Show HOODOO CAPPED CLIMAX The man from the Territory directed tho waiter to see what the gentlemen wonld have then resumed his discourse dis-course upon life In the great Southwest J have had some good luck and boirfo bad ho sold and I ftavc been JnHlght places aId mixed up in one or maybe two or three affairs In which T3lobd was spilled and most of It was niV own but I never committed n crime Yet some of my best frlemlH and some o my employees arc looking for mo i with the purpose of putting a roper rope-r und 1n neck for an atrocious mur er I could l explain the affair to them ut they dont know It is me they arc looking for and I am not guilty anyhow any-how so I have let tho matter drop But if they ever do arrest come poor devil for doing what I did on the suspicion that he did what they thinkI did It will be up to me to go to the front and I make an explanation I was the windup o a series of what tic French call cawn tray tawms For six months or more I never went tom to-m homo In the Territory without a coincidental disaster Once It was a rqlroad wreck another time it was a holdup again It was n free fight in which several men were badly hurt and It was nearly everything else you could think of including a postotllce robbery The hoodoo seemed so persistent that I began to suspect myself and wonder why I was not arrested as a dangerous visitor to the locality Still I was innocent in-nocent and no one but myself appeared to notice that whenever I came homo something was stirring So I let the I hoodoo rock along hoping it would wear itself out But it wouldnt null till the climax i came That was one night when I went to the place without notifying any ono that r was coming You know my house Is right near the station and I I I frequently drop Inand talk to the ticket agent Well that night I was about ten miles away on a neighbors ranch and I struck me as a good thing to go home I I nnd say howdy to the folks I bor tore a horse and rode over to my < place Just asI neared tho talon the I horse snorted and wheeled I was astonished as-tonished as1 ft was quite a gentle old range pony and afraid of nothing so far ao I knew I put the spurs to him and forced him back to the place where he shied He wheeled and tried to run ngaln but I turned him and finally got him to stand There was 0 ray of light from the window of the station and It fell on anpot In the road where there Was a path leading up the railroad em bankment I was convenient arrange Jnent for the station master and his Visitors an they were saved from the tlbk of failing into a deep ravine that skirts the track line As soon as my horse stood still I began looking at the ground to Bee what had frightened him I knew It wasnt a snake for the weather was cold and I did not believe a catamount would come so near the ulatlon Ilatonfer a strugglo the horse stood Rtlll long for I 11 enough or me to look around The gleam of the lamp from the station t wpreud right along the path As my eyes became accustomed to tHc light I taw something in the path that made my blood run cold Say 1C i you ever had a stream of ice Jmer run down your bock you would know how I felt All the blood In my elns seemed to congeal and my hands and and feet tingled as they do when they gO to sleep Youve felt that way i havent you when you got a sudden hockWhat What I HaW was a human head that lad been cut from the body as neatly 28 the guillotine could have done i o 1 realized in 0 injnutc what the mat tf r WIt Some poor devil had gone to B1eep on the track and n train had de Pllaled him Meanwhile tH horfio L C fta bucking and trying his best t get away from tho smell of blood I hol j ijfired and finally tho station agent came 10 the door Theres 0 mann head out here In th path I said Somebody has been in over He went back and got 0 lantern and took a look at the head U Its a bad Job he said Then he walked ufo the track a piece and found something that he picked up and brouglt back and laid beside the head headThe The horse was still plunging but I could see that the thing the agent brought back was the rest of the man whose head I had seen The horse whirled about this time and ran a hun dred yards or more before I could check him By that time there was a handcar hand-car In hearing and as I did not want to be a witness at a Coroners Inquest I I rode home Next morning lien early for St Louis The first newspaper 1 saw contained con-tained an article setting forth that an unknown man had been murdered at and that the murderer had been seen by the station agent He had shot the victim then placed the body on the track so that tho train would run over it and give ground for the theory of an accident or a suicide r Tho station agent said that the probable murderer was mounted and had called him out to gather up the remains re-mains then rode away The affair aroused n lot of indigna tion and a reward was offered and is still offered for the apprehension of the murderer on horseback Now I didnt kill the man and privately pri-vately I think It was a case of suicide but what can I do about It I I go and tell that I was the mysterious disappearing dis-appearing person on horseback who discovered dis-covered the head then went away I may be arrested Now Isnt that a hIl of a fix for an honest man to be In Say waiter see what the gentlemen r will haveSt Louis GlobeDemocrat |