.i i. ii i r ' ? l"r"rn -L ' * ? | ^|^^EMX,WEEKL^^ ' i.m. grist ft sons, publishers. } $. ^itmilg gercsgajjer: Jfor the promotion of the J^ificatjSoeiat, Sgdculiural, and (Jlommeitciat Interests of the fliutt. J tbe"|^S^ot/. established 1855. YORKVILLE, S. C., VEPpSDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1898. NO. 98 . ' ? ! i ?? -i v.?_ ?????? 11?? r n.LSi? I .. ? 7 . ? LOST MAI By ANNA KATI Copyright, 1897, by Anna K. Rohlfs. Synopsis of Previous Installments. In order that new readers of The Enquirer may begin with the following installment of this story, and understand it just the same as though they had read it all from the beginning, we here give a synopsis of that portion of it which has already been published: Amelia Butterworth, who has done clever detective work, is called upon by Mr. Gryce, a professional detective, to take up an interesting case. He tells her that in a certain village several persons have suddenly disappeared. In this place lives a family of the name of Knollys, the children of a former friend of Miss Butterworth. Mr. Gryce desires Miss Butterworth to enter this family for detective work. Miss Butterworth goes to visit the Knollys' home, finding there Misses Lucetta and Loreen Knollys and their brother William. She dines with the family and is taken to her room. She remains awake during the night, and, hearing strange noises, goes into the hall and calls Lucetta, who gives unsatisfactory reasons for the disturbance. Mr. Trohm, a neighbor visits the Knollys. Lucetta is terrified at seeing him and faints. Miss Butterworth receives a letter from Mr. Gr.vce telling her that if she is in danger to blow upon a whistle be sends her. An old crone called Mother. Jane appears. Miss Butterworth gives her a quarter, whereupon Mother Jane repeats a curious combination of numbers. Miss Bntterworth leaves the bouse and hears of a young girl formerly leaving tbe Knollys house in a carriage and being I married before her mother could overtake her. Since then a phantom carriage is said to go through Lost Man's lane at midnight, suggesting that tbe carriage may carry away the persons mysteriously [ ? -1 ? disappearing. Mr. lroum unvw luisa Butterworth in his wagon. Returning to the house she witnesses a parting between Lucetta and a lover, whose request for an * answer to bis suit Lucetta is endeavoring to put off. He leaves without getting a favorable reply. Miss Butterworth gets from Loreen the key to a chamber which she has heard is haunted. In visiting it she finds her way into William's sanctum and discovers that he is a vivisectionist. Miss Butterworth passes an uncomfortable night. She is locked in hi r chamber and loses her whistle which she keeps to call the police, but recovers it. Making further explorations, she finds two shutters tied together with a knot of crape, indicating a death in the house. CHAPTER XX. questions. I kept the promise I bad made to myself and did not go to the stables. Had I intended to go there, I could not have done so after the discovery I have just mentioned. It awakened too many thoughts and contradictory surmises. If this knot was a signal, for whom was this signal meant? If it was a mere acknowledgment of death, how recon cile the sentimentality wmco proiupued snch an acknowledgment with the monstrous and diseased passions lying at the base of the whole dreadful occurrence? Lastly, if it was the result of pure carelessness, a bit of crape having been caught up and used for a purpose for which any ordinary string would have answered, what a coincidence between it and my thoughts, what a wonderful coincidence, amounting almost to miracle! Marveling at the whole affair and deciding nothing, I allowed myself to stroll down alone to the gate, William having left me at my peremptory refusal to drag my skirts any longer through the briers. The day being bright and the sunshine warming even the gloomy recesses of the forest before me, the road, 1 thought, looked less ominous than usual, especially in the direction of the village and Deacon Spear's cottage. The fact is that anything seemed better than the grim and lowering walls of the bouse behind me. If my home was there, so was my dread, and I welcomed p rhaps more than I ought to the sight of Mother Jane's heavy figure bent over her herbs at the door of her hut, a few paces to my left, where the road turned. Had she not been deaf, 1 believed I would have called her. As it was, Icontented myself with watching the awkward swayiugs of ber body as she pottered to and fro among her turnips and carrots. My eyes were still on her when I oiiflHotilr hpnrrl thp olafr.tPX of horses' hoofs on the highway. Looking np, I encountered the trim figure of Mr. Trohni, bending to me from a fine sorrel. "Good morning, Miss Butterworth. It's a great relief to me to see you in such good health and spirits this morning, " were the pleasant words with which ho endeavored, perhaps, to explain his presence in a spot more or less considered as tinder a ban It was certainly a surprise. What right had 1 to look for such attentions from a man whose acquaintance 1 had made only the day before: It touched me, little as I am in the habit of allowing my. elf to le ruled by trivial sentimentalities, and though I was discreet enough to avoid any further recognition of his kindness than was his due from a lady of great self respect ho was evidently sufficiently gratified by my response to draw rein and pause for a moment's conversation under the pine trees. This for the moment seemed so natural that I forgot that more than one pair of eyes might bo watching me from the upper windows back of us?eyes which might wonder at a meeting which to the foolish understandings of the young might have the look of premeditation. But, pshaw! I am speaking as if I were 20 instead of?let the family record say I never could see that it was a weakness for a woman to keep certain 6ecrets to herself. "How did you pass the uightr" was Mr. Trohm's lirst question. "I hope in all due peace and quiet. " "Thank you," 1 returned, not seeing why 1 should increase his anxiety in my regard. "I have nothing to complain of. I had a dream, but dreams are to be expected where one has to pass a rs LAI. IARINE GREEN. half 3ozen empty rooms to one's apartment." He could not restrain his curiosity. "A dream!" he repeated. "I do not believe in sleep that is broken by dreams, unless they are of the most cheerful sort possible And I judge from what you say that yours was not cheerful." I wanted to tell him. 1 felt that in a way he had a right to know what had happened to me or what I thought had happened to me under this roof. And yet I did not speak. What I could tell would sound so puerile in the broad sunsliine that enveloped us. I merely remarked that cheerfulness was not to be expected in a domicile so given over to the ravages of time, and then with that lightness and versatility which characterize me under certain exigence* 1 introduced a topic we could discusii without any embarrassment to himself or me. "I>o yon see Mother Jane there?" I asked. "I had some talk with her yesterday. She seems like a harmless imbecile." "Very harmless," said he; "her only fault is greed; that is insatiable. Yet it is not strong enough to take her a quarter of a mile from this place. Nothing could do that, I think. She believes, you see, that her daughter Lizzie is still alive and will come back to the ' 1 1 CJL/v tti/m-iIaIh 'f Kn oxttoxf XJUt buuit! ucly. cuc yv uuiuu v uv uvu; then for all the bank holds. I know, for I have tried to tempt her. It's yery sad when you think that the girl's dead and has been dead nearly 40 years." "Why does she harp on numbers?" said L "I heard her mutter certain ones over and over." "That is a mystery none of ns has solved," said be. "Possibly she has no reason for it. The vagaries of the witless are often quite unaooouutable." I felt him looking at me, not frorn any connection between what he* had just said and anything to be observed in me, but from? Well, I was glad that I have been carefully trained in my youth to pay the greatest attention to my morning toilets. Any woman can look well at night and many women in-the flush of a bright afternoon, but I the woman who looks well in the mornI ing needs not always to be young to attract the appreciative gaze of a man of real penetratiou. Mr- Trohnj was such a man, and I did not begrudge him the pleasure he showed in my neat gray silk and carefully adjusted collar. But he said nothing, and a short silence ensued, which was perhaps more of a compliment than otherwise. Then he uttered a short 6igh and lifted the reins. "If only I was not debarred from entering," he smiled, with a short gesture toward the house. I did not answer. Even I understand that on occasion the tongue plays but a sorry part in such interviews. He sighed again and uttered some short encouragement to his horse, which started that animal up and sent him slowly pacing* down the road toward the cheerful clearing toward which my own eyes were looking with what I was determined should not be construed even by the most sanguine into.a glance of anything like wistfulness. As he went Mr. Trohm gave me a bow I have never seen surpassed in my own parlor in Gramercy park, and upon my bestowing upon him a short return glanced up at the house with an iutentness which seemed to increase as some object invisible to me from where I stood caught his eye. As that eye was directed toward the left wing and lifted as far as the second row of windows I could not help asking myself if he had seen the knot of crape which had produced upon me so lugubrious an impressiou. Before I could make sure he had passed from sight and the highway fell again into shadow?why, 1 hardly knew, for the sun certainly had been shining a few minutes before. CHAPTER XXL MOTHKR JANE. "Well, well, what did Trohm want here this morning?" cried a harsh voice from amid the tangled walks behind me. "Seems to me he finds this place pretty interesting all of a sudden." I turned upon the intruder with a look that should have daunted him. I had recognized William's courteous tones and was in no mood to endure a questioning so unbecoming in one of his ago to one of mine. But as I met his eye, which had something in it besides anger and suspicion, something that was quizzical if not impertinent, I changed my intention and bestowed upon him a conciliatory smile, which I hope escaped the eye of the good angel who records against man all his small hypocrisies and petty deceits. "Mr. Trohm rides for his health," said I. "Seeing mo looking up the road at Mother .lane, he stopped to tell me some of the idiosyncrasies of that old woman. A very harmless courtesy, Mr. Knollys." "Vow " ho oohnpfl nnf. without a touch of sarcasm. "I only hope that is all," he muttered, with a sidelong looli back at the houso. "Lucetta hasn't fi particle of belief in that man's friendship, or, rather, she believes he uevei goes anywhere without a particular intention, and I do believe she's right oi why should he come spying around here just these two days when"?ho caughl himself up with almost a look of terroi ?"when?when you are here?" he completed lamely. "I do not think," I retorted, more angrily than the occasion perhaps war ranted, "that tho word spying applief tQ JSIr.. Trohmv But if it did. what ii tSere to gain from a panse at the gate and a word to snch a new acquaintance as I am?" "I don't know," he still persisted suspiciously. "Trohm's a sharp fellow. If there was anything to see, he would see it even from his place down there. But there isn't. You don't know of anything wrong here, do you, which such a man as that, hand in glove with the police as we know him to be, might consider himself to be interested in?" Astonished both at this blundering oommittal of himself and at the certain sort of anxious confidence he showed in me, I hesitated for a moment, but only for a moment, since if half my susT\ioinno wer? trne this man. above all others, must not know that my perspicacity was more to be feared than ever Mr. Trohm's was. "If Mr. Trohm is interested in this house," said I, with a heroio defiance of ridicule which I hope Mr. Gryce has duly appreciated, "and since a period of two days, I beg leave to call your attention to the fact that on yesterday morning he came to deliver a letter addressed to me which had inadvertently been left at his house, and that this morning he called to inquire how I had spent the night, which, in consideration if the ghosts which are said to haunt this honse and the strange and ancanny apparitions which pnjy three nights ago made the entrance to this lane hideous to one pair of eyes at least, should not cause a gentleman's son liko you any astonishment, It does not mq, I assure you." He laughed. I meant he should, and, losing almost instantly his air of doubt and suspicion, turned toward the gate from which I had jnst moved away, muttering: "Well, it's a small matter to me anyway. It's only the girls that are afraid of Mr. Trohm. I am not afraid of anything but losing Saracen, who has pined like the deuce at his long confinement in the court- Pear him now; just hear him." And I could hear the low and unhap Cs I $ 6 A / ,rll AS I SPOKE. I CAUOHT SIGHT OF py moaning of tlio hound distinctly. It was not a pleasant sound, and I was almost tempted to tell him to unloose the dog, but I thought better of it. "By the way," said he, "speaking of Mother Jane, I have an errand from the girls to her. You will excuse me if I speak to the poorAvoman." Alarmed by his politeness more than I ever have been by his roughness and inconsiderate sarcasms, I looked at him inquiringly as he left the gate and did not know whether to stand my ground or retreat to the house. I decided to stand my ground, an errand to this woman seeming to mo a matter of some interest. I was glad I did, for after some five minutes' absence, during which he had followed her into the liouso, I saw him come back again in a statoof sullen displeasure, which disappeared as lie came upon me still standing by the gate. "Ah, Miss Butterworth, you can do me a favor. The old creature is in one of her stubborn fits today and won't give me a hearing. She may not be so deaf to you; she isn't apt to be to women. Will you cross the road then and speak to her? I will go with you. You needn't be afraid." The way he said this, the confidence he expected to inspire, had almost a ghastly effect upon mo. Did he know or suspect that the only thing I feared in this lane was he? Evidently not, for he met my eye quite confidently. It would not do to shake his faith at such a moment as this, so calling upon Providence to see me safely through this adventure I stepped into ttio lngliway and went with him into Mother Jane's cottage. Had I had any other companion I would have been, glad of this oppor[ tunity. As it was, I found myself iguori ing any possible danger I might be run[ uing into in my interest in the remarkable interior to which I was thus introduced. ! Having been told that Mother Jane i was poor, I had expected to confront : squalor and possibly filth, but I never i have entered a cleaner place or one in . which order made the poorest beloug iugs look decent Tho four walls were . unfinished, and so were the rafters which formed the ceiliug, but the floor, , neatly laid in brick, was spotless, and ? !./? fimnl'ifo <