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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (Dec. 4, 1918)
THE BEE: OMAHA, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 4, 1918. 11 The Abandoned Room ' By Wadsworth Camp. CHAPTER XIV The Crying Through the Woods. Bobby's inability to cry out alone prevented his alarming the others nd announcing to Paredes and Doctor Groom his unlawful pres ence in the room. During the mom ent that the shock held him, silent, motionless, bent in the darkness above the bed. he understood there could have been no ambiguity about his ghastly and loathsome experi ence. The dead detective had al tered his position as Silas Blackburn had done, and this time someone had been in the room and suffered the appalling change. Bobby's fin gers still responded to the charnel feeling of cold, inactive flesh sud denly become alive and potent be neath his touch. And a reason for apparent miracle offered itself. Be tween the extinction of his candle and the commencement of that movement! only a seco: 1 or so the evidence had disappeared from the detective's pocket. Bobby relaxed. He stumbled across the room and into the cor ridor. He went with hands out stretched through the blackness for no candle burned in the upper hall, but he knew that Katherine was on guard there. When he left the pas sage he- saw her, an unnatural figure herself, in the yellowish, unhealthy twilight which sifted through the stair well from the lamp in the hall below. She must have sensed something out of the way immediately, for she hurried to meet him and her whisper held no assurance. "You got the cast and the hai.J kerchief, Bobby?" And when he didn't answer at once she asked with a sharp rush of fear: "What's the matter- What's hap pened?" He shuddered. At last he man aged to speak. "Katherine! I have felt death cease to be death." Later he was to recall that phrase with a sicker horror than he ex perienced now. "You saw something'" she said, "But your candle is out. There is 1. 1 light in the room." He took her hand. He pressed it. "You're real!" he said with a ner vous laugh. "Something I can un derstand. Everything is unreal. This light " He strode to the table, found a match, and lighted his candle. Kath erine, as she saw his face, drew back. 'Bobby!" "My candle went out." he said dully, "and he moved through the darkness. I tell you he moved be- nealh my hand. She drew farther away, staring at him. "You were frightened " "No. If we so there with a light now," he said with the same dull conviction, "we will find him as we fou::d my grandfather this after noon." The monotonous voices of the three men in the lower hall weaved a background for their whispers. The normal, familiar sound was like a tonic. Bobby straightened. Kath erine threw off the spell of his an nouncement. . I i-"But the evidence I You got" J She stared at his empty hands. He fancied that he saw contempt in her cyeS. 'In spite of everything you must go back. You must get that." "Even if I had the courage," he said wearily, "it would be no use, for the evidence is gone." "But I saw it. At least I saw his pocket" "It was there," he answered, "when my light went out. I did put my hand in his pocket. In that second it was gone." "There was no one there," she said, "no one but you, because I watched." He leaned heavilv against the wall. "Good God. Katherine! It's ton big. Whatever it is, we can't fight it." She looked for some time down the corridor at the black entrance ot the sinister room. At last she turned and walked to the banister. She called: "Hartley! Will you come up?" Bobby wondered at the steadiness of h:r voice. The murmuring be low ceased. Graham ran up the stairs. Her summons had been warn ing enough. Their attitudes, as Graham reached the upper hall, were eloquent of Bobby's failure. ' "You didn't get the cast and the handkerchief?" he said. Bobby told briefly who had hap-r.enpd. "What is one to do?" he ended.. "Even the dead are against me. "It's beyond belief," Graham said roughly. He snatched up the candle and entered the corridor. Uncertainly Katherine and Bobby followed him. He went straight to the bed and thrust the candle beneath the cano py. The others could see from the door the change that had taken place. The body of Howells was turned awkwardly on its side. The coat pocket was, as Bobby had de scribed it, flat and empty. Katherine turned and went back to the hall. Graham's hand shook s Bobby's had shaken. "No tricks, Bobby?" Bobby couldn't resent the sus picion which appeared to offer the only explanation of what had hap pened. The candle flickered in the draft. "Look out!" Bobby warned. The misshapen shadows danced with a multiple vivacity across tne walls. Graham shaded the candle Rame, and the shadows became like morbid decorations, gargantuan and motionless. "It's madness," Graham said. "There's no explanation of this that we can understand." Howells' straight smile mocked them. As if in answer to Graham 1 voice sighed through the room. Its quality was one with the shadows, unsubstantial and shapeless. Bobby grasped one of the bed posts and braced himself, listening. The candle in Graham's hand commenced to flicker again, and Bobby knew that it hadn't been his fancy, for Graham istened, too. It shook again through the heavy, oppressive night, merely accentua ted by the candlea faint ululation barely detaching itself from silence, straying after a time into the silence again. 'At first it was like the griet of a woman heard at a great dis tance. But the sound, while it gained no strength, forced on them more and more an abhorrent sense of intimacy. This crying from an in finite distance filled the room, seem ing finally to have its source in the room itself. After it had sobbed thinly into nothing, its pulsations continued to sigh in Bobby's ears. They seemed timed to the renewed and eccentric dancing of the amor phous shadows. Graham straightened and placed the'candle on the bureau. He seemed more startled than he had been at the unbelievable secretiveness of a dead man. "You heard it?" Bobby breathed. Graham nodded. "What was it? Where did you think it came from?" Bobby de manded. "It was like someone mourning for this this poor devil." Graham couldn't disguise his effort to elude the somber specter of the room, to drive from his brain the illusion of the unearthly moan ing. "It must have come from outside the house," he answered. "There's no use giving way to fancies where there's a possible explanation. It must have come from outside from some woman in great agony of mind." Bobby recalled his perception of a woman moving with a curious absence of sound about the edges of the stagnant lake. He spoke of it to Graham. "I couldn't be sure it was a wo man, but there's no house within two miles. What would a woman be doing wandering around the Cedars?" "At any rate, there are three wo men in the house," Graham said" "Katherine and the two servants, Ella and Jane. The maids are bad ly frightened. It may have come from the servants' quarters. It must have been one of them." But Bobby saw that Graham didn't believe either of the maids had released that poignant suffering. "It didn't sound like a living voice," he said simply. "Then how are we to take it?" Graham persisted angrily. "I shall question Katherine and the two maids." He took up the candle with a stubborn effort to recapture his old forcefulness, but as they left the room the shadows thronged thickly after them in ominous pursuit; and if wasn't necessary to question Katherine. She stood in the corri dor, her lips parted, her face white and shocked. "What was it?" she said. "That nearly silent grief?" She put her hands to iier ears, lowering them helplessly after a moment. "Where did you think it came from?" Graham asked. "From a long ways off," she an swered. "Then I I thought it must be in the room with you, and 1 wondered if you saw " Graham shook his head. "We saw nothing. It was prob ably Ella or Jane. They've been badly frightened. Perhaps a night mare, or they've heard us moving around the front part of the house. I am going to see." Katherine and Bobby followed hinj - downstairs. Dr. Groom and Paredes stood in front of the fire place, questioningly looking up ward. Paredes didn't speak at first, but Dr. Groom burst out in his grumbling, bass voice: "What's been going on up there?" "Did you hear just now a queer crving?" Graham asked. "Xo." "You, Paredes?" "I've heard nothing," Paredes answered, "except Dr. Groom's dis quieting theories. It's an uncanny hour for such talk. What kind of a cry may I ask?" "Like a woman moaning," Bobby said, "and, doctor, Howells has changed his position." "What are you talking about?" the doctor cried. "He has turned on his side as Mr. Blackburn did," Graham told him. Paredes glanced at Bobby. "And how was this new mys tery discovered?" Bobby caught the implication. Then the Panamanian clung to his slyly expressed doubt of Katherine which might, after all, have had its impulse in an instinct of self-preservation. Bobby knew that Graham and Katherine would guard the fash ion in which the startling discovery had been made. Before he could speak for himself, indeed, Graham was answering Parades: "This crying seemed after a time to come from the room. We en tered." , "But Miss Katherine called you up," Paredes said. "I supposed she had heard again movements in the room." Bobby managed a smile. "You see, Carlos, nothing is con sistent in this case." Paredes bowed gravely, g "It is very curious a woman should cry about the house." "The servants mav make it seem The Most Joyful Christmas Since A. D. 1 will be that of A. D. 1918. Christmas gifts should be personal and perma nent. RYAN JEWELRY CO. Typewriters and Adding Machines All Makes for Rent. We buy, sell, exchange and - repair Central Typewriter Exchange (Established 15 Years) Doug. 4121. 1905 Farnam natural enough," Graham said. "Will you come, Bobby?" As they crossed the dining room they heard a stirring in the kitchen. Graham threw open the door. Jen kins stood at the foot of the serv ants' stair. The old butler had lighted a candle and placed it on the mantel. The disorder of his clothing suggested the haste with which he had left his bed and come downstairs. He advanced with an expression of obvious relief. "I was just coming to find you, Mr. Robert." "What's up?" Bobby asked. "A little while ago I thought you were all asleep back here." "One of the women awakened him," Graham said. "It's just as I thought." "Was that it?" the old butler ask ed with a quick relief. But imme diately he shook his head. "It couldn't have been that, Mr. Graham, for I stopped at Ella's and Jane's doors, and there was no sound. They seemed to be asleep. And it wasn't like that." "You mean," Bobby said, "that you heard a woman crying?" Jenkins nodded. "It woke me up." "If you didn't think it was one of the maids," Graham asked, "what did you make of it?" "I thought it came from outside. I thought it was a woman prowling around the house. Then I said to myself, why should a woman prowl around the Cedars? And it was too unearthly, sir, and I remembered the way Mr. Silas was murdered, and the awful thing that happened to h's body this afternoon, and I you won't think me foolish, sirs? I doubted if it was a human voice I had heard." "No," Graham said dryly, "we won't think you foolish." "So I thought I'd better wake you up and tell you." Graham turned to Bobby. "Katherine and you and I," he said, "fancied the crying was in the room with us. Jenkins is sure it came from outside the house. That is significant." "Wherever it came from," Bobby said softly, "it was like some one mourning for Howells." Jenkins started. "The policeman!" Glasses "Correctly" Fitted O.J.BRADSHAW j Doctor ef Ophthalmology Securities Bldf. 322 (Third Floor). 16th and Farnam. Bobby remembered that Jenkins hadn't been aroused by the discov ery of Howell's murder. "You'd know in a few minutes anyway," he said. "Howells has been killed as my grandfather was." Jenkins moved back, a look of un belief and awe in his wrinkled face. "He boasted he was going to sleep in that room," he whispered. Bobby studied Jenkins, not know ing what to make of the old man, for into the awe of the wrinkled face had stolen a postitive relief, an emotion that bordered on the tri umphant. "It's terrible," Jenkins whispered. Graham grasped his shoulder. "What's the matter with you, Jenkins? One would say you were glad." "Xo. Oh, no sir. It is terrible. I was only wondering about the po liceman's report." "What do you know about his re port?" Bobby cried. ,- "Only that that he gave it to me to mail just before he went up to the old room." "You mailed it?" Graham snap ped. Jenkins hesitated. When he an swered his voice was self-accusing. "I'm an old coward, Mr. Robert. The policeman told me the letter was very important, and if any thing happened to it I would get in trouble. He couldn't afford to leave the house himself, he said. But, as I say, I'm a coward, and I didn't want to walk through the woods to the box by the gate. I figured it all out. It wouldn't be taken up until early in the morning, and if I waited until daylight it would only be delayed one collection. So I made up my mind I'd sleep 'on it, because I knew he had it in for you, Mr. Robert. I supposed I'd mail it in the morning, but I decided I'd think it over anyway and not har row myself walking through the woods." "You've done a good job," Graham said excitedly. "Where is the report now?" "In my room. Shall I fetch it, sir?" Graham nodded, and Jenkins shuf fled up the stairs. "What luck!" Graham said "Hi-iwpIIq mint have telenhonpd his suspicions to the district attorney. He must have mentioned the evi dence, but what does that amount to since it's disappeared along with the duplicate of the report, if Howells made one?" "I can fight with a clear . con science,'" Bobby cried. I "wasn't asleep when Howell's body altered its position. Do you realize what that means to me? For once I was wide awake when the old room was as its tricks." "If Howells were alive," Graham answered shortly, "he would look on the fact that you were awake nd alone with the body as the worst possible evidence against you." Bobby's elation died. "There is always something to tangle me in the eyes of the law with these mysteries. But I know, and I'll fight. Can you find any trace of a conspiracy against me in this last ghastly adventure?" "It complicates everything," Graham admitted. "It's beyond sounding," Bobby said, "for my grandfather's death last night and the disturbance of his body this afternoon seemed cal culated to condemn me absolutely, yet Howell's murder and the move ment of his body, with the disap pearance of the cast and the hand kerchief, seem designed to save me. Are there two influences at work in this house one" for me one against me?" "Let's think of the human ele ments," Graham answered with a frown. "I have no faith in Parades. My man has failed to report on Maria. That's queer. You fancy a woman in black slipping through the woods, and we hear a woman cry. I want to account for those things before I give in to Groom's spirits. I confess at times they seem the only logical explanation. Here's Jenkins." "If trouble comes of his with holding the report I'll take the blame," Bobby said. Graham snatched the long en velope from Jenkins' hand. It was addressed in a firm hand to the dis trict attorney at the county seat. "There's no question," Graham said. "That's it. We mustn't open it. We'd better not destroy it. Put it where it won't be easily found, Jenkins. If you are questioned you have no recollection of Howells having given it to you. Mr. Black burn promises he will see you get in no trouble." The old man smiled. "Trouble!" he scoffed. "Mr. Blackburn needn't fret himself about me. He's the last of this fam ily that is Miss Katherine and he. I'm old and about done for. I don't mind trouble. Not a bit, sir." Bobby pressed his hand. His voice was a little husky: "I didn't think you'd go that far in my serv ice, Jenkins." The old butler smiled slyly: "I'd go a lot further than that, sir." "We'd better get back," Graham said. "The blood hounds ought to be here, and they'll sniff at the case harder than ever because it's done for Howells." They watched Jenkins go upstairs with the report. (To Be Continued Tomorrow.) Woman Demands $89 When Clothes Are Wet by City Filling Hose A little misdirected water may cost the city $89. Mrs. W. W. Dawson said her clothing was damaged to that ex tent when a hose being used to fill a city flushing wagon at Thirteenth and Farnam streets became dis connected and splashed her from head to foot. She asks for $17.50 for a hat; $42.50 for a dress; $14 for shoes: $7.50 for a silk petticoat and $7.50 for a pair of gloves. Commissioner Butler said his de partment paid for cleaning and pressing the damaged clothes. But Mrs. Dawson demands that they be replaced. All of which goes to show the high cost of women's attire 1 Woman Found Dead in Room. Viola Oliver, 2327 South Six teenth street, age 55 years, negro cook at the Merriam hotel, was found dead in her room by police Tuesday morning. It is believed that she has been dead for several days. She is said to have died of influenza. Brk City Neivs Lighting Fixture Burgess-Granden Have Root lYInt tt Beacon Tress. Dr. L. K. Moon, 429 Brandeis Bldff. Agnlnst Skip-Stop Man Tho West Leavenworth Improvers have voted against the skip-stop plan tot street cars. Wounded Soldiers Knroute Forty wounded soldiers, traveling In hospi tal oars and destined for Pacific coast points will arrive in Omaha Wednesday over the Northwestern and depart over the Union Pacific. Hml Load of Boone Doshun Molt simovieh, South Omaha baker, was arrested at Plattsmouth, Neb., with 340 pints of whisky and was taken to Lincoln Tuesday to enter a plea before federal court, in session here. Want to Locate Henry Kehi Postottlce authorities have been asked to help locate Henry Kehi, who 16 years . go lived at 1225 South Sixteenth street. His son. William Kdward Kehi, 723 Twelfth avenue, Seattle, Wash., wants to get into communication with him. Many nt Brotherhood Dinner The Brotherhood dinner at the North Presbyterian church Monday night was well attended, covers having been laid for close to 150 men. 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