Jasper County Democrat, Volume 10, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 October 1907 — IN A TUNNEL. [ARTICLE]

IN A TUNNEL.

Having visited my estate at Poissy, I started back with a package of bills amounting to $2,000, which I was in too much of a hurry to count. Happily for me, the 3:20 express for Paris was late arriving, and I had time to spring Into a compartment that I thought was empty. A lady, however, was there before me in the corner to the right. This lady was not only young, but very pretty, elegant and dressed in perfect taste. Presently she tofk up a paper folded on her lap and began to read. Meanwhile we were rapidly approaching the station of Maisons-La-fltte, when all at once the notion struck me to read again some letters I had about me and that I had only glanced at in the hurry of my morning departure.

I put my hand In my pocket then and drew out in a loose heap the bundle of papers and letters and among them my pocketbook. I took up the pocketbook, therefore, drew out the notes and in the absolute security of that narrow, shut in carriage counted them slowly, complacently, without the slightest fear of being spied on. With my accustomed carelessness in everything I did I laid the pocketbook down on the seat beside me, along with the handful of letters that I proposed to read. A sharp rattle of iron made me look up brusquely. Was it really possible we were already passing Asnleres? The young woman, too, had been drawn by the noise from her immobility. She folded up her paper, then drew off her glove. But now the shadow of the great wall of the Batlgnolles was falling into the wagon, already gray with the coming twilight, and I saw that the lantern was uot lighted. A moment more and we rushed Into the Asnleres tunnel. Immediately I was conscious of a slight rustling sound, almost imperceptible fracas of rattling iron, a sort of light rubbing or scratching among the papers lying on the seat beside me.

Absentminded as I am, there were a hundred chances to one against my noticing so slight a thing. Nevertheless, be it a supernatural warning or latent suspicion, I instantly thought of my pocketbook, and instantly, too, without reflection, I threw myself .forward, my two hands spread out wide upon my scattered papers, and leaned heavily upon them. My heart gave one great plunge and seemed to stop beating, for I felt at once under those sheets of paper that I had seized upon something—something that, like a bear in a trap, sought to be free, writhing, struggling, clawing, twisting. Just then the train whistled again,, a whistle of distress, of inquiry maybe, relaxed its speed and came to a stop In the black night of the tunnel, and there In thatjrttchy darkness, for some seconds at least, I lived through the crisis of a veritable nightmare. How long it went on I never knew—never will know—but presently that hand, after doubling Itself with the vain but tortured tossings of a captive servant—that hand—crushed remorselessly under my own two palms, grew still and stirred no more, like a thing that is dead. And all this while 1 saw nothing, heard, nothing, not even g sighing

breath from the owner of that hand; though I perfectly comprehended that -she-to whom the hand belonged was simply crafty; that she was biding her time merely; that in that black obscurity even she eydtl me treacherously. At last the train began to move on once more. The relief experienced as it started was so great that involun-. tarily my entire being seemed to relax from its strain. She was watching for exactly that moment, for instantly that hand was stirring again, struggling again to be free, not in fits and starts this time, but in a steady recoil, tenacious, vigorous, Into which was thrown all its regnaining energy. I felt it through the papers, slipping, gliding, escaping me,,little by little. To get a better purchase on it I moved my palms slightly, and—the hand was gone. I grasped only my pocketbook. I opened it feverishly, learned by feeling that the bills were still there, thrust it into the breast of my coat and folded my arms upon it. Then I breathed freely. The darkness now was growing less, the street light beginning to enter the compartment. Naturally my first glance leaped toy that young woman’s face.. She was in the same place in the same attitude of haughty unconcern. Nothing was deranged' about her toilet; not a fold of her robe seemed to have stirred. The paper still lay folded upon her lap; the umbrella stood up beside her against the door. Only she was paler, and with eyes fixed on her wrist—the bruised and abraded right wrist, as I knew very well—she was relacing her glove, dexterously as ever, but with considerably more haste. * Meanwhile we had reached the station. The platform was on my side. The young woman rose, dropped her paper negligently, took up her umbrella and with admirable coolness stepped by me, murmuring in a voice clear and calm and In exactly the commonplace tone demanded by courtesy: “Your pardon, monsieur!” She was a thief. I know it. She had done her best to rob me, I knew that too. She sprang to the platform. The crowds had closed around her and swallowed her up. From that day to this I have never seen her more.—Chicago Dispatch.