See here, my lad," said he, "I've got a job that's worthy of you at
     last. You'll have the doing of it in your own hands."

     "Proud I am to hear it," McMurdo answered.

     "You can take two men with you--Manders and Reilly. They have been
     warned for service. We'll never be right in this district until
     Chester Wilcox has been settled, and you'll have the thanks of every
     lodge in the coal fields if you can down him."

     "I'll do my best, anyhow. Who is he, and where shall I find him?"

     McGinty took his eternal half-chewed, half-smoked cigar from the
     corner of his mouth, and proceeded to draw a rough diagram on a page
     torn from his notebook.

     "He's the chief foreman of the Iron Dike Company. He's a hard
     citizen, an old colour sergeant of the war, all scars and grizzle.
     We've had two tries at him; but had no luck, and Jim Carnaway lost
     his life over it. Now it's for you to take it over. That's the
     house--all alone at the Iron Dike crossroad, same as you see here on
     the map--without another within earshot. It's no good by day. He's
     armed and shoots quick and straight, with no questions asked. But at
     night--well, there he is with his wife, three children, and a hired
     help. You can't pick or choose. It's all or none. If you could get a
     bag of blasting powder at the front door with a slow match to it--"

     "What's the man done?"

     "Didn't I tell you he shot Jim Carnaway?"

     "Why did he shoot him?"

     "What in thunder has that to do with you? Carnaway was about his
     house at night, and he shot him. That's enough for me and you. You've
     got to settle the thing right."

     "There's these two women and the children. Do they go up too?"

     "They have to--else how can we get him?"

     "It seems hard on them; for they've done nothing."

     "What sort of fool's talk is this? Do you back out?"

     "Easy, Councillor, easy! What have I ever said or done that you
     should think I would be after standing back from an order of the
     Bodymaster of my own lodge? If it's right or if it's wrong, it's for
     you to decide."

     "You'll do it, then?"

     "Of course I will do it."

     "When?"

     "Well, you had best give me a night or two that I may see the house
     and make my plans. Then--"

     "Very good," said McGinty, shaking him by the hand. "I leave it with
     you. It will be a great day when you bring us the news. It's just the
     last stroke that will bring them all to their knees."

     McMurdo thought long and deeply over the commission which had been so
     suddenly placed in his hands. The isolated house in which Chester
     Wilcox lived was about five miles off in an adjacent valley. That
     very night he started off all alone to prepare for the attempt. It
     was daylight before he returned from his reconnaissance. Next day he
     interviewed his two subordinates, Manders and Reilly, reckless
     youngsters who were as elated as if it were a deer-hunt.

     Two nights later they met outside the town, all three armed, and one
     of them carrying a sack stuffed with the powder which was used in the
     quarries. It was two in the morning before they came to the lonely
     house. The night was a windy one, with broken clouds drifting swiftly
     across the face of a three-quarter moon. They had been warned to be
     on their guard against bloodhounds; so they moved forward cautiously,
     with their pistols cocked in their hands. But there was no sound save
     the howling of the wind, and no movement but the swaying branches
     above them.

     McMurdo listened at the door of the lonely house; but all was still
     within. Then he leaned the powder bag against it, ripped a hole in it
     with his knife, and attached the fuse. When it was well alight he and
     his two companions took to their heels, and were some distance off,
     safe and snug in a sheltering ditch, before the shattering roar of
     the explosion, with the low, deep rumble of the collapsing building,
     told them that their work was done. No cleaner job had ever been
     carried out in the bloodstained annals of the society.

     But alas that work so well organized and boldly carried out should
     all have gone for nothing! Warned by the fate of the various victims,
     and knowing that he was marked down for destruction, Chester Wilcox
     had moved himself and his family only the day before to some safer
     and less known quarters, where a guard of police should watch over
     them. It was an empty house which had been torn down by the
     gunpowder, and the grim old colour sergeant of the war was still
     teaching discipline to the miners of Iron Dike.

     "Leave him to me," said McMurdo. "He's my man, and I'll get him sure
     if I have to wait a year for him."

     A vote of thanks and confidence was passed in full lodge, and so for
     the time the matter ended. When a few weeks later it was reported in
     the papers that Wilcox had been shot at from an ambuscade, it was an
     open secret that McMurdo was still at work upon his unfinished job.

     Such were the methods of the Society of Freemen, and such were the
     deeds of the Scowrers by which they spread their rule of fear over
     the great and rich district which was for so long a period haunted by
     their terrible presence. Why should these pages be stained by further
     crimes? Have I not said enough to show the men and their methods?

     These deeds are written in history, and there are records wherein one
     may read the details of them. There one may learn of the shooting of
     Policemen Hunt and Evans because they had ventured to arrest two
     members of the society--a double outrage planned at the Vermissa
     lodge and carried out in cold blood upon two helpless and disarmed
     men. There also one may read of the shooting of Mrs. Larbey when she
     was nursing her husband, who had been beaten almost to death by
     orders of Boss McGinty. The killing of the elder Jenkins, shortly
     followed by that of his brother, the mutilation of James Murdoch, the
     blowing up of the Staphouse family, and the murder of the Stendals
     all followed hard upon one another in the same terrible winter.

     Darkly the shadow lay upon the Valley of Fear. The spring had come
     with running brooks and blossoming trees. There was hope for all
     Nature bound so long in an iron grip; but nowhere was there any hope
     for the men and women who lived under the yoke of the terror. Never
     had the cloud above them been so dark and hopeless as in the early
     summer of the year 1875.





          CHAPTER VI
          Danger


     It was the height of the reign of terror. McMurdo, who had already
     been appointed Inner Deacon, with every prospect of some day
     succeeding McGinty as Bodymaster, was now so necessary to the
     councils of his comrades that nothing was done without his help and
     advice. The more popular he became, however, with the Freemen, the
     blacker were the scowls which greeted him as he passed along the
     streets of Vermissa. In spite of their terror the citizens were
     taking heart to band themselves together against their oppressors.
     Rumours had reached the lodge of secret gatherings in the Herald
     office and of distribution of firearms among the law-abiding people.
     But McGinty and his men were undisturbed by such reports. They were
     numerous, resolute, and well armed. Their opponents were scattered
     and powerless. It would all end, as it had done in the past, in
     aimless talk and possibly in impotent arrests. So said McGinty,
     McMurdo, and all the bolder spirits.

     It was a Saturday evening in May. Saturday was always the lodge
     night, and McMurdo was leaving his house to attend it when Morris,
     the weaker brother of the order, came to see him. His brow was
     creased with care, and his kindly face was drawn and haggard.

     "Can I speak with you freely, Mr. McMurdo?"

     "Sure."

     "I can't forget that I spoke my heart to you once, and that you kept
     it to yourself, even though the Boss himself came to ask you about
     it."

     "What else could I do if you trusted me? It wasn't that I agreed with
     what you said."

     "I know that well. But you are the one that I can speak to and be
     safe. I've a secret here," he put his hand to his breast, "and it is
     just burning the life out of me. I wish it had come to any one of you
     but me. If I tell it, it will mean murder, for sure. If I don't, it
     may bring the end of us all. God help me, but I am near out of my
     wits over it!"

     McMurdo looked at the man earnestly. He was trembling in every limb.
     He poured some whisky into a glass and handed it to him. "That's the
     physic for the likes of you," said he. "Now let me hear of it."

     Morris drank, and his white face took a tinge of colour. "I can tell
     it to you all in one sentence," said he. "There's a detective on our
     trail."

     McMurdo stared at him in astonishment. "Why, man, you're crazy," he
     said. "Isn't the place full of police and detectives and what harm
     did they ever do us?"

     "No, no, it's no man of the district. As you say, we know them, and
     it is little that they can do. But you've heard of Pinkerton's?"

     "I've read of some folk of that name."

     "Well, you can take it from me you've no show when they are on your
     trail. It's not a take-it-or-miss-it government concern. It's a dead
     earnest business proposition that's out for results and keeps out
     till by hook or crook it gets them. If a Pinkerton man is deep in
     this business, we are all destroyed."

     "We must kill him."

     "Ah, it's the first thought that came to you! So it will be up at the
     lodge. Didn't I say to you that it would end in murder?"

     "Sure, what is murder? Isn't it common enough in these parts?"

     "It is, indeed; but it's not for me to point out the man that is to
     be murdered. I'd never rest easy again. And yet it's our own necks
     that may be at stake. In God's name what shall I do?" He rocked to
     and fro in his agony of indecision.

     But his words had moved McMurdo deeply. It was easy to see that he
     shared the other's opinion as to the danger, and the need for meeting
     it. He gripped Morris's shoulder and shook him in his earnestness.

     "See here, man," he cried, and he almost screeched the words in his
     excitement, "you won't gain anything by sitting keening like an old
     wife at a wake. Let's have the facts. Who is the fellow? Where is he?
     How did you hear of him? Why did you come to me?"

     "I came to you; for you are the one man that would advise me. I told
     you that I had a store in the East before I came here. I left good
     friends behind me, and one of them is in the telegraph service.
     Here's a letter that I had from him yesterday. It's this part from
     the top of the page. You can read it yourself."

     This was what McMurdo read:

     How are the Scowrers getting on in your parts? We read plenty of them
     in the papers. Between you and me I expect to hear news from you
     before long. Five big corporations and the two railroads have taken
     the thing up in dead earnest. They mean it, and you can bet they'll
     get there! They are right deep down into it. Pinkerton has taken hold
     under their orders, and his best man, Birdy Edwards, is operating.
     The thing has got to be stopped right now.

     "Now read the postscript."

     Of course, what I give you is what I learned in business; so it goes
     no further. It's a queer cipher that you handle by the yard every day
     and can get no meaning from.

     McMurdo sat in silence for some time, with the letter in his listless
     hands. The mist had lifted for a moment, and there was the abyss
     before him.

     "Does anyone else know of this?" he asked.

     "I have told no one else."

     "But this man--your friend--has he any other person that he would be
     likely to write to?"

     "Well, I dare say he knows one or two more."

     "Of the lodge?"

     "It's likely enough."

     "I was asking because it is likely that he may have given some
     description of this fellow Birdy Edwards--then we could get on his
     trail."

     "Well, it's possible. But I should not think he knew him. He is just
     telling me the news that came to him by way of business. How would he
     know this Pinkerton man?"

     McMurdo gave a violent start.

     "By Gar!" he cried, "I've got him. What a fool I was not to know it.
     Lord! but we're in luck! We will fix him before he can do any harm.
     See here, Morris, will you leave this thing in my hands?"

     "Sure, if you will only take it off mine."

     "I'll do that. You can stand right back and let me run it. Even your
     name need not be mentioned. I'll take it all on myself, as if it were
     to me that this letter has come. Will that content you?"

     "It's just what I would ask."

     "Then leave it at that and keep your head shut. Now I'll get down to
     the lodge, and we'll soon make old man Pinkerton sorry for himself."

     "You wouldn't kill this man?"

     "The less you know, Friend Morris, the easier your conscience will
     be, and the better you will sleep. Ask no questions, and let these
     things settle themselves. I have hold of it now."

     Morris shook his head sadly as he left. "I feel that his blood is on
     my hands," he groaned.

     "Self-protection is no murder, anyhow," said McMurdo, smiling grimly.
     "It's him or us. I guess this man would destroy us all if we left him
     long in the valley. Why, Brother Morris, we'll have to elect you
     Bodymaster yet; for you've surely saved the lodge."

     And yet it was clear from his actions that he thought more seriously
     of this new intrusion than his words would show. It may have been his
     guilty conscience, it may have been the reputation of the Pinkerton
     organization, it may have been the knowledge that great, rich
     corporations had set themselves the task of clearing out the
     Scowrers; but, whatever his reason, his actions were those of a man
     who is preparing for the worst. Every paper which would incriminate
     him was destroyed before he left the house. After that he gave a long
     sigh of satisfaction; for it seemed to him that he was safe. And yet
     the danger must still have pressed somewhat upon him; for on his way
     to the lodge he stopped at old man Shafter's. The house was forbidden
     him; but when he tapped at the window Ettie came out to him. The
     dancing Irish deviltry had gone from her lover's eyes. She read his
     danger in his earnest face.

     "Something has happened!" she cried. "Oh, Jack, you are in danger!"

     "Sure, it is not very bad, my sweetheart. And yet it may be wise that
     we make a move before it is worse."

     "Make a move?"

     "I promised you once that I would go some day. I think the time is
     coming. I had news to-night, bad news, and I see trouble coming."

     "The police?"

     "Well, a Pinkerton. But, sure, you wouldn't know what that is,
     acushla, nor what it may mean to the likes of me. I'm too deep in
     this thing, and I may have to get out of it quick. You said you would
     come with me if I went."

     "Oh, Jack, it would be the saving of you!"

     "I'm an honest man in some things, Ettie. I wouldn't hurt a hair of
     your bonny head for all that the world can give, nor ever pull you
     down one inch from the golden throne above the clouds where I always
     see you. Would you trust me?"

     She put her hand in his without a word. "Well, then, listen to what I
     say, and do as I order you, for indeed it's the only way for us.
     Things are going to happen in this valley. I feel it in my bones.
     There may be many of us that will have to look out for ourselves. I'm
     one, anyhow. If I go, by day or night, it's you that must come with
     me!"

     "I'd come after you, Jack."

     "No, no, you shall come with me. If this valley is closed to me and I
     can never come back, how can I leave you behind, and me perhaps in
     hiding from the police with never a chance of a message? It's with me
     you must come. I know a good woman in the place I come from, and it's
     there I'd leave you till we can get married. Will you come?"

     "Yes, Jack, I will come."

     "God bless you for your trust in me! It's a fiend out of hell that I
     should be if I abused it. Now, mark you, Ettie, it will be just a
     word to you, and when it reaches you, you will drop everything and
     come right down to the waiting room at the depot and stay there till
     I come for you."

     "Day or night, I'll come at the word, Jack."

     Somewhat eased in mind, now that his own preparations for escape had
     been begun, McMurdo went on to the lodge. It had already assembled,
     and only by complicated signs and counter-signs could he pass through
     the outer guard and inner guard who close-tiled it. A buzz of
     pleasure and welcome greeted him as he entered. The long room was
     crowded, and through the haze of tobacco smoke he saw the tangled
     black mane of the Bodymaster, the cruel, unfriendly features of
     Baldwin, the vulture face of Harraway, the secretary, and a dozen
     more who were among the leaders of the lodge. He rejoiced that they
     should all be there to take counsel over his news.

     "Indeed, it's glad we are to see you, Brother!" cried the chairman.
     "There's business here that wants a Solomon in judgment to set it
     right."

     "It's Lander and Egan," explained his neighbour as he took his seat.
     "They both claim the head money given by the lodge for the shooting
     of old man Crabbe over at Stylestown, and who's to say which fired
     the bullet?"

     McMurdo rose in his place and raised his hand. The expression of his
     face froze the attention of the audience. There was a dead hush of
     expectation.

     "Eminent Bodymaster," he said, in a solemn voice, "I claim urgency!"

     "Brother McMurdo claims urgency," said McGinty. "It's a claim that by
     the rules of this lodge takes precedence. Now Brother, we attend
     you."

     McMurdo took the letter from his pocket.

     "Eminent Bodymaster and Brethren," he said, "I am the bearer of ill
     news this day; but it is better that it should be known and
     discussed, than that a blow should fall upon us without warning which
     would destroy us all. I have information that the most powerful and
     richest organizations in this state have bound themselves together
     for our destruction, and that at this very moment there is a
     Pinkerton detective, one Birdy Edwards, at work in the valley
     collecting the evidence which may put a rope round the necks of many
     of us, and send every man in this room into a felon's cell. That is
     the situation for the discussion of which I have made a claim of
     urgency."

     There was a dead silence in the room. It was broken by the chairman.

     "What is your evidence for this, Brother McMurdo?" he asked.

     "It is in this letter which has come into my hands," said McMurdo. He
     read the passage aloud. "It is a matter of honour with me that I can
     give no further particulars about the letter, nor put it into your
     hands; but I assure you that there is nothing else in it which can
     affect the interests of the lodge. I put the case before you as it
     has reached me."

     "Let me say, Mr. Chairman," said one of the older brethren, "that I
     have heard of Birdy Edwards, and that he has the name of being the
     best man in the Pinkerton service."

     "Does anyone know him by sight?" asked McGinty.

     "Yes," said McMurdo, "I do."

     There was a murmur of astonishment through the hall.

     "I believe we hold him in the hollow of our hands," he continued with
     an exulting smile upon his face. "If we act quickly and wisely, we
     can cut this thing short. If I have your confidence and your help, it
     is little that we have to fear."

     "What have we to fear, anyhow? What can he know of our affairs?"

     "You might say so if all were as stanch as you, Councillor. But this
     man has all the millions of the capitalists at his back. Do you think
     there is no weaker brother among all our lodges that could not be
     bought? He will get at our secrets--maybe has got them already.
     There's only one sure cure."

     "That he never leaves the valley," said Baldwin.

     McMurdo nodded. "Good for you, Brother Baldwin," he said. "You and I
     have had our differences, but you have said the true word to-night."

     "Where is he, then? Where shall we know him?"

     "Eminent Bodymaster," said McMurdo, earnestly, "I would put it to you
     that this is too vital a thing for us to discuss in open lodge. God
     forbid that I should throw a doubt on anyone here; but if so much as
     a word of gossip got to the ears of this man, there would be an end
     of any chance of our getting him. I would ask the lodge to choose a
     trusty committee, Mr. Chairman--yourself, if I might suggest it, and
     Brother Baldwin here, and five more. Then I can talk freely of what I
     know and of what I advise should be done."

     The proposition was at once adopted, and the committee chosen.
     Besides the chairman and Baldwin there were the vulture-faced
     secretary, Harraway, Tiger Cormac, the brutal young assassin, Carter,
     the treasurer, and the brothers Willaby, fearless and desperate men
     who would stick at nothing.

     The usual revelry of the lodge was short and subdued: for there was a
     cloud upon the men's spirits, and many there for the first time began
     to see the cloud of avenging Law drifting up in that serene sky under
     which they had dwelt so long. The horrors they had dealt out to
     others had been so much a part of their settled lives that the
     thought of retribution had become a remote one, and so seemed the
     more startling now that it came so closely upon them. They broke up
     early and left their leaders to their council.

     "Now, McMurdo!" said McGinty when they were alone. The seven men sat
     frozen in their seats.

     "I said just now that I knew Birdy Edwards," McMurdo explained. "I
     need not tell you that he is not here under that name. He's a brave
     man, but not a crazy one. He passes under the name of Steve Wilson,
     and he is lodging at Hobson's Patch."

     "How do you know this?"

     "Because I fell into talk with him. I thought little of it at the
     time, nor would have given it a second thought but for this letter;
     but now I'm sure it's the man. I met him on the cars when I went down
     the line on Wednesday--a hard case if ever there was one. He said he
     was a reporter. I believed it for the moment. Wanted to know all he
     could about the Scowrers and what he called 'the outrages' for a New
     York paper. Asked me every kind of question so as to get something.
     You bet I was giving nothing away. 'I'd pay for it and pay well,'
     said he, 'if I could get some stuff that would suit my editor.' I
     said what I thought would please him best, and he handed me a
     twenty-dollar bill for my information. 'There's ten times that for
     you,' said he, 'if you can find me all that I want.'"

     "What did you tell him, then?"

     "Any stuff I could make up."

     "How do you know he wasn't a newspaper man?"

     "I'll tell you. He got out at Hobson's Patch, and so did I. I chanced
     into the telegraph bureau, and he was leaving it.

     "'See here,' said the operator after he'd gone out, 'I guess we
     should charge double rates for this.'--'I guess you should,' said I.
     He had filled the form with stuff that might have been Chinese, for
     all we could make of it. 'He fires a sheet of this off every day,'
     said the clerk. 'Yes,' said I; 'it's special news for his paper, and
     he's scared that the others should tap it.' That was what the
     operator thought and what I thought at the time; but I think
     differently now."

     "By Gar! I believe you are right," said McGinty. "But what do you
     allow that we should do about it?"

     "Why not go right down now and fix him?" someone suggested.

     "Ay, the sooner the better."

     "I'd start this next minute if I knew where we could find him," said
     McMurdo. "He's in Hobson's Patch; but I don't know the house. I've
     got a plan, though, if you'll only take my advice."

     "Well, what is it?"

     "I'll go to the Patch to-morrow morning. I'll find him through the
     operator. He can locate him, I guess. Well, then I'll tell him that
     I'm a Freeman myself. I'll offer him all the secrets of the lodge for
     a price. You bet he'll tumble to it. I'll tell him the papers are at
     my house, and that it's as much as my life would be worth to let him
     come while folk were about. He'll see that that's horse sense. Let
     him come at ten o'clock at night, and he shall see everything. That
     will fetch him sure."

     "Well?"

     "You can plan the rest for yourselves. Widow MacNamara's is a lonely
     house. She's as true as steel and as deaf as a post. There's only
     Scanlan and me in the house. If I get his promise--and I'll let you
     know if I do--I'd have the whole seven of you come to me by nine
     o'clock. We'll get him in. If ever he gets out alive--well, he can
     talk of Birdy Edwards's luck for the rest of his days!"

     "There's going to be a vacancy at Pinkerton's or I'm mistaken. Leave
     it at that, McMurdo. At nine to-morrow we'll be with you. You once
     get the door shut behind him, and you can leave the rest with us."





          CHAPTER VII
          The Trapping of Birdy Edwards


     As McMurdo had said, the house in which he lived was a lonely one and
     very well suited for such a crime as they had planned. It was on the
     extreme fringe of the town and stood well back from the road. In any
     other case the conspirators would have simply called out their man,
     as they had many a time before, and emptied their pistols into his
     body; but in this instance it was very necessary to find out how much
     he knew, how he knew it, and what had been passed on to his
     employers.

     It was possible that they were already too late and that the work had
     been done. If that was indeed so, they could at least have their
     revenge upon the man who had done it. But they were hopeful that
     nothing of great importance had yet come to the detective's
     knowledge, as otherwise, they argued, he would not have troubled to
     write down and forward such trivial information as McMurdo claimed to
     have given him. However, all this they would learn from his own lips.
     Once in their power, they would find a way to make him speak. It was
     not the first time that they had handled an unwilling witness.

     McMurdo went to Hobson's Patch as agreed. The police seemed to take
     particular interest in him that morning, and Captain Marvin--he who
     had claimed the old acquaintance with him at Chicago--actually
     addressed him as he waited at the station. McMurdo turned away and
     refused to speak with him. He was back from his mission in the
     afternoon, and saw McGinty at the Union House.

     "He is coming," he said.

     "Good!" said McGinty. The giant was in his shirt sleeves, with chains
     and seals gleaming athwart his ample waistcoat and a diamond
     twinkling through the fringe of his bristling beard. Drink and
     politics had made the Boss a very rich as well as powerful man. The
     more terrible, therefore, seemed that glimpse of the prison or the
     gallows which had risen before him the night before.

     "Do you reckon he knows much?" he asked anxiously.

     McMurdo shook his head gloomily. "He's been here some time--six weeks
     at the least. I guess he didn't come into these parts to look at the
     prospect. If he has been working among us all that time with the
     railroad money at his back, I should expect that he has got results,
     and that he has passed them on."

     "There's not a weak man in the lodge," cried McGinty. "True as steel,
     every man of them. And yet, by the Lord! there is that skunk Morris.
     What about him? If any man gives us away, it would be he. I've a mind
     to send a couple of the boys round before evening to give him a
     beating up and see what they can get from him."

     "Well, there would be no harm in that," McMurdo answered. "I won't
     deny that I have a liking for Morris and would be sorry to see him
     come to harm. He has spoken to me once or twice over lodge matters,
     and though he may not see them the same as you or I, he never seemed
     the sort that squeals. But still it is not for me to stand between
     him and you."

     "I'll fix the old devil!" said McGinty with an oath. "I've had my eye
     on him this year past."

     "Well, you know best about that," McMurdo answered. "But whatever you
     do must be to-morrow; for we must lie low until the Pinkerton affair
     is settled up. We can't afford to set the police buzzing, to-day of
     all days."

     "True for you," said McGinty. "And we'll learn from Birdy Edwards
     himself where he got his news if we have to cut his heart out first.
     Did he seem to scent a trap?"

     McMurdo laughed. "I guess I took him on his weak point," he said. "If
     he could get on a good trail of the Scowrers, he's ready to follow it
     into hell. I took his money," McMurdo grinned as he produced a wad of
     dollar notes, "and as much more when he has seen all my papers."

     "What papers?"

     "Well, there are no papers. But I filled him up about constitutions
     and books of rules and forms of membership. He expects to get right
     down to the end of everything before he leaves."

     "Faith, he's right there," said McGinty grimly. "Didn't he ask you
     why you didn't bring him the papers?"

     "As if I would carry such things, and me a suspected man, and Captain
     Marvin after speaking to me this very day at the depot!"

     "Ay, I heard of that," said McGinty. "I guess the heavy end of this
     business is coming on to you. We could put him down an old shaft when
     we've done with him; but however we work it we can't get past the man
     living at Hobson's Patch and you being there to-day."

     McMurdo shrugged his shoulders. "If we handle it right, they can
     never prove the killing," said he. "No one can see him come to the
     house after dark, and I'll lay to it that no one will see him go. Now
     see here, Councillor, I'll show you my plan and I'll ask you to fit
     the others into it. You will all come in good time. Very well. He
     comes at ten. He is to tap three times, and me to open the door for
     him. Then I'll get behind him and shut it. He's our man then."

     "That's all easy and plain."

     "Yes; but the next step wants considering. He's a hard proposition.
     He's heavily armed. I've fooled him proper, and yet he is likely to
     be on his guard. Suppose I show him right into a room with seven men
     in it where he expected to find me alone. There is going to be
     shooting, and somebody is going to be hurt."

     "That's so."

     "And the noise is going to bring every damned copper in the township
     on top of it."

     "I guess you are right."

     "This is how I should work it. You will all be in the big room--same
     as you saw when you had a chat with me. I'll open the door for him,
     show him into the parlour beside the door, and leave him there while
     I get the papers. That will give me the chance of telling you how
     things are shaping. Then I will go back to him with some faked
     papers. As he is reading them I will jump for him and get my grip on
     his pistol arm. You'll hear me call and in you will rush. The quicker
     the better; for he is as strong a man as I, and I may have more than
     I can manage. But I allow that I can hold him till you come."

     "It's a good plan," said McGinty. "The lodge will owe you a debt for
     this. I guess when I move out of the chair I can put a name to the
     man that's coming after me."

     "Sure, Councillor, I am little more than a recruit," said McMurdo;
     but his face showed what he thought of the great man's compliment.

     When he had returned home he made his own preparations for the grim
     evening in front of him. First he cleaned, oiled, and loaded his
     Smith & Wesson revolver. Then he surveyed the room in which the
     detective was to be trapped. It was a large apartment, with a long
     deal table in the centre, and the big stove at one side. At each of
     the other sides were windows. There were no shutters on these: only
     light curtains which drew across. McMurdo examined these attentively.
     No doubt it must have struck him that the apartment was very exposed
     for so secret a meeting. Yet its distance from the road made it of
     less consequence. Finally he discussed the matter with his fellow
     lodger. Scanlan, though a Scowrer, was an inoffensive little man who
     was too weak to stand against the opinion of his comrades, but was
     secretly horrified by the deeds of blood at which he had sometimes
     been forced to assist. McMurdo told him shortly what was intended.

     "And if I were you, Mike Scanlan, I would take a night off and keep
     clear of it. There will be bloody work here before morning."

     "Well, indeed then, Mac," Scanlan answered. "It's not the will but
     the nerve that is wanting in me. When I saw Manager Dunn go down at
     the colliery yonder it was just more than I could stand. I'm not made
     for it, same as you or McGinty. If the lodge will think none the
     worse of me, I'll just do as you advise and leave you to yourselves
     for the evening."

     The men came in good time as arranged. They were outwardly
     respectable citizens, well clad and cleanly; but a judge of faces
     would have read little hope for Birdy Edwards in those hard mouths
     and remorseless eyes. There was not a man in the room whose hands had
     not been reddened a dozen times before. They were as hardened to
     human murder as a butcher to sheep.

     Foremost, of course, both in appearance and in guilt, was the
     formidable Boss. Harraway, the secretary, was a lean, bitter man with
     a long, scraggy neck and nervous, jerky limbs, a man of incorruptible
     fidelity where the finances of the order were concerned, and with no
     notion of justice or honesty to anyone beyond. The treasurer, Carter,
     was a middle-aged man, with an impassive, rather sulky expression,
     and a yellow parchment skin. He was a capable organizer, and the
     actual details of nearly every outrage had sprung from his plotting
     brain. The two Willabys were men of action, tall, lithe young fellows
     with determined faces, while their companion, Tiger Cormac, a heavy,
     dark youth, was feared even by his own comrades for the ferocity of
     his disposition. These were the men who assembled that night under
     the roof of McMurdo for the killing of the Pinkerton detective.

     Their host had placed whisky upon the table, and they had hastened to
     prime themselves for the work before them. Baldwin and Cormac were
     already half-drunk, and the liquor had brought out all their
     ferocity. Cormac placed his hands on the stove for an instant--it had
     been lighted, for the nights were still cold.

     "That will do," said he, with an oath.

     "Ay," said Baldwin, catching his meaning. "If he is strapped to that,
     we will have the truth out of him."

     "We'll have the truth out of him, never fear," said McMurdo. He had
     nerves of steel, this man; for though the whole weight of the affair
     was on him his manner was as cool and unconcerned as ever. The others
     marked it and applauded.

     "You are the one to handle him," said the Boss approvingly. "Not a
     warning will he get till your hand is on his throat. It's a pity
     there are no shutters to your windows."

     McMurdo went from one to the other and drew the curtains tighter.
     "Sure no one can spy upon us now. It's close upon the hour."

     "Maybe he won't come. Maybe he'll get a sniff of danger," said the
     secretary.

     "He'll come, never fear," McMurdo answered. "He is as eager to come
     as you can be to see him. Hark to that!"

     They all sat like wax figures, some with their glasses arrested
     halfway to their lips. Three loud knocks had sounded at the door.

     "Hush!" McMurdo raised his hand in caution. An exulting glance went
     round the circle, and hands were laid upon hidden weapons.

     "Not a sound, for your lives!" McMurdo whispered, as he went from the
     room, closing the door carefully behind him.

     With strained ears the murderers waited. They counted the steps of
     their comrade down the passage. Then they heard him open the outer
     door. There were a few words as of greeting. Then they were aware of
     a strange step inside and of an unfamiliar voice. An instant later
     came the slam of the door and the turning of the key in the lock.
     Their prey was safe within the trap. Tiger Cormac laughed horribly,
     and Boss McGinty clapped his great hand across his mouth.

     "Be quiet, you fool!" he whispered. "You'll be the undoing of us
     yet!"

     There was a mutter of conversation from the next room. It seemed
     interminable. Then the door opened, and McMurdo appeared, his finger
     upon his lip.

     He came to the end of the table and looked round at them. A subtle
     change had come over him. His manner was as of one who has great work
     to do. His face had set into granite firmness. His eyes shone with a
     fierce excitement behind his spectacles. He had become a visible
     leader of men. They stared at him with eager interest; but he said
     nothing. Still with the same singular gaze he looked from man to man.

     "Well!" cried Boss McGinty at last. "Is he here? Is Birdy Edwards
     here?"

     "Yes," McMurdo answered slowly. "Birdy Edwards is here. I am Birdy
     Edwards!"

     There were ten seconds after that brief speech during which the room
     might have been empty, so profound was the silence. The hissing of a
     kettle upon the stove rose sharp and strident to the ear. Seven white
     faces, all turned upward to this man who dominated them, were set
     motionless with utter terror. Then, with a sudden shivering of glass,
     a bristle of glistening rifle barrels broke through each window,
     while the curtains were torn from their hangings.

     At the sight Boss McGinty gave the roar of a wounded bear and plunged
     for the half-opened door. A levelled revolver met him there with the
     stern blue eyes of Captain Marvin of the Mine Police gleaming behind
     the sights. The Boss recoiled and fell back into his chair.

     "You're safer there, Councillor," said the man whom they had known as
     McMurdo. "And you, Baldwin, if you don't take your hand off your
     pistol, you'll cheat the hangman yet. Pull it out, or by the Lord
     that made me--There, that will do. There are forty armed men round
     this house, and you can figure it out for yourself what chance you
     have. Take their pistols, Marvin!"

     There was no possible resistance under the menace of those rifles.
     The men were disarmed. Sulky, sheepish, and amazed, they still sat
     round the table.

     "I'd like to say a word to you before we separate," said the man who
     had trapped them. "I guess we may not meet again until you see me on
     the stand in the courthouse. I'll give you something to think over
     between now and then. You know me now for what I am. At last I can
     put my cards on the table. I am Birdy Edwards of Pinkerton's. I was
     chosen to break up your gang. I had a hard and dangerous game to
     play. Not a soul, not one soul, not my nearest and dearest, knew that
     I was playing it. Only Captain Marvin here and my employers knew
     that. But it's over to-night, thank God, and I am the winner!"

     The seven pale, rigid faces looked up at him. There was unappeasable
     hatred in their eyes. He read the relentless threat.

     "Maybe you think that the game is not over yet. Well, I take my
     chance of that. Anyhow, some of you will take no further hand, and
     there are sixty more besides yourselves that will see a jail this
     night. I'll tell you this, that when I was put upon this job I never
     believed there was such a society as yours. I thought it was paper
     talk, and that I would prove it so. They told me it was to do with
     the Freemen; so I went to Chicago and was made one. Then I was surer
     than ever that it was just paper talk; for I found no harm in the
     society, but a deal of good.

     "Still, I had to carry out my job, and I came to the coal valleys.
     When I reached this place I learned that I was wrong and that it
     wasn't a dime novel after all. So I stayed to look after it. I never
     killed a man in Chicago. I never minted a dollar in my life. Those I
     gave you were as good as any others; but I never spent money better.
     But I knew the way into your good wishes and so I pretended to you
     that the law was after me. It all worked just as I thought.

     "So I joined your infernal lodge, and I took my share in your
     councils. Maybe they will say that I was as bad as you. They can say
     what they like, so long as I get you. But what is the truth? The
     night I joined you beat up old man Stanger. I could not warn him, for
     there was no time; but I held your hand, Baldwin, when you would have
     killed him. If ever I have suggested things, so as to keep my place
     among you, they were things which I knew I could prevent. I could not
     save Dunn and Menzies, for I did not know enough; but I will see that
     their murderers are hanged. I gave Chester Wilcox warning, so that
     when I blew his house in he and his folk were in hiding. There was
     many a crime that I could not stop; but if you look back and think
     how often your man came home the other road, or was down in town when
     you went for him, or stayed indoors when you thought he would come
     out, you'll see my work."

     "You blasted traitor!" hissed McGinty through his closed teeth.

     "Ay, John McGinty, you may call me that if it eases your smart. You
     and your like have been the enemy of God and man in these parts. It
     took a man to get between you and the poor devils of men and women
     that you held under your grip. There was just one way of doing it,
     and I did it. You call me a traitor; but I guess there's many a
     thousand will call me a deliverer that went down into hell to save
     them. I've had three months of it. I wouldn't have three such months
     again if they let me loose in the treasury at Washington for it. I
     had to stay till I had it all, every man and every secret right here
     in this hand. I'd have waited a little longer if it hadn't come to my
     knowledge that my secret was coming out. A letter had come into the
     town that would have set you wise to it all. Then I had to act and
     act quickly.

     "I've nothing more to say to you, except that when my time comes I'll
     die the easier when I think of the work I have done in this valley.
     Now, Marvin, I'll keep you no more. Take them in and get it over."

     There is little more to tell. Scanlan had been given a sealed note to
     be left at the address of Miss Ettie Shafter, a mission which he had
     accepted with a wink and a knowing smile. In the early hours of the
     morning a beautiful woman and a much muffled man boarded a special
     train which had been sent by the railroad company, and made a swift,
     unbroken journey out of the land of danger. It was the last time that
     ever either Ettie or her lover set foot in the Valley of Fear. Ten
     days later they were married in Chicago, with old Jacob Shafter as
     witness of the wedding.

     The trial of the Scowrers was held far from the place where their
     adherents might have terrified the guardians of the law. In vain they
     struggled. In vain the money of the lodge--money squeezed by
     blackmail out of the whole countryside--was spent like water in the
     attempt to save them. That cold, clear, unimpassioned statement from
     one who knew every detail of their lives, their organization, and
     their crimes was unshaken by all the wiles of their defenders. At
     last after so many years they were broken and scattered. The cloud
     was lifted forever from the valley.

     McGinty met his fate upon the scaffold, cringing and whining when the
     last hour came. Eight of his chief followers shared his fate.
     Fifty-odd had various degrees of imprisonment. The work of Birdy
     Edwards was complete.

     And yet, as he had guessed, the game was not over yet. There was
     another hand to be played, and yet another and another. Ted Baldwin,
     for one, had escaped the scaffold; so had the Willabys; so had
     several others of the fiercest spirits of the gang. For ten years
     they were out of the world, and then came a day when they were free
     once more--a day which Edwards, who knew his men, was very sure would
     be an end of his life of peace. They had sworn an oath on all that
     they thought holy to have his blood as a vengeance for their
     comrades. And well they strove to keep their vow!

     From Chicago he was chased, after two attempts so near success that
     it was sure that the third would get him. From Chicago he went under
     a changed name to California, and it was there that the light went
     for a time out of his life when Ettie Edwards died. Once again he was
     nearly killed, and once again under the name of Douglas he worked in
     a lonely canyon, where with an English partner named Barker he
     amassed a fortune. At last there came a warning to him that the
     bloodhounds were on his track once more, and he cleared--only just in
     time--for England. And thence came the John Douglas who for a second
     time married a worthy mate, and lived for five years as a Sussex
     county gentleman, a life which ended with the strange happenings of
     which we have heard.





          CHAPTER VIII
          Epilogue


     The police trial had passed, in which the case of John Douglas was
     referred to a higher court. So had the Quarter Sessions, at which he
     was acquitted as having acted in self-defense.

     "Get him out of England at any cost," wrote Holmes to the wife.
     "There are forces here which may be more dangerous than those he has
     escaped. There is no safety for your husband in England."

     Two months had gone by, and the case had to some extent passed from
     our minds. Then one morning there came an enigmatic note slipped into
     our letter box. "Dear me, Mr. Holmes. Dear me!" said this singular
     epistle. There was neither superscription nor signature. I laughed at
     the quaint message; but Holmes showed unwonted seriousness.

     "Deviltry, Watson!" he remarked, and sat long with a clouded brow.

     Late last night Mrs. Hudson, our landlady, brought up a message that
     a gentleman wished to see Holmes, and that the matter was of the
     utmost importance. Close at the heels of his messenger came Cecil
     Barker, our friend of the moated Manor House. His face was drawn and
     haggard.

     "I've had bad news--terrible news, Mr. Holmes," said he.

     "I feared as much," said Holmes.

     "You have not had a cable, have you?"

     "I have had a note from someone who has."

     "It's poor Douglas. They tell me his name is Edwards; but he will
     always be Jack Douglas of Benito Canyon to me. I told you that they
     started together for South Africa in the Palmyra three weeks ago."

     "Exactly."

     "The ship reached Cape Town last night. I received this cable from
     Mrs. Douglas this morning:--

     "Jack has been lost overboard in gale off St. Helena. No one knows
     how accident occurred.
     "Ivy Douglas."

     "Ha! It came like that, did it?" said Holmes, thoughtfully. "Well,
     I've no doubt it was well stage-managed."

     "You mean that you think there was no accident?"

     "None in the world."

     "He was murdered?"

     "Surely!"

     "So I think also. These infernal Scowrers, this cursed vindictive
     nest of criminals--"

     "No, no, my good sir," said Holmes. "There is a master hand here. It
     is no case of sawed-off shot-guns and clumsy six-shooters. You can
     tell an old master by the sweep of his brush. I can tell a Moriarty
     when I see one. This crime is from London, not from America."

     "But for what motive?"

     "Because it is done by a man who cannot afford to fail--one whose
     whole unique position depends upon the fact that all he does must
     succeed. A great brain and a huge organization have been turned to
     the extinction of one man. It is crushing the nut with the hammer--an
     absurd extravagance of energy--but the nut is very effectually
     crushed all the same."

     "How came this man to have anything to do with it?"

     "I can only say that the first word that ever came to us of the
     business was from one of his lieutenants. These Americans were well
     advised. Having an English job to do, they took into partnership, as
     any foreign criminal could do, this great consultant in crime. From
     that moment their man was doomed. At first he would content himself
     by using his machinery in order to find their victim. Then he would
     indicate how the matter might be treated. Finally, when he read in
     the reports of the failure of this agent, he would step in himself
     with a master touch. You heard me warn this man at Birlstone Manor
     House that the coming danger was greater than the past. Was I right?"

     Barker beat his head with his clenched fist in his impotent anger.

     "Do you tell me that we have to sit down under this? Do you say that
     no one can ever get level with this king-devil?"

     "No, I don't say that," said Holmes, and his eyes seemed to be
     looking far into the future. "I don't say that he can't be beat. But
     you must give me time--you must give me time!"

     We all sat in silence for some minutes, while those fateful eyes
     still strained to pierce the veil.









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