Democratic Sentinel, Volume 4, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 January 1881 — THE MISSING MAN. [ARTICLE]

THE MISSING MAN.

A. STORK OF A FACT. a She was a curious sort of woman; I could never quite make her out. Evidently she had “a past,” but she would not tell me much about it, until a mere accident opened it all up. I will not stop to relate how I knew her, but come to the point at once. I was dawdling one morning over the Times, when my eye fell upon an advertisment about a missing man; I forgot how it ran, but he had disappeared in some mysterious way, had never been heard of, and that sort of thing; was supposed to have h d a large sum of money about him, and a reward was offered fur such information as might lend to his discovery, etc.—you know, the usual business. Well, I can not say why, but I happened to read this advertisement out to my friend, and as I went on, glancing down the paper, I said: * ‘Ah 1 poor fellow, he will never be heard of again; robbed and murdered, no doubt; these disappearances are all undiscovered murders, I suppose.” I. heard her move uneasily and sigh, and, as I continued reading to myself, there followed a sob and a moan. Looking up, I saw to my surprise, that she had buried her face in her hands, and was crying bitterly. Rising and crossing the room, I asked what was the matter. It was a long time before she could speak; at last she said, through her sobs, in a kind of absent way: “No, no; they are not all murdered, not all.”' “Why, what in the name of mischief do you know about such things ?” I inquired. “What has come to you, poor child ? Calm yourself. How should you know whether they are all murdered or not ?” “Because,” she went on presently, and looking at me in a strange, sad manner, her pretty brown eyes filled with tears, “because I have too much reason. But there, it’s very foolish of me; I have no right to bore you in this way—forgive me;” and she rose to leave the room. I stopped her; I saw I was on the brink of a revelation; I did not intend to miss it, for I was fond of her and consequently interested. So I pressed iyy advantage, the end being that I elicited a very strange story; true, I have not the least doubt. Briefly this is it, though I shall only give it in her words when it serves me best to do so. In its narration she once or twice grew so dramatic that I will try to remember exactly what she said. Her husband must have been a man < *' good family, but an utter scamp, gambler, spendthrift, and drunkard; all his own people turned their backs on him. Dropping lower and lower, he reached a very low ebb, indeed, at last, and she ihula bad life of it with him. They had been living somewhere in Yorkshire, he racing, betting—heaven knows what. The Doncaster meeting was coming round, and he found the region getting too hot for him, so he made a bolt of it, and came to London, bringing her with him (they had no children); came, as I understood, with a couple of portmanteaus, and under an assumed name—-of course, she never told me liis real one. He took a small, old-fashioned, furnished cottage for three months; a dilapidated place somewhere near Kilburn, quite on the outskirts, and where the new neighborhood, which has now sprung up, was only then first beginning to be thought of. There were a few new roads led out, and here and there an odd house or two erected, with the shells of others incomplete—you know the sort of place, all scaffold poles, cabbage gardens, dead cats, battered tin kettles, and stagnant pools. They had been in this precious abode but three days, when what happened, happened. They were without a servant —in the house alone, in fact, the wife becoming the drudge meanwhile. A high wall surrounded the garden in which the cottage stood, it having been a neat little box in its day, quite in the country. An old and now almost disused road ran along one side of this wall, which had a door in it among some thick trees. Wei*, it was early in September, the weather was close and sultry, and on the third evening, as it was getting dusk, she strolled out and sat down on a bench under these trees, near the door, leaving him sulkily smoking in the house. * ‘ Sad and miserable indeed I was as I sat there,” went on my friend, “thinking, thinking, thinking, in the silent gloaming. Everything was still as death in that dreary neighborhood, so that when the sound of a footstep coming slowly along the road by the side of the wall caught my ear, I almost started; but when I heard the footstep suddenly totter, then stop close to the door, and some one stagger against it, I rose from sheer nervousness. When to this sound succeeded a long-drawn gasp and moan, and then a heavy thud as of the person falling to the ground, with an instinctive pity 1 flew to the door, and drawing back the lock gently opened it There on the step lay, as well as I could see by the twilight, a young, well-dressed man. He mode an effort to rise when he saw me, partly regaining his feet, caught at the door-post, staggered and fell headlong into our garden. All this was but the work of a moment, and now thoroughly alarmed, and hardly knowing what I did, I closed the door and rushed into the house. My husband met me on the threshold. “ ‘What now? What’s all that scrimmage about?’ he asked. “ Timidly I told him “ ‘You fool, are we not hard-up enough already, but you must be playing the Good Samaritan, and let the man in? De you want to turn the place into a hospital? He’s drunk, no doubt. ’ “ With thia fee reached the spot where

the unfortunate man lay face downwards upon the edge of the soft, unmown lawn. Gently turning him over, my husband went on: “ ‘Why, he’s dying, if not dead; we must fetch a doctor. A pretty mess you have got us into, but we must go through it honestly, or else who knows what we may be charged with—murder, perhaps? Be off and get a doctor; there’s a red lamp at the second turning on the left down this road.’ “ I flew to do his bidding, terrified by his words, which I saw had some reason in them, and had nearly reached the house when he called out: “ ‘Here, go out this way, by this door here into the road: it’s nearer. ’ “I returned and was about to open the garden door, close to which he was still bending over the body, when I saw he was examining the contents of a large portemonnaie, which he had taken from the pocket of the prostrate, unconscious man. It seemed to be full of notes and gold. I hesitated, but fearing to remonstrate, was drawing back the bolt, when he whispered: “ ‘Stop—wait a minute. Did any one see you let him in ?’ “ ‘No one; there is not a creature about, and the roads is not overlooked, I answered. “ ‘No, nor this corner of the garden where we are—no, it’s too much shut in by trees, and it’s getting too dark. ’ “Whilst speaking he was looking around to assure himself that he was unobserved, and, seeming satisfied, began to further examine the contents of the pockets and to transfer the portemonnaie, a letter or two, a handsome gold watch and chain, and a scarf pin to his own. “‘What are you doing?’ I timidly asked. “ ‘Mind your own busines,” he said, ‘do as I tell you and hold your tongue. I’ll go for the doctor myself; but first of all we must get him into the house. Here, catch hold of his feet.’ “Then, without listening to my protests, my husband raised in his arms the slim, helpless form of the young man. and, with my assistance, carried him along the path, under the shadow of the high wall and trees, into the house, and laid him on a sofa in the little breakfast parlor that gave upon the lawn by an open sash-window. “ ‘Light a candle, pull down the blind, get some water and brandy; he is not quite dead,’said my husband, whilst examining the man’s pocket handkerchief “ ‘No initials, nothing to identify him by. Good ! Now I will go for the doctor; you stay with him. Put a little more brandy to his lips from time to time, loosen his necktie—so, and now. mind, when I return with the doctor, if there have been any signs of consciousness, or if the poor fellow speaks at all, keep it to yourself; don’t say a word. You can tell me when the doctor is gone. The man is not dead, but he will die, I think, and if he does die without speaking—well, we shall lose nothing for our hospitality; it’s worth risking. Mind, now, what I tell you,’ he added, with a fierce look at me, ‘if you don’t I’ll be the death of you.’ “Then he went out through the front door and gate, ostentatiously in a hurry, and I heard him running down the silent road. I turned to my patient, and found him still breathing, but quite unconscious. “Terrified and bewildered I hardly knew how long it was before I heard hurrying footsteps again on rhe road, and presently, having let himself in by the latch key, my husband appeared with a stranger, the doctor, a seedy, needylooking man. “Rapidly examining the patient, he said, with his finger on the pulse. “ ‘About twenty minutes since he was seized, eh? H’m your younger brother, you say?’ / V ; “ ‘Yes,’ answered my husband promptly, with a significant look at me as I started at his reply. “The doctor had his ear on the man’s chest, while my husband continued with assumed emotion: “ ‘My youngest, my favorite brother. Dear sir, pray tell me—Ah! I fear by your face; but say, is there no hope?’ “The doctor shook his head. ' “ ‘Oh, will he die?’ “The doctor bowed his head, and my husband buried his face in his hands for a moment. “I was aghast, perplexed beyond measure, and was about to speak when another fierce look checked me. “When the doctor had moistened the patient’s lips once more with brandy, and after using the stethoscope for several minutes, he said with professional gravity: “ ‘lt is my painful duty to tell you that you must prepare for the worst.’ “ ‘Ah, I feared so!’ said my husband. ‘My poor brother was supposed to have disease of the heart; it was the opinion expressed by a physician two years ago.’ “ ‘This is not the heart,’ said the doctor, feeling the pulse again. ‘This is cerebral hemorrhage—apoplexy, in fact. He is all but gone; nothing can be done.’ “Then there was a slight convulsion, and the doctor continued: “ ‘I fear I can be of no further use professionally; but can I help you to do what is necessary now, or do you know any—’ “ ‘No, we know no one in the neighborhood; we are strangers here,’ interrupted my husband. ‘We are from Cornwall, and are come to live in Loudon, and Rave only been in the house three days. My dear brother came to stay with us yesterday. He has been out all day. The moment he came in he fainted, and then—and then I ran for you. Will there be any need for an inquest?’ “ ‘lndeed,’ said the doctor, ‘l’m afraid there will. ’ " ‘Oh, how very distressing!’ went on my husband. ‘Can we not be spared this pain?’ “The other paused, and then said slowly, with a peculiar expression on his face:

“ ‘Well, surely, surely with what you tell me, and with what I have seen of the case, I might perhaps certify, and so spare you the distress of any inquiry. ’ “ ‘Thank thank you a thousand times, ’ said my husband earnestly, as I saw him press a couple of the sovereigns he had lately taken from the dead man’s pocket into the doctor’s hand. “ ‘Very well, then,’ answered that functionary; ‘I will manage it, and do all that is necessary. I will send some one immediately. Good-night ’ “When he was gone .I summoned up courage to ask the meaning of what I had heal’d. “ ‘What are your intentions? Pray tell me,’ I said. \ “ ‘You always were an idiot,’ he answered, ‘ but I will try and make you understand for once in a way. Any woman who was not a fool, and had been a living wife and alive to her husband’s welfare, could have seen with half an eye what my game is. It’s.-a very simple one, and mind you do not spoil-it, or it will be the worse for you; and that you may have no excuse for doing so, I’ll tell yon what it is. There was something like six hundred pounds in notes and gold in that poor devil’s pocketbook. There is nothing to show who he was to anybody but me, who luckily can keep a secret, so I shall not tell you his name; besides, it does not signify. Not a soul but our two selves know how he came on to my premises; he can never be traced there. I pass him off as my brother, and bury him accordingly. No one hereabouts knows who we are, so who is to say he is not my brother? Had not good luck brought him to our hospitable gate at the critical moment, and had you not been the far-seeing, clever woman you are, and not let him in, why, he would have fallen down dead in the public highway, and his property have been at the mercy of the first person who found him, They might have been honest or not, I

He would have been taken to the hospital, and of course his friends would nave been duly informed of the sad loss they had sustained. ** Now, as it is, they will be spared this sorrow, because they will never know what has become of him. He will only be one more victim added to the list of mysterious disappearances.’ “ ‘Well, but,’ I broke in, ‘his friends will make inquiries after him. He may be traced to our gate, and we may be called upon to explain. ’ “ ‘We may be,’ continued my husband, ‘but it’s sufficiently unlikely. It will be a cursed piece of ill luck if he is. Who is to trace him into this God-abandoned region? Under all the circumstances, and by your own showing, it is most improbable—nay, it is impossible. ’ “ ‘Yes,’ I again interposed; ‘but he will be advertised for and described.’ “‘Very likely,’ he went on; ‘but the doctor and the undertaker are the only people besides ourselves who will have seen him, and they will have nothing to identify him by qyen if they ever know or hear anythingvabout the disappearance. They will never recognize in my dear brother, poor John Smith, who died of apoplexy, here in my house, under the very eye of the doctor, the forlorn man by the name of (but I will keep that to myself,) ‘who was last seen,’ etc., as the advertisement will run. No; they will not know the name. It will convex nothing to their minds; how should it! For, remember, the moment you so judiciously let him in and closed our garden door upon him, the lost man had ceased to lie. From that moment he became my brother John; the real man was gone as clean out of existence, had as clean parted with his identity, as if he had never been! By heavens! it's a stroke of genius on my part 1 never guessed I was half so clever a fellow,’ added my husband, triumphantly. “‘But,’ cried I once more, ‘this is a very dreadful, a very dangerous game, as you call it, to play. It is absolute theft, and worse ’ “ ‘lf you can not use better language,’ he said, ‘hold your tongue; don’t insult me. I tell you the money might as well have fallen into my hands as into those of the first policeman or pot-boy who might have found him. 1 want it badly enough, and if you don’t betray our secret there is very little risk of my right to it being disputed. ’ “ ‘But,’ I said, ‘the watch, the rings, as well as the money —they may lead to your discovery. ’ “ ‘Not at all,’ he answered, ‘if they are carefully converted, and I will manage that. The jiotes are the only difficulty; but I can get over that, too. If I go straight to the Bank of England tomorrow morning, directly it is opened, and change them into gold, I shall be there long before their loss is known, or, conseqently, the numbers are stopped. The young fellow, perhaps, will not be missed for a week; he comes a long way from here; I have seen enough to tell me that. We do not know what his habits were; we do not even know that any one was aware he had the money about him. No; the more I think of it the safer the whole game looks. You have only to keep your own and my couns"el and our fortunes are retrieved for a few months, and we have nothing to fear. Ah, that’s the undertaker, no doubt. You get out of the way; leave it all to me.’ “There was a ring at the bell here, which he went to answer. “Ah, that was a dreadful night, and during the few. days following I was nearly beside myself with terror. Of course, the house was closed, as became the occasion. The funeral—a very quiet one—took place in due course at Kensal Green Cemetery, my husband following as chief mourner in the coach, accompanied by the doctor. “No remarks, no suspicion attended so common-place a circumstance, and when the ground had closed over the unfortunate unknown man, and wl’p, a week later, a modest tombstone rec -> .led the decease of the imaginary ‘John Smith, aged twenty-three,’ all trace of the dreadful fraud, save that which is printed indelibly in my mind was gone. ” As my friend reached this part of her story she was a good deal overcome, and said she had nothing more to tell; but after a while I learned from her that the scoundrel had managed the conversion of the notes exactly as he had proposer!. He slipped away from the house quite early the morning after the death, and almost as soon as the Bank of England was opened changed the notes into gold, as he could do, by merely writing a name and address—ficticious, of course —on their backs. He returned from the city with his little black bag, as he had gone, by a circuitous route; so evading all chance of being followed, though, of course, there was really no likelyhood of any one being on the alert. He got drunk in the afternoon and confided these details to his- unhappy wife. The unfortunate victim of apoplexy had probably not then even been missed. It was a cunning game truly, and boldly played out; and this is really about all I know of it; my poor little friend refused to let out any more very important facts. Her husband utterly deserted her in less than six months afterwards, and she was left—well, that does not matter. To this day she knows nothing of who or what the unlucky young fellow was, where he came from, B'r whether he was ever inquired after; but, though, when she told mb her story seven years had passed since she let him in at the garden door, and he fell all but dead at her feet, she very naturally felt—and, and, no doubt, still does feel—extremely uncomfortable when aqy chance reference is made to a missing man.— AU the Year Hound.