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Show ONR HP THR R By Clifford Raymond j SYNOPSIS. The Brownings, Rnhurd and Hopo. fire entertaining entertain-ing in their own eharmins manner on Christmas eve. Hope leaves the room for a moment and re-enters with terrible bruises on her throat, announcing a masked man discovered at her jewel ease struck her cruelly.. Richard and Philip Kline search the grounds. The hervanu are Questioned, and Richard decides they must all bo discharged, and plans to take Hopo south. Sarah Parr, who lives in the village, and has known Hopo always, appears to know more than she cares to tell about the happening. Philip and Dr. Arthur spend the night at the Parrs', returning to Quatuck the nejci morning. Sarah tells them about Kather Browning. Richard's mother, of her love for children and all young, tender things. Richard takes Hope south alter Christmas, and there Hope ha aa-other aa-other terrifying experience. A Mec;ro is hanged as suspect. She and Richard go to New York, and Dr. Arthur sees a horrihed look in her eyes one evening while they are dining. Jasper Lord. Richard's uncle, returns from a voyage, bringing with him Hope's brother. Gerald. Dr. Arthur thinks Gerald is responsible re-sponsible lor the marks at Hope's throat, and sits up all night at the Brownings' to vuard her from harm. He has a peculiar sensation of being watched. Philip Kline learns that Jasper Lord sent a huge ape to Quatuck years before. One sultry mght. during an electric storm, a man servant at tlio Brownings' Is frightened by aomo animal which ho says clutched his throat. Again Dr. Arthur and Philip Kline remain awake to watch, and in tho dark Arthur encounters something not human. Hope's brother is going away, and they all feel his departure will remove a dark shadow from Quatuck. bimon and Sarah, with the two younger men. attend a circus nearby, and Philip recognizes one of the performers as Gerald. Later, when he aceks him out. Gerald is gone, together with a large ape Irom the circus. NINTH INSTALLMENT. IN THE HAZEL WOOD. WHEN we found Hope we thought she was dead. She was lying In a clump of hazel bush a quarter of a mile from Quatuck house,.inexplIcably there, but apparently dead. There were dark marks on her neck, finger marks, and her Hps had been bleeding. The blood clots had, formed. The blood had trickled down her throat. Arthur arid Itiad gone for hickory nuts. It was an excuse for a glorified revival of boyhood. boy-hood. The night before we had been through the experiences which suggested that something some-thing outrageously malevolent was In the outskirts of our pleasant knowledge of Quatuck. Qua-tuck. We had had such experience before. It came out of the darkness. It evaporated with the daylight. We had had it at the Brownings'. We had found the night saturated' sat-urated' with, intimation of evil. Daylight always al-ways had made intimation absurd. There was Quatuck, house 'or village, in the day-1 day-1 light, beautiful or commonplace, beautiful in many of its commonplaces, in its placidity and assurances and guarantees. The night had been malevolent by suggestion sug-gestion and indication but to go t6 bed under the old roof had been reassuring. There was a black oak overspreading part of the house. It was dropping acorns. After I was in bed several acorns hit the shingles with solid thumps. Explicable sounds were j reassuring. i In the morning when we came downstairs to take the basin out to the pump for'water and to comef with face dripping, to the roller towel,, Sarah was making muffins and frying salt pork.' That was pleasant reality. ! We had planned to go for hickory nuts I that day, and after we had helped with the ' chores about the place we started. It was a glorious day. The maples had colored. The soft oaks were turning. The sumac was aflame. The small shagbarks already had dropped all their leaves, and there was that assertion of benevolence which attends autumn and precedes winter rather than attends spring and precedes summer. . The full granary is the benevolent fact. Autumn Is the full granary. There were some butternuts to be had, and we got some hazelnuts. We had a sack, and when we came to the hickory trees we knocked the nuts down by throwing clubs Into the trees. It was a rare sport. We had been going toward Quatuck house. About a mile from it we came upon some boys of the village who knew Arthur. They were clubbing club-bing hickory nuts , out of two richly,, laden trees. They recognized Arthur and "shouted at him. " Did you know the Brownings got back last night? " one boy called. " Getting any nuts? " "Some," said Arthur. "That's astonishing," astonish-ing," he said to me. " I thought they'd let some of us know and make some preparations prepara-tions before they came home. I wonder if it's true." " The boys probably know," I suggested. " They have been roaming all over the place." " I couldn't - have been very easy in my 1 mind if I had known they were here last night," said Arthur. "That makes it really bad." "Xou still think Gerald is the explana- . cion," I said. "I don't know," said Arthur. "It's one of three, and ail three are here now by the most inexplicable twist of fate. I think it Is I Gerald, but I don't know." "The ape's obviously another. What's the third? " "I wouldn't dare say." said Arthur. "It makes me chill even to think of it. It Isn't possible. It is possible, but It isn't believable." believ-able." We had been going across country, climb-, climb-, ing fences, going through groves and across pasture land, j " Of course we'll go over to the house," j Arthur sale' i Then, in a clump of hazel bush, a quarter of a mile from the house, we found Hope. She was stretched out on the ground, apparently ap-parently lifeless. She had put on a sweater and tall walking boots and a khaki skirt she frequently wore outdoors. By her side was a small sack with some hazelnuts in it. Dead aa the beautiful face of Hope seemed. It was not so lifeless, I thought, as the face of Airthur as he stood, for an instant, palsied, motionless, dead, dead on hi3 feet, dead not only physically, It seemed, but emotionally, spiritually. We had come through the clump of witch-hazel witch-hazel and viburnum, edged with helianthus and wild asters, with an occasional oak sapling the whole effect being one of dense thicket touched at the margin with color and the discovery of Hope's body was one of curiously cumulative effect upon the perceptions. Vision Itself ia Incomplete. Perception Percep-tion Is wholly inadequate. A startling phenomenon unexplained only partly part-ly seen a foot protruding -rom a thick growth of tall helianthus stems the edge of a khaki skirt a woman's body, revealed by parting the wild sunflower stalks a body motionless, the head, with hair lovely but disheveled, resting on an outstretched arm as if V the woman was asleep jvl! the dark marks on the JWyvtd throat the blood at the M lips the stains and the ,'ffe'S woman Hope. Vawl " She's not dead," he said, " She's not dead." Dead a3 Hope seemed, when vision and perception at last got the whole picture, she was more alive than Arthur. He was an undemonstrative man, but this was a knife run In under ihe fifth rib. He moaned as if Inarticulate agony had found a sound without words. Then he dropped to his knees beside her. " She's not dead." he said. " She's not dead." He took her wrist and felt for the pulse. He had said she was not dead as if he were asserting something which had to be a fact. Then he said again: " She Is not dead." That was in a different tone. It was the assertion of something that was a fact. He made a hurried examination. " She has been terribly treated, shocked, stunned, and hurt," he said, "but not seriously seri-ously injured physically." His emotionalism, so significantly revealed for an instant, was gone. " We must carry her to the road," he said. " It's only a hundred feet. Then we'll see." Hope did not revive. " It's all right if she doesn't until she's home. It's been a terrible shock. It's bound to have some nervous consequences." When he got to the road we were In more luck than we could have looked for. A light farm wagon came along, proceeding toward Quatuck house. It had straw on the bottom of the wagon box. The farmer helped us lift Hope into the box. She stirred and moaned a little, but did not open her eyes. The taciturnity of country folk never seemed more admirable than it did In the conduct con-duct of this farmer who had driven up so fortunately for us. He was sympathetic without lnquisltlveness, tender and helpful, but not exclamatory. Something had happened. hap-pened. He could be of help. That, for the time, was enough for him. I knew that he would be garrulous later, but that did not matter. He was perfection at the moment when he was most needed. Another wagon, driven toward the village. came just as we were lifting Hope Into the wagon box. Two farmers were on the seat. It was natural that they, seeing the body of a woman being lifted into a wagon and laid seemingly lifeless on the straw, should stop. They did, and one of them jumped down. " It's Mrs. Browning! " he exclaimed. " What's the matter? " " We found her over in that clump of hazel," I said. " We don't know what happened. hap-pened. She's been unconscious all the time." " She's been hurt," said the man. " Look at her neck and at the blood. Some one has hurt her." "That's what we think," I said, "but we don't know anything about it." The man's face became curiously and grimly grim-ly ennobled by an emotion which took all the commonplaces of his life away and substituted substi-tuted for them the ldeji -of a whole breed. He was unconscious of it, but his expression I became one -of uncomprlsing retribution. It was the expression of generations of men from whom he had obtained his traditions and his ideals. " It would go rather hard on the fellow that did this if he was found around here," he said. " We've heard two or three stories about things happening to Mrs. Browning. She's been well liked around here." " I've been thinking about that man and that monkey from the circus," said the man whose wagon we were using. For the first time I recognized him as the young farmer who had brought us word from the circus. "We must first get Mrs. Browning home," said Arthur, who had been putting a blanket under Hope's head. " Please, let's hurry." We went on toward the house. The other men went on toward the village. We learned later that they went to the store and told the strange occurrence to Simon. They repeated re-peated our young farmer's remark regarding the circus man and the ape. Simon not only told them who the circus man was that he was Hope's brother that there had been difficulty regarding a ring but some fears as to Hope's security had arisen before because be-cause of his presence in the neighborhood. Simon not only did that, but he forgot to tell Sarah anything of the occurrence. Simon had these tricks of forgetfulness. Sarah dealt very little with gossip or news as a distrib utor, but she was as eager an auditor as any distributor ever had, and Simon, with what she thought was utter inconslderateness of her comfort and pleasure frequently forgot to tell her the most important thing he had heard during the day at the store. Just as frequently, Sarah discovering it, It made trouble for Simon. He forgot to toll her this. When he went home he told her, with a detail that fatigued her, all about his efforts to get some satisfaction from the C, M., P. & R. railroad for two barrels of sugar smashed in unloading from the local freight, but he did not tell her that Hope Browning had been found in the thicket of witch-hazel and viburnum. vibur-num. Simon afterward could not explain this himself. He had told the stern farmers what he knew of Gerald that Gerald had been with a circus In the neighborhood and had gone with an ape and he had not told Sarah, who had the whole secret and was waiting to act to act upon precisely such Information had not told her anything except of two broken barrels of sugar. Arthur and I, thinking only of Hope, had not realized what might be the consequences of arousing a rural community to Indignation. I might have perceived If I had really seen what was in the farmer's face 'y when his personality disap- -O1 peared from his expression and when his traditions sternly en- We drove up to the house and w&55t ' found a new perplexity. Hope - and Richard having wome back J"" only the day before had opened it without servants. Richard was not there. We felt helpless. i:ek The young farmer again was Ah helpful. IlkrV "rm on!y a 1,IttIe way be' j7 jond" he said. "I'll get my wife to come over. It won't take but a minute." min-ute." We carried Hope to a divan, and Arthur tried simple restoratives. I got compresses for him and basins of water. " This is no place for her," he said impatiently. impa-tiently. " I hope that young fellow's wife gets here soon." Hope was alive but not conscious. " Nervous shock," said Arthur. " Sort of catalepsy. We've got to bring her out of this coma without producing another shock. If she comes to consciousness and returns to the state of mind she was in when she was in terror it's olng to be bad. I hope that woman comes soon." I knew that in an emergency in which a woman, merely a human being, was reliant upon Arthur, a human being merely a physician, physi-cian, ho would not have hesitated an instant to do anything required. The young farmer came to the door with his wife, a strong, comely woman with that Instantly expressed and serviceable affection which women have for each other in certain kinds of distress. She ran to Hope with strong, capable arms outstretched, and Arthur's Ar-thur's apparent relief was that of a man who had come out of difficulties he did not know how to meet and had remaining only difficulties with which he could deal. Hope had moved several times. I even thought once that her eyes had opened at least that the eyelids had moved as If they were opening. " We'll carry her up to her room," said Arthur. "Then Mrs. Simons will get her Into bed. Can you do that, Mrs. Simons? " " Yes," said the woman eagerly. " If you can find her things," said Arthur, "make everything just as li she had gone to Bleep in bed. If it can be done. I want her to come out of this in a way which suggests that she is just waking up in the morning. Now. Phil, if you'll help me." We carried Hope upstairs and laid her on her bed. Mrs. Simons remained to undress her. Simons, the young farmer, begged to be allowed to do anything useful. " There isn't a person about the place," said Arthur. " and we can't send any one anywhere. If you could drive to Appleton and get Mrs. Renwlck and take some prescriptions prescrip-tions to a drug store for me." Simons was anxious to do so. " It won't take you two hours to make it," said Arthur, "and Mrs. Renwlck can drive her car over in half an hour if you find her at home. I hope you do. Leave word for her to come as soon as possible if she is not at home." I knew by the fashion in which the young farmer went that it would not rajio film two hours to go to Appleton. - " I gave her a hypodermic," said Arthur. " She'll probably come out of a sleep rather than out of a terror but then I shan't know what to do. It's out of my province. What possessed them to come back here and open up the house without any help?" "Where do you suppose Richard is?" I asked. " Irresponsibly -wandering off somewhere s in the country, I suppose," said Arthur. I felt that, however blameless Richard might be, Arthur, this aloof love of Hope, had to be impatient, for an Instant, with him. "And then," said Arthur, " maybe he isn't. How do I'know? I wish I did. I wish I knew a lot of things. I'm thinking too many and I don't knovV enough." "I know one thing," I said. " WTe have come to the end of this. Wre've got to have an answer now." " We've got to," said Arthur. " I'm just wondering whether we're going to get it." " But Hope knows." " I suppose she does. I'm just wondering whether she's going to tell." WTe were much mors at ease with Mrs. ...... cic emu no iittu. iiol tuiu octiaji, who ... , , , , ,, . . , lc.t, -D I knew by the fashion in which the young Vision Itself ia incomplete. Percep- had the whole secret and was walUng to act- farmer went that it would not ta n.m two tion Is wholly inadequate. A startling W. to act upon Precisely uch Information had hours to go to Appleton. phenomenon unexplained only part- Mffm not told her anything except of two broken " I gave her a hypodermic," said Arthur, ly seen a foot protruding -rom a thick l' barrels of sugar. " She'll probably come out of a sleep rather growth of tall helianthus stems-the Arthur and I, thinking only of Hope, had , than out ot a terror-but then I shan't know edge of a khaki skirt-a woman's fip$S$ not realized what might be the consequences What to Ut f 7 , . , . C Seftft'Sfe- 'tr-p possessed them to come back here and open body, revealed by parting s7MMWM)fr? of uslnS a rural community up the house wlthout any help?" the wild sunflower stalks to Indignation. I might have "Where do you suppose Richard is?" I a body motionless, the , fefmW'f perceived If I had really seen asked. head, with hair lovely but 7 ft JSmL WMSM what was in the farmer's face "Irresponsibly wandering off somewhere , disheveled, resting on an MfM u!P4ll , ' when his personality dlsap- in the country, I suppose," said Arthur. I , 1 VSwl I CM&MtC J ST) -X felt that, however blameless Richard might outstretched arm-as if tSBwA ' peared from h,s and be, Arthur, this aloof love of Hope, had to be the woman was asleep waWw M!HtsSV -prV0 ' when his traditions sternly en- impatient, for an Instant, with him. "And the dark marks on the 2yyKAj SWJfiHSk yMCi tered. then," said Arthur, "maybe he isn't. How throat-the blood at the MmlMWW We drove up to the house and do t know? I wish I did. I wish I knew a lips-the stains-and the WC f0Und "eW lexlty. Hope 'V enough " ' woman Hope. . JSI mm.wlmWD and Rlchard havln -ome back ""I know Tnehing," I said. "We have mmm fHn "ly Ul day bef0le had opened come to the end of this. We've got to have jSfijjii it without servants. Richard an answer now." MF KvWVm was not there. We felt helpless. ' " We've got to," said Arthur. '" I'm just ffn? I inlWlfvWTOKjr t 1 wondering whether we're going to get it." rWmTS. 'WtX I m only a little way be- whether she's going to tell." 0nd" he said. "I'll get my We were much more at ease with Mr, Dead as Hope seemed, when vision f V ' Wi and perception at last got the whole v JiPA A .stiSc " - V-KJ'j picture, she was more alive than ZfrS fh 4 VdT hi Ml M''f sound without words. Then he lf $ i-' l ' Y Simons in the house. Arthur was sure that, wfth the opiate, Hope would not come to consciousness for some hours. By that time Ruth Renwick would be with us we could be certain. I think we felt a conscious relief that the inevitable, or what we regarded as the inevitable, in-evitable, had at last come to an issue. This event had to have'1 a solution. It could not possibly be Ignored. Out of all the shadows which had been in corners, out uf all the intimations inti-mations which had been ia darkness, something some-thing explicable now had to come. If it became necessary, if there were ,no other way out, Hope must toll. Whatever had happened, it had happened In the daylight and must have been known to her. She must have seen her assailant. She could not longer hope, no matter what benevolence guided her self-sacrifice, that she could offer herself for immolation after this. . We had I know I had this curious sense regarding the thing we did not understand at Quatuck that it was not chance that it was not incidental brutality that it did not have & casual causation that it did not get real Intimation in the causeless terrors of a dark night, and that it was a moral beatification of Hope. These ideas had sa turated rr y shado -.y comprehension of the mystery. Without them it was a trivial mystery. If I had not known by every Instinct and intuition which can possibly guide the juclgmer.t that, we had in this affair a great moral ju itiflcation of a human life, I could not have been so held In the grasp of the incomprehensible horror. It never had been a horror tangibly. It had been startling. It had had moments which started the imagination ar.d moments which terrified the Imagination, but the revealed facts were commonplace, no rartter how disagreeable. dis-agreeable. I knew that the revea'ei facts were not the facts, and that Is why as Arthur and I waited Impatiently for Richard to appear, for Ruth -J i Eonwick to come, for the time wuen Ho j could be allowed to come out of her now drugfcd coma that is why I knew the cond' lions of life at Quatuck had been impregnated ' with a significance beyond our understanding . Arthur was restless when he could not ba ' of survloe and restrained whenever he v. upstairs to see how Hope progressed. nrs Simons sat constantly with her. Anh. would go up, find that Hope remained unconscious uncon-scious in these visits being the Jmpenurh. able physician and, coming downstairs, h9 the distracted friend of Hope, wandering r0at. lessly over the enth e downstairs, looking out of windows, betraying every nervous symp. torn of disordered mind, collecting and restraining re-straining himself whenever It was advisable even permissible, that he go upstairs. ' : I knew he did not want to talk, and there, fore said very little to him. " I wish I knew where Richard was," h said once. " I'm rather glad he is not here," I Eaii "He could not possibly be of any help, an(j he would ''be so distracted that he might be merely an added disturbance. I'd like to get the thing partly straightened out before ' we have him in our hands." " So would I, and yet I'd like to know ' where he Is," said Arthur. He stood for a few moments looking out of a window which gave a view of the road. " I wonder If she'll tell," he said. " Sarah?" I asked. "What ha3 Sarah to tell?" lie asked, "of course I mean Hope." " I've an Idea that Sarah was the one who would tell," I said. Arthur stood looking out of the window, and paid no attention to me. "I wish Ruth would come," he said, "j wish we knew where Richard was." He went upstairs again, and came down more perplexed. " I really don't know whether to give hnr another hypodermic or not," he said. "I don't want her to grasp the full consciousness of . the thing until Richard is here. I don't want her to have the consequences of the morphine ; to contend with when Ehe does make her ' effort." I was standing at the window having a 1 view of the road. j "Richard's coming," I said. j Arthur joined me at the window. Richard ' was approaching by a bit of road of which we had a view. Pie had a heavy stick over his shoulders and from it was hung a burlap i sack. We knew that he had been out for hickory nuts. He had knocked down as many as he could carry comfortably and was i coming slowly home. i "It's strange," I said, " that If they both went for hickory nuts they did not go to-eeti.er." to-eeti.er." ! "Evidently they didn't," said Arthur. "I wish I didn't have to tell Richard what's han. pened to Hope." Richard came slowly into the grounds and i up to the house. He spread his hickory nuts out upon the roof of a small shed, emptying them out of the sack and spreading them out ! to dry before he husked them. ' All this was within view from the window 1 and Arthur watched him. I watched Ar- ' thtir, Richard part of the time, but Arthur most of the time. As Richard came towards the rinor Arthur said: " I think I'd rather talk to him alone. He'll be extravagantly upset." "I'll go out by the library door," I said,' "and wait until you call me." After a while Arthur came to the door. I had been sitting under the trees wondering what could be happening within the house. Arthur whistled and I went over to him. "Well?" I said. '; " I told him and he saw Hope." " What then?" ' . " He seemed to grow ecstatic in anger," said Arthur. " Hope is still unconscious. I went up with him after I had told him. He stood for a moment at the foot of her bed. Then he put both hands to his head as if lie were trying to keep something from breaking break-ing out of the skull. He kissed her and he ran out crying that he would find the man who had done this and if he did find him h would kill him." " Was it safe to allow him to go?" I asld. " It would npt have been possible to keep him from going." I went back to the window from which I first had a glimpse of Richard coming down the road. " There's a car coming," I said. "Then Ruth was at home," said Arthur, with thanksgiving in his voice. He hustled her directly to Hope's room. The young farmer had come back with her. "I left my rig in town," he said. "T"a horse needed shoeing, and Mrs. Renwick will take me back tomorrow. So I left the horse there. There's a good deal of excitement about this thing in the neighborhood." "Do they know anything about it?" I pe ked. " They seem to," he said. " -Mrs. Browning is pretty veil likci. and they're pretty tired of this sort of thing. There's a Posse out. and I hear they've heard about her brother Gera! and the big monkey. As we came through the villnge I heard that this bro:her and the big monkey had been seen ui a roadhouse near Three Oaks, four miles W6it, and the posso had gone over to get thum." Arthur and Mrs.' Simons camo downstairs-" downstairs-" Susan can stay here and got supper for you," said tlio younir fanner. "I'll nave pet back on the place unkss I'm needed. I' Yko to be. with ;. posse. Mrs. Browning born awrul clover to us. and if they ca c that man there's going to to something don cbout it pretty qul-nk." iTn '. continued. 1 Copyrlshti UriU: 1H CUlford Rajiuond.l |