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THE BELLE AND THE PEEL.

BY A. W. BELLAW.

 

 

The balmy air of June was sweet
As I went wandering down the. street;
The street was gay with cavaliers
And dainty-costumed maiden dears;
I wore my bran new summer suit
And on each foot a charming boot;
A rose was on my left lapel,
And I was cutting quite a swell.
I smoothed my kids and twirled my cane,
And was in quite a happy vein:
A kerchief from my pocket peered
0! color red, which I revered._
(Merely a piece of silk sewed in;—
The kerchief was as false as sin l)
When coming down the street, on my!
I saw my sweetheart drawing nigh,
With airy step, and sweetly drest
In ribbons, till I couldn’t rest!
Mfy heart beat pianissimo;
I sit my color come and go;
My breath was very hard to get,
And still on her my eyes were set.
These e es upon her face were glued
Until I cared she’d think me rude.
Oh. happy moment, just to meet
The girl I loved upon the street!
And all the style I’d in reserve
I then put on, and walked with nerve.
The scene is on my memory yet;
Before a fruit store there we met.
I spread a circus-poster smile
That could be seen for half a mile
Over my face; she did the same;
I raised my hat and breathed her name,
When suddenly our mutual heels
Came down on some banana peels
And then went up into the air—
Both of us together there!
I thought for sure I’d never stop,
I seemed to keep on going up;
I thought I'd knock the cornice off
That six-floored house or smash the roof;
I thought I never would get down.
And wished that I could fly the town.
I saw the people standing by _
And heard them yelling out—“ Hi 3'1 2”
It seemed we were a half an hour
Sustained in air by some strong power.
Loud for a ladder I did call;
It would have saved us from a fall;
And lots of time they had, no d0ubt,
In whicn to bring some pillows out.
But then our flight came to an end,
And toward the pave we did descend.
I wonder why those paving-stones
Coulo keep from uttering some groans,
For down we came with a great crash—-
A funny way to make a “mash.”
We rose and went our different ways,
And I was lame for several days.
I jarred the buttons oh? my coat

And bi oke my watch beyond repair;
She broke the news to me by note

That smashed was our engagement there.

 

love Mad.

The Mystery of the Burnap Case.

 

BY A DETECTIVE.

 

PART I.

A'r twenty-three, Frank Burnap was gradu-
ated from a medical college and immediately
went to Hartville, where he displayed a hand-
some shingle informing the public that he was
prepared to administer to the needs of those
suffering from the ailments to which human
flesh is heir.

Fine-looking, genial, of correct habits, Dr.
Burnap readily won the personal regard of all
whom he met; requiring the services of a phy-
sician or surgeon, the people of Hartville pre-
ferred to employ one of the two medical men
who had for years dwelt in their midst rather
than the new-comer.

The young M. D. was a finished scholar and
possessed of great literary ability; so, the living
that he could not obtain by his profession, he did
secure by acting as tutor to those desiring to
pursue a higher grade of studies than were
taught in the Hartville schools, and by contri-
buting to various periodicals.

On a certain occasion, when the two other
physicians were out of town, he was—as a mat-
ter of necessity—summoned to attend one who
had met with a terrible accident, and so skill—
fully did he conduct the case that, thenceforth,
he had no lack of practice.

One May morning, Hartville was startled and
grieved by the announcement that “ Dr.

rank"—as he was familiarly known—had been
found dead in his office; still more amazed
when it was reported that he had committed
suicide.

It was impossible for anybody to imagine a
motive for such an act, and one person—a blue-
eyed, golden-haired girl, who was soon to have
become his wife—amid her tears and heart-
rending cries, persisted that he had been mur-
dered.

The local authorities thought this view of the
matter as probable as the suicide theory, and at
once telegraphed to a detective bureau for
assistance—the bureau of which I am a mem—

er. »

Early that evening, I was in Hartville and,
going to the chairman of the board of select—
men, I introduced myself to him.

“ I am very glad to see you,” said the official—
whose name was Conant—in a cordial manner,
as he conducted me into his house. “ Have you
been to tea?”

“ I have not,” was my reply.

“ Neither have I, business keeping me from
home until a few moments since, and you will do
me the honor of sppping with me.”

“ Thank you, I shall be pleased to do so.”

“ Excuse me,” be observed when I had seated
myself, and withdrew from the room.

Presently, he returned, saying:

“Tea is ready,” and he led the ‘way to the
dining-room, where I was presented to his
daughter, an unusually attractive young lady
who, I learned later, with himself constituted
his entire household.

“ Do you know anything of the case upon
which you are to work?” he inquired.

“ I do not,” I answered.

He acquainted me with all that he knew of
the affair-at most but little—and then I
asked:

“ Has Doctor Burnap’s body been removed
from his late office?”

“ It has not as, pending the arrival of a detec-
tive, it was deemed advrsable that everything
in the office remain as it was when the body was
found.”

“ A wise course to pur3ue,” I responded.

Directly that the meal was over, we went to
the office—on the first floor of a small building
at some distance from any other—to which an
entrance was gained by means of a key in the
possession of Mr. Conant. He struck a match
and lighted a lamp, revealing to my view a
neatly-furnished apartment, though nothing in
it indicated extravagance on the part of its
occupant—«now lying cold in death on a table
near the center of the room, covered with a
cloth.

Presently we were joined by the other mem-
bers of the board of selectmen, the coroner, the
gentleman who had discovered the body. who
had been summoned hither at my requcst, to
whom—individually—I was introduced by Mr.
Conant.

“ “'ill you kindly explain how you chanced
to find Doctor Burnap’s remains?” I asked, ad-
dressing one of them.

“ For nearly three years,” was the reply, “ he
has boarded at the same place with myself, and
was invariably accustomed to inform our
boarding-mistress when he was to be absent
from any meal, in his kindness wishing to save
her the trouble of keeping the table waiting for
him. ‘ He slept in a room adjoining this. and as
he neither appeared at the breakfast table nor
sent any explanation of his absence, this morn-
ing, she feared he must be ill and wished me to
call at his office and learn if such were the
case.

“ I did as she requested, and found him lying
on that lounge ”——pointing to the piece of furni-
ture—“asleep, as I supposed. He did not wake
at my entrance nor when I spoke to him: and,

 

getting a glimpse of his pallid, ghastly face, I
felt that life must be extinct—an impression
that was confirmed when I placed my hand on
his clammy brow.” V

“ Did you suspect that death had resulted
from other than natural causes?” 1 inquired.

“ I detected a singular odor in the room, and
on the floor, near him, discovered an empty
vial which emitted a like odor—that of bitter
almonds. Then I suspected that something was
wrong." ,

The s eaker’s voice was tremulous, his eyes
were fll ed with tears; and, noticing these ev1-
dences of emotion, I said, interrogativelyz.

“ You and Doctor Burnap were warm friends,
I judge?” . _ ,

“ Everybody who knew him was his friend; I
worshiped him, for he saved my life when other
physicians had said that I must die, and would
not accept a cent for his serv1ces, aware of the
poverty then mine.” _ _ _

“ You were, presumably, quite intimate With
him?”

ft I was.”

“ Did you ever discover anything in his man-
ner or speech indicating despondency, which
usually precedes suicide, when not resultant
from mental aberration?"

“ Never. He was always cheery, as one has
reason to be whose professional success is what
his has been, whose prospect for future happi-
ness is such as his was.”

“ When did you See him alive, for the last
time?” .

“ He called upon me for a few minutes at the
store where I am employed, about eight o’clock
last evening.”

“ He then seemed in his ordinary frame of
mind i"

“ He did.” .

“ Please state what the postmortem examina-
tion revealed to you,”I observed, addressing the
coroner.

“ Enough prussic acid in the dead man’s
stomach to cause the instant death of a dozen
persons,” was the answer. .

“ How long before the autopsy did death oc-
cur, in your opinion?”

“ Do you know, Mr. Ames, at what hour
Doctor Burnap had his supper, last evening?”
the coroner inquired of the clerk whom I had
been questioning. .

“ The regular hour for supper at my boarding-
place is six,” was the reply, “ but the doctor
was not then present, yesterday. If he took
supper there at all, last evening, it was probably
on his way therefrom to his office that he dropped
into the store to see me.”

“ There were traces of food in his stomach,”
the coroner remarked, turning to me, “in an
undigested state. whose conversion into chyme
requires about three hours. So his death must
have been within three hours after his supper.”

“ Where is the vial that was found near the
loun e?” I asked.

“ his is it,” replied the coroner, drawing a
vial from his pocket and passing it to me.

“ It is exactly as it was found?”

“ It is.”

After putting various questions to the select—
men, the coroner and Mr. Ames—whose answers
acquainted me with the complete history of Dr.
Burnap since he had come to Hartville, as well
as with much of his previous history—I careful-
ly examined the office and the grounds surround—
ing it. Then:

“I have not the faintest doubt that Doctor
Burnap was murdered,” I said, “ but to the
perpetrator of the crime it will, I am assured,
be the most difficult task of my life to find a
clew.”

“Find the miscreant, if possible,” every one
present said.

“I will,” I said, in a determined tone.

 

PART 11.

TWO weeks later, a lady appeared in Hart-
ville as an itinerant dressmaker, who, found to
be an excellent modisfe, had all the work that
she could do; by her refined manner and win-
some ways gained the esteem and confidence of
those employing her.

Two weeks later still, I presented myself be-
fore Mr. Conant and said:

“ I think I have solved the mystery attaching
to Doctor Burnap’s death.”

“ What?” exclaimed Mr. Conant, in amaze-
ment. “ I thought you had renounced the
case?”

“ I did renounce it, ostensibly, in order to
prosecute.investigations more secretly.”

“ You have been away from Hartville nearly
three weeks.”

“ Yes, and during the greater part of the
time another has been serving for me—the dress-
maker who is so popular in this place.”

“ Ah i” ejaculated Mr. Conant. '

“Perhaps you remember that the vial con-
taining the fatal poison was without a label?” I
remarked, questioningly.

“ I do,” was the reply.

“ You are aware that a druggist putting up
anything like prussic acid is compelled by law
to place on the outside of its receptacle a label
marked Poison?”

u I am.”

“A person intent upon committing suicide
does not take any pains to conceal the means by
which he will accomplish such an end. Hence,
it was evident that Doctor Burnap’s death was
not that of a suicide, as it was that he did not
remove the label from the vial which, had it
remained, would have shown Where the poison
was procured and have furnished a slight clew
to the one purchasing it. Indeed, nothing indi-
catiiid that there had ever been any label on the
Via .

“ I next endeavored to discover some motive
for the deed. Such crimes usually result from
enmity, a lust for wealth or jealousy. Doctor
Burnap had never done aught to excite any
one’s enmity: an orphan, and without a living
relative, he stood in the way of nobody’s inher-
itance, and would leave no heir to the small
property which he had accumulated; he was af—
fianced to a lady who had awakened the especial
regard of no other person.

“Examining the ofiice of the deceased, I
found a tiny piece of a lady’s rubber water-
proof attached to a nail that protruded from
the lounge on which the lifeless body was dis
covered by Mr. Ames, and mechanically placed
it in my pocket—impressed that the owner of
the waterproof would prove to be the guilty
person. Thenceforth my aim was to get on the
track of a lady who had a waterproof from
which a piece like that in my possession was
missing.”

“ How could she administer the deadly poison
to him against his will?” Mr. Conant asked, in
surprise.

“ He was not in a condition to realize anything
about the affair.”

“ You are enigmatical.”

“ For several days and nights Doctor Burnap
had been extremely busy. lie-timing. naturally,
very tired and sleepy. He lay down on his lounge
for a rest and fell into a profound sleep. His
murderess found him in this condition and
poured the poison between his lips.”

“ Horrible!” exclaimed Mr. Conant, shudder-
ingly. “ Is it not more probable that a man,
wearing a waterproof ,committed the crime than
that it was the work of a woman 5’”

“Not if I have rightly conjectured the mo-
tive.”

“ Which was-”

” A secret love for Dcc‘ir Burnap, so intense
that the one affected by it could not endure the
thought that he was to wcd another than her
self; such as is natural to one having the tem—
perament of your daughter.”

“ My daughter?” '

And Mr. Conant’s cheeks finished as he uttered
the words.

_ “ Did you ever suspect your daughter of hav-
ing an especial regard for Mr. Burnap?”

“ What do you mean?” Mr. (‘onant asked, an-
grily. “ That—”

“Do you recollect where your daughter was
during the night of the murder?” I quietly in—
terrupted.

 

genes

“ She watched with a sick friend, who died
three days later,” he replied.

“ Did she come home during the night?”

“ She did not.”

“ The name of the sick friend was-”

“ Anna Richards.”

“ The lady who watched by the bedside of
Anna Richards, that eventful night, at twenty
minutes of ten, said she must go home for a
short time, put on her waterproof—it was rain-
ing hard—and started from her friend’s resi-
dence, to which she returned at ten minutes past
ten so nervous that it was painful to look upon
her.”

“ My God!” fairly shrieked Mr. Conant, as he
swa ed to and fro in his chair.

“ he dressmaker-detective,” I went on,
“found a piece gone from your daughter’s
water-proof exactlylike that which I discovered
in Doctor Burnap‘s office; your dau hter an-
swers to the description of a lady w o, a few
da 5 prior to the crime, purchased some prussic
ac1d in Vinton. The evidence of her guilt is
purely circumstantial, and I should like to have
you ask her to come here, as the manner in
which she replies to a single question I will ask
her will establish her innocence or guilt beyond
the possibility of a doubt.”

Mr. Conant rose from his seat and staggered
from the room like a drunken man. He had
been gone several minutes when I heard an
agonized scream. Going to a room whence it
seemed to me to hays come, I found Mr. Conant
on the floor senseless, while his daughter lay on
a beck—dead, yet warm. Beside her was a bot-
tle labeled, “ Poison, James Turner, Druggist,
Vinton,” in her hand a missive which read:

55
5

   

“ My DARLING FA'rnnaz— .

“I have overheard enough of your conversation
with the detective to know that my crime has found
me out. I cannot endure the trial, conviction and
punishment in store for me if I live. and die by
means of the poison of which I gave a fatal dose to
him whom I loved as it seems to me no other wo-
man can have loved. -.

“ I went to his office intending to confess my love
—unwomanly though such an act might be—and
then prove to him how essential he was to my earth-
ly happiness by committing suicide. I found him
asleep, and, on the impulse of the moment, poured
all the poison I had with me down his throat.
Since then my life has been a veritable hell.

“ Please try and forgive me, dearest of fathers—-
forget me if you can.

“Lovingly, your daughter,
“ALICE.”

The coroner, at my request—when I had ex
plained matters in full to him—rendered a ver-
dict that her death was caused by a “heart-
trouble," by no means absolutely false.

The mystery of Dr. Burnap’s death was never
before made public, nor would it now be, save
that the proper names which I have used are
fictitious.

 

Nora’s Quest.

THE STORY OF TENDERFOOT LODE.

 

BY JOHN W. OSBON.

“ AH! he comes.”

As the ejaculation slipped from his tongue,
Jabez Carbley raised his thin, wiiy form from
the chair beSIde the one window in the office of
the Tenderfoot Mine and hurriedly opened the
door.

On the threshold, with asealed letter in his
hand, stood a dwarf—a hunchback, with mild
blue eyes and a patient face.

“ You saw her, Dick?” exclaimed Carbley,
with undisgmsed eagerness. “ But why ask—
you have her answer there!”

“ I saw her, boss, and have her answer.”

And the hunchback handed the other the mis-
s1ve.

Tearing open the envelo e, Jabez Carbley
turned to his desk and sat own. The expres-
sion upon his thin. sharp visage at that moment
more than hinted at a struggle between hope
and fear.

A breath of hesitancy, then he drew forth the
inclosure—a sheet of plain commercial note, up—
on which were a few terse sentences in a femi-
nine hand.

Dick,the hunchback, silently entered the office
and closed the door.

A moment passed; then, with an imprecation,
J abez Carbley jumped to his feet and dashed the
letter upon the desk.

" Perdition!” he growled, his fingers working
nervously, his face turning red,his usually cold-

ray eyes gleaming hotly. “Perdition, I say!
3 the woman a lunatic, or simply a fool!

“ Dick Deeper,” turning abruptly to the
hunchback, “ do you know the nature of the
note you carried to this Queen of Tenderfoot?”

The hunchback shook his head, but over his
irieetlli brown face crept a peculiar smile as he re—
p 1e : .

“ I don’t, boss; but I’m willin’ to bank up to
the limit that I kin call it. You’ve been hit
hard by the little beauty; you popped the ques-
tion, an’ threw the Ten er oot at her feet."

“ And this?”

The mine-owner held up the letter he had
tossed upon the table.

The hunchback’s smile deepened into a grin.
11119 ghave his misshapen shoulders a significant

itc .

“ You are right, Dick, in both instances,”ad-
mitted Jabez, moodily resuming his seat at the
desk. “ Confound the girl! I don’t understand
it, at all. For a month 1 have been confident
that she would snap at the bonanza as greedily
as a catfish at a bluebottle, but she throws it
over as if such affairs were an everyday thing!”

The dwarf drew a trifle nearer.

“It is no mystery to me, boss,” he averred,
an impish leer distorting his usually meek and
placid countenance. "‘ I kin give you the secret
of it all in a nutshell. There is a luckier man
P camp. The Queen of Tenderfoot is not heart-
rce !‘

Carbley’s face lengthened and turned white.

“ I believe you are right!” he exclaimed,
bringing his hand down upon his knee. “ And
who, Dick, do you suspect this fortunate indi-
vidual to be i”

“ Harry Arkwright.”

“ What! my mine boss?” and the mine—owner
again quittcd his chair.

“ Just so,” asserted Dick, in most positive
tones. “ I’ve seen it for weeks."

“ And never dropped me a hint!” ,

“Your lay was too quiet for me, boss. If I’d
only knowed—”

“ Never mind—you are right. But I am de-
termined to, nay, must—marry that girl, Dick!

“ Now, take a look outside, and then come
here. I need your keen wit.”

 

Nora Ranks sat alone in the outer room of the
snug little cubin she called her home. The door
was closed, and the curtain at; the one window
was closely drawn.

Before the girl, upon the rough table at which
she was seated, lay a parcel of letters neatly tied
with a bit of white ribbon.

This package she regarded tenderly, even
reverentially, her blue eyes growing misty with
unshed tours; then, with trembling fingers, Slie
removed the ribbon and tOok up the uppermost
envelope.

1 At that juncture some one rapped on the
( oor.

Hastily thrusting the treasured niissives out
of sight, Nora arose and answered the sum-
mons.

At the doorway stood a tall, bewliiskercd,
broad shouldered young man, evidently a pros—
perous miner.

“ Harry 2”

“ Yes, Nora; you were not expecting to see
me this evening?” and doffing his hat, Harry
Aigrwright stepped into the scantily—furnished
on in.

“ Unexpected pleasures are often greatest,”
smiling archly into the glowing brown eyes of
the young miner. “ But, sit—1’ '

The invitation was not finished. As the door
closed, Arkwright ardently caught the girl to
his breast, murmuring:

    

 

  

sit

“ Can’t you ever guess what I’m here for,
Nora darling? Can’t you see that something’s
happened—something that concerns you as much
as me?”

The girl‘s beautiful face grew a shade white.
Into her expressive eyes crept a startled look.
With a sinuous movement she writhed out of
her lover‘s embrace

“ Have you heard of Jack, Harry—of poor
Jack i” she exclaimed, tremulously.

“ It is not of poor Jack, dear, ’ replied Ark-
wright, his tones growing graye, his frank face
clouding. “ Confound my awkward way of
getting at things! I’ve hurt you. I wish from
the bottom of my heart that I had news of
Jack.”

He looked at her regretfully, wistfully.

“Never mind,” said Nora, with a brave at
tempt at cheerfulness. “ You have helped me
in my quest with a true heart and a strong and
willing hand, Harry, and if poor Jack is never
found it will be no fault of ours.” _ '

Arkwright again pressed er to his heart With

lover—like ardor.
I I“My eyes! but you’re a stunner, Nora !” he
cried, holding her off at arm’s-length and gaz-
ing into her clear-cut face as admiringly as
fondly. “ You are the Queen of Tenderfoot, and
no mistake!

“ Now, let me tell you my errand.

“ I have come to ask you to set the day. This
morning Boss Carbley called me into his office
and, after a short talk, told me that from this
time on my wages would be 33 1-3 per cent.
higher!

“ How is that—eh?”

Nora’s eyes brightened.

" That is indeed cheering intelligence,” she
admitted. “But, sit down, Harry, and let us
talk the matter over like rational creatures.”

To this proposition Arkwright readily assent-
ed, and pleaded his cause so eloquently that
when he walked homeward through the faint
starli ht an hour later he carried with him the
fair ora’s promise to become his wife just one
month from that day.

As soon as Arkwright had departed the Queen
of Tenderfoot drew forth the package of letters
and singled out the missive she had previously
selected.

“ It is poor Jack’s last,” she murmured, draw-
ing from the envelope a number of small sheets
of paper evidently torn from a memorandum-
book. ‘ But where is J ack?—wherc is the
mine?”

Nora Banks had asked herself the same ques-
tions times without number. it was to learn
their answers that she was in Tenderfoot City—
that she had gone from camp to camp through-
out that portion of wild Montana.

Four years before, Jack Banks, her brother,
her senior by five years, had quitted his home
in Illinois to seek his fortune in the West. For
something over two years, his letters had
reached her with almost unvarying regularity.
Then came a brief hiatus in the record of his
travels, then the letter in her hand; after that,
not a word.

Where was Jack Banks?

His last letter had been posted at Bannock,
Mont., and bore the date of June 10, 188-. The
first three pages, numbered plainly in their con-
secutive order, contained a simple narrative of
his travels and adventures since last writing,
and was explanatory of his silence. On the
fourth of the small pages was scrawled the fol-
lowing:

“mum!

‘i
”‘lulmm'

“And now. dear sis, a word as to the result of all
this tramping and junketing about. I have at last
struck it rich. as an evidence of which I send you
$500 by Ex ress. At last I have found the long-
coveted gol ~mine, and it promises to rove one of
the richest in the district, if not the ric est. As yet
but one man knows of my find, and, as he is an ex

crienced miner, I have empioyed him to aid me

n developing the claim, with the object of forming
a company to work it, as capital will be the one
thing need In! now.

Here is a map showing the exact location ofthe
claim, with full directions for reaching the locality.
It may be of interest to you and mother.“

But page five, containing the promised, and
now precious, map, was missing—had never
been received.

Then followed pages six, seven and eight;
but they possessed little of importance, aside
from developing the fact that Jack’s assistant
was an undersmed fellow, answering to the
name of Joel Ruddle.

Reading and re—reading the time-dimmed
pages, and vainly ondering the mystery of the
missing number, ora fell asleep.

 

On the morning following Harry Arkwright’s
visit to the Queen of Tenderfoot, the camp
awoke to a profound sensation.

Some time during the night, the office of the
Tenderfoot Mine had been burglariously en-
tered, and the safe rifled of its valuable con-
tents.

Quick upon the heels of this discovery came
another, equally startling. '

Harry Arkwright, the mine-boss, was missr
ing. And by noon it was definitely determined
that he had been the culprit.

No matter as to the evidence. Let it suffice
that it was so strong and direct that could the
infuriated miners have put their hands upon
the missing man, he would have been hanged
Without loss of time.

But if Arkwright had taken the funds and
decamped, he had also covered his trail most
cunningly. Not a trace of him was discover-
able. There was absolutely nothing to indicate
the direction of his flight.

During the evening of the third day follow-
ing the burglary, Dick, the hunchback, and
Jabez Carbley were seated at the latter’s desk
in the office of the Tenderfoot Mine, conversing
in low tones, when some one knocked at the
office door.

The dwarfed henchmen at once admitted the
caller, who proved to be one Saul Turpin—
probably the oldest and most influential miner
of the camp.

“ Evenin‘, capt’in,” be briefly saluted, thrust~
ing his hand into his blouse, and marching
straight up to Carbley. “I wuz comin’ past
Miss Banks’s cabin, jest now, when she hailed
me an’ guv me this fer ye.”

With that, Turpin threw a letter upon the
desk, turned, and the next minute was gone.

“ A letter from Queen Nora!” chuckled
Carbley, his sallow face lighting up with an
evil glow. “Has the little beauty capitu-
lated?"

If the mine-owner thought as much, the note
certainly did not tend to destroy the im-
pression:

“ Ma. CARBanz—I would be pleased to have you
call at my house at 8:30 this evening,

“ Yours. etc..
“ Norm BANKS."

“ It‘s just as I told you,boss!”lauglicd the
hunchback, glccfully. “ ‘ Out of sight, out of
mind.’ W imnien are the same, the world
over!”

“ Well, I shall go up, at all evonts,”decidcd
the minc-owncr, complacently stroking his thin
mustache. “ You may await my return here.”

The fellow was as good as his word. Thirty
minutes later found him at Nora’s door.

chcr had the Quccn of Tenderfoot scemcd
lovelier. In either white, delicatelynioldcd
check was a vivid flush, while her blue eyes
glowed and sparkled with strange fervor and
brilliancy.

“ You received my note?" she asked, as she
motioned her visitor to a chair.

“I did, fair Nora, and am here in response
thereto,” returned the mine-owner, inclining
himself profoundly.

“ Did~did you suspect‘ the motive impelling
me to write it?"

Mr. Carbley grinned in a self-satisfied way,
and lightly twisted the ends of his mustache.

“Moat aswredly,” he replied. “You had
concluded to reverse your decision of last
week."

“By no means,” declared Nora, coldly. “I
sent for you to ask if you recognize this knife,
Jocl Ruddlc f”

The girl’s voice, though not loud, was keen
and inciSive. As she uttered the last words, she

 

1"...

held up a knife—a long, rusty blade with a buck-
horn handle.

With a faint cry, J abez Carbley sprung half-
erect, then sunk back—aghast, weak and trem-
bliiig.

“ It would be utterly useless for you to deny
the ownership of this blade,” continued Nora,
as calmly as coldly. “ With it you took in
brother’s life, that you might secure to yourse f
the Tenderfoot Mine 1”

“ It is false—it is all untrue!” Carbley grated,
in a sudden blaze of anger and resentment, as
he sprung to his feet and started toward the

Ogllt is all true, Joel Ruddle!” enunciated a
new voice, and then the missing Harry Ark-
wright stepped into view from the rear apart-
ment, closely followed by Six of the leading
miners of the camp.

At the same moment the front door was
thrown open, and old Saul Turpin appeared,
dragging the hunchback by the collar. _

“ We’ve got the pa’r ov ’cm, pards,” he cried,
with a quick lance at the occupants of the
apartment. “ his feller had his ear to the key-
hole.”

“ You have done well, friend Saul,” said
Harry. Then, turning to the men at his back,
who seemed not a little surprised at the turn af-
fairs had taken, he continued: .

“ Now, my friends, a word in explanation.

“ You have all heard Queen Nora’s story. and
know ner object in coming to Tenderfoot City.
You have all heard, too, of the letter with the
missing page?”

The miners bowed and at a sign from Ark-
wri ht Nora stepped forward.

“ he page has been found,” she announced,
holding up a small sheet of paper. “ According
to the map it contains, the Tenderfoot Mine was
the roperty of my missing brother.

“ ow, listen. Two weeks ago Joel Ruddle,
or J abez Carbley asked me to become his wife,
a proposition which I at once declined to con—
sider. Learning that I favored Harry Ark-
wright’s suit, be plotted to rid himself of the
man he considered his rival, and to that end, on
the night the burglary was committed, de'coyed
him from the camp to a lonely spot back in the
hills, where, with the help of Dick Desper there
he knocked him senseless and buried his body
into an abandoned prospect-hole. _

“ Returning to the camp, Ruddle and his ally
made it appear that the Tenderfoot office had
been entered and the safe robbed, and menu—
factured evidence to prove Harry Arkwright,
whom they believed dead, to have been the cul-

rit.
p “ Unfortunately for them, however, Saul
Turpin yesterday afternoon discovered Ark-
wright in the abandoned prospect-hole, helped
him out, and, at his request, brought him here
under cover of night."

“ And now, gentlemen,” said Arkwright,
again stepping forward, “ a word as to the con-
tents of the prospect-hole.

“ At the bottom was a skeleton, with that
knife fixed firmly in the bones of the left shoul-
der, showing that the man had been stricken
down from behind.

“ In one of the pockets of the decayed cloth-
ing enshrouding the poor bones was a memoran-
dum book, proving conclusively that the man
had been none other than Queen Nora’s brother,
J ack Banks.

“ Within the book was the page missing from
the letter. In some inexplicable manner it had
been left out of the envelope when the letter was
sealed and posted.

“ Here, gentlemen. are the knife, the page and
the memorandum—book. You will please exam-
ine them and return your verdict.”

As Arkwri ht concluded and the mcn stepped
forward, Joelfituddle’s knees gave way and he
sunk Iimply to the floor.

“Have mercy!” he walled, lifting his hands
imploringly. “ It is true—all true—true! I
killed Jack Banks—I stole the mine!”

The hunchback uttered a snoering laugh and
dealt the grovoling wretch a vicious kick.

“ (let up, you cur!” he cried. “ If you have
lived like a dog, at least die like a man!"

Arkwright was vindicated, and Nora’s quest
was ended.

The next morning the prisoners werc missing.
During the night a quantity of rope from the
Tenderfoot Mine had also disappeared.

Villainy had overreached itself!

 

Telephone Echoes.

THE man who spelled the word “ Dudes ”
D-U—D-S was about right.

“ THE child shall be father to the man.” Like—
wise an old goat shall become a button kid.

A LADY refers to the time she spends in front
of her looking—glass as “ moments of reflec-
tion. ’

“ A FEW days ago a Chicago man displaced
his heart.” He probably got it mixed up with
four spades. ‘

LIE on ri ht side, says a health journal. If it
had been a aw journal it would have said: Lie
on both sides.

HE—“ Miss, I love you passionately: ma y I
speak to your parents?” She—“ Yes, of course;
what else are parents for?”

“ I CANNOT look back over the path I have
trodden without giving me pain,” as the man
said who had two boils on his neck.

“ WHAT do you think of this idea of when
you are smitten on one check to turn the other?”
“ I should call it a reversible cuff.”

A VASSAR COLLEGE girl says that she doesn‘t
know much about military tactics, but she
thinks the “ call to arms ” must be the most iii-
teresting feature of the manual. '

“I’M awfully sorry, don’t you know, that
these knickerbockers are not more the fashion.
Gives a teller an opportunity of showing a
calf.” “ Oh, your conversation does that!”

A COMMITTEE appointed in Paris to investi—
gate the subject of suicide, states that the surest
method of modcrn times is to swallow a tea—
spoonful of prussic acid and jump into the
ocean.

THERE is one man of whom it can never be
said he is “ 0n the high road to success,” how-
ever ablc he may be in his business. We allude,
of course, to the chiropodist, who must travel to
success by the tow-path.

OHSIAN, the Bard, fiourishr'd in the Highlands
of Scotland in the year 200, and he never had a
poem rejected by a newspaper editor. This was
something worth bragging about, although the
fact that there were no nowspapcrs printed in
Ossian’s day may liavo had something to do
with it.

THE ability of a subpwna to attract. bodies
from great distunccs bnfllcs the scientists, who
cannot understand why a subpu-nu having no
magnetic force, specific gruvity,or otlicr attrac-
tivc qualities, should be endowed with the power
to bring or draw men from distances of a thou—
sand milcs and upward.

SENsuiLE Wine.w “ My dear, you rcmcmbei',
of course, that before our marriage I told you
that I rather enjoyed cigar-smoke. IVell, I am
sure I do not love you any less now, yet. the fuct
remains that I find your smoking intcnsely dis-
agreeable. What is it?” Scnsiblo Husband—
“ “’hcu I had only myself to support I smoked
two for a quarter; now I smoke two for five.”

MAN is an ungainly creaturc at. the best. His
head is an irregular spheroid; his eyes are not
alike or of equal efficiency: his whiskers won’t
grow uniformly. One shoulder is higher than
the other, one hand or foot larger than the
other—and this on opposite sides—his hips (if he
has any) are unequal in shape. The calves of
his legs are not twins in anything but age, and
without his tailor, batter, and boot-maker he is
a sorry—looking animal. As for women—well,
this article is not written to discuss their physi-
cal crookedness. If it was it would not be half
the length that it is.

 

 

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