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Show f tj ICp 0 FT' HP ll 3 fZ By Clifford Raymond V SYNOPSIS. The Brownins-. Richard ant Hope, am entcrt.-iln-(r.sr in their own charming manner on Christmas eve. lion.' lcnvcs the icuqi ior a moment and i-c-enterfl x'ilh terrible hruitwe on her throat, annoum-mir a ni:i!;ctl man discovered at her Jewel cine struck her crurllv Ri.harrl anil I'hilin Kline ncm-ch the grountla. 'the ervaiits are nucbliuned. and Kichar.l deculei ibv dim all be discharged, and plans to take Hope soulh Sarah Pnrr. who lives in the TillM. o known Hope always, apooars to know more than f.io cares to tell aho.it the happening. Philip and Dr. Arthur FPnd the nisnt at the Parrs', returning to iV'i.ni. l,- the next morning. Sarah tells them about liner Browmne. K). hard's mother, of her love (or . hil.lieii and ail yonne. tender thint-s. Richard takes Hone south alter Christmas, and there Hope tuw an-.1'lpr an-.1'lpr terrifying experience. A Netfro is hanged ai Fil peet. She and Hiehard (to to New York, and Dr. .Arthur sees a horrified look in her eyes one evening while they are dining. Jasper Lord. Richard's ancle, returns front a vnvagre. bnngintr v.dth him Hope' brother, fir-rald. Ur. Arthur thinks Gerald's eornmj Tvorriea Hope. lie i? Qtutc sure that Gerald is responsible re-sponsible lor the marks at Hope's throat, r.nd sits up all night at the FlrowuiiiKs' to puard her from narin. He lias a peculiar sensation of being watched. I'iuhp Kime learns that Ju-per Lord sent a huge ape to Quatu.-k years before. One sultry night, during an electric storm, a- man servant at thu Brownings' is frightened by acme animal which hm says clutched at his throat. Again Dr. Arthur and Philip Kline remain awake to watch, and lit the dark Arthur encounters somethine not human. REVEN7H INSTALLMENT. GENIAL MORNING. PT1HE next morning the house was Us I pleasant reality again. The sunshine X swept and cleared It The phantasmagoria phantas-magoria of night went with the darkness. The room whore Arthur and I had stood conscious, with the storm at Its height, of unseen and unexplained presences, of things or persons moving, where Arthur had touched something hairy or thought he had was in the morning light a place where no such things could happen. Day made unreal every reality of the night and made fantastic every intimation of the night. Arthur and I had sat through the night matting other demonstrations or suggestions of evil, but the storm subsided to a gentle fall of rain which presently ceased and the hc'iire was quiet. We had both fallen asleep In our chairs. Arthur was still sleeping when I awoke and I went outside alone into the oak woods and sat on a bench. Deeper in the woods oven birds were calling. When I reentered the house Arthur was awake. lie was standing by a large chair. Across the chair some one carelessly had thrown an almost shaggy wool sweater. It was more a sheepskin coat than a. sweater. Life at Quatuck was robust rather than precise. In making the most of outdoors the house furnished for its guests and visitors a great wardrobe of knockabout garments. Hope could go to a room and return with ' arrnfuls of clothing for almost any number of people for almost any occasion at any time of the year. Richard had no sense of order. He discarded dis-carded a thing the moment he had no further use tor it at the place whefe that moment found him. Arthur was looking at the sheepskin or rough wool sweater in amused speculation. He motioned to it with a smile which explained ex-plained his thought. " It's been there all night," he said. The suggestion in a manner irritated ma. " And once or twice got off the chair and moved around making noises," I said. Arthur touched the coat, brushed it lightly with his hand, struck it, rested his hand on it, seemed to' be trying In various fashions fash-ions to do what he might have done in the night and get the same sensation one which would satisfy him that it was the coat he had touched. The experiment was unsatisfactory. unsatis-factory. " Circumstances are not the same," I suggested, sug-gested, knowing what he was trying to do. "You can't . reproduce now the state of nerves, the a'armsr the thunderstorm, the lights failing in the flash of lightning, our apprehensions, ap-prehensions, and dreads. They all would have significance in the sensation you got from touching a thing unexpectedly in the dark. Now you see it and know what it is. Then you didn't know what it was and you didn't see it." " You know, Phil," said Arthur, "you'll finally convince me that this outrageous ape Idea " ! " Which is not outrageous and isn't an idea," I objected, " which is merely something some-thing to bo considered as a possibility." " - is mine and not yours. You are trying try-ing to convince me that what you have suggested sug-gested and what I do not believe is not true. But that coat is not the thing I touched in the dark last night because what 3 touched had movement and life underneath it. It wasn't something on the back of a Chajr." ; Hope came downstairs. She always rose with a morning fragrance as if site were the essence of spring flowers and the embodiment embodi-ment of all wholesome Ideas which would live in clean air and morning sunlight. She always wore gingham in the morning, of blight checks, and a fresh, bright gingham always to me seemed to come out of the early summer sunrise. " You two were not in bed last night," she said. " We sat up talking," I. tried to confess with guilt, "and fell asleep in our chairs.-I chairs.-I talked until I put Arthur to sleep and fell asleep myself. We Just woke up a little while ago." "That is rmt true," said Arthur, inconsiderate incon-siderate of my feeble tactics. "I know It is not." said Hope, "because you Lave not been to bed for two nights." " And you know why," said Arthur. "I'll be' (Yank if yon won't. I sat up one m'ht ati'l T.'hil and I sat up ten night together because be-cause we wanted to find out v.iiat threat-ns uu." Hope put out her hand aa if to steady herself her-self in her effort to control herself com pletely. She put it on the sheepskin coat, but just at the contact with the wool sharply drew It back as If in reaction to a shock. I thought that she looked terrified, as if she would ask mercy of Arthur, ask him not to be cruel in his kindness and affection. "You won't be frank," Arthur continued, ' " and you have been in danger. I will be frank this much. When that brother of yours leaves the house I as your best friend shall feel a little more secure." " He is going today," said Hope. I thought that she had experienced a revulsion of emotion emo-tion when she touched the coat and a relief of emotion when Arthur spoke of Gerald. She did not say anything more, -which also I thought was strange. Arthur had challenged chal-lenged abruptly the presence of her brother in her home. Her answer was merely that he was leaving it. Richard tried very hard to be nice to Gerald Ger-ald that morning. It eeemed to weigh on hl3 sense of hospitality that, whether he had revealed it or not, he had not wanted this man in the house and now that the man' was going away Richard wanted to extricate himself from his own suggestions that he had been selfish. He took Gerald about the place. He showed him the barns and granaries, the orchards and berry patches. He tried to tell him of Quatuck horticulture, of the flowers, berries, fruits, and vegetables in which they took pride. He showed him the stock and made every amiable effort to Interest him. Gerald went with him and said nothing. He looked and was silent. I thought I never had seen such bright beady eyes in a face so otherwise sullen and morose. Inactive oppo-. sitlon to everything genial and Cordial was expressed in Gerald's features and attitude until you saw his eyes. They revealed hard, shifty cunning and ac-quitiveness, ac-quitiveness, low cunning and determined purpose. pur-pose. N ; " It can't be done," ft .Richard said finally in despair to Hope. " I'm ( Sr,' ' sorry, dear, but I really don't know what to do i J'f more. He is extraordln- $':' 'f ary. I don't believe he's (, - fj& UlVi'nr-ft ti ' P ' P said two words since he entered the house. I'm sorry, but there just doesn't seem to be anything to do about it." " You've been perfect. Richard," said Hope " I suppose Gerald was moved by curiosity to Eee his sister and maybe he has been so embarrassed that he could not do anything but what he has done. But he is going and you have been wonderful to him." Gerald went shortly before noon. Arthur said he had a sick child to see In the village and he told me that he was so dead for the lack of sleep that he would go to Simon's and take a long nap throughout the afternoon. after-noon. He asked mo to go back to the Parrs' with him. We rode with Gerald to Quatuck village and there found the Parr household in a turmoil. tur-moil. Sarah had lost her teeth. Simon had lost his glasses. The store and the postof-fice postof-fice were taking care of themselves. Old man Nichols and old man Hart might be and probably were eating all the dried apples, ap-ples, crackers, prunes, and cheese. Two or three boys might be standing about hopeless for the lack of a sack of salt, a pound of coffee, cof-fee, a spool of thread or a package of pins to take home. Simon could not be there because Sarah had lost her teeth and Simon was known to be the prime factor in the loss. He had lost his glasses again, but Sarah knew where they were and so did we as soon as we entered the kitchen. He might as well have searched for them in the store as in his home. They were back on his head. Sarah was too exasperated to tell him. " Drat the man," said Sarah, " I think he threw out the glass of water I had them in." 1 " I hope I didn't drink it," said Simon. "And I think I did." " Don't you think Simon might have better bet-ter luck in finding your teeth If he found his eirn glasses first?" Arthur asked. " Sooner or later he'll find his glass?"." said Sarah, "but I know he threw my leerh away. I had them in a glass and th; glass was empty." " If you would keep your teeth in your rroutli where they are supposed to belong, " said Simon, " I wouldn't be in danger ot drinking them every time I pick up a glass of water." Pie Eat down In a rocking chair in ludicrous ludi-crous dismay. " I know I had my glasses at dinner time and I know I took them o.f for a minute after dinner and put them on the window . ledge and then I didn't miss them until the mall came in and I couldn't read." " Have you felt on your head? " Arthur arked. Simon recovered his glasses and rocked In his chair for a minute-. " Well, then," ho said, " where are Sarah's teeth. Arthur, if you're so smart? " "They are ten feet outside the door on the grass by the damson plum tree, where Simon threw a glass of water." " How do you know I threw a glass of water there? " Simon asked. " I don't," said Arthur, " but I know if you did that's where you threw it. I've watched you too many times." Well, I didn't," said Simon, " but I did empty a glass of water into the dishwater, and if they were in it Sarah threw them out herself." " That accounts for it," said Sarah, going to the kitchen door and outside into the yard. She came back presently with her teeth and Simon grinned. " Now we're both as good as new again." he said. " Sarah was specially keen about having her teeth today because she's got some ham hock she's got to eat. You can make this a professional call, Arthur. How much do we owe you for it? " " If the ham hocks are as good as they always have been I'll say a supper for Phil and me and a chance to sleep a couple hours." Simon grinned. " It's cheap enough for our teeth and eyes," he said. "We might give a tramp that much if he'd sleep in the barn and take all the matches out of his pockets first." Sarah with a tooth brush was scrubbing her teeth in a basin of hot water. " I ought to see that he drinks some dishwater," dish-water," she said. " I'd like to see anybody who wants their teeth thrown in the dish wator and then out In the yard." " Who threw them out in the yard? " Simon asked. " I only threw them in the dishpan. If your teeth get much looser in their carryings carry-ings on somebody will have them up before Squire Tott for trespass." Simon winked at Arthur to show that he was enjoying himself. He got his hat and went to the door. " I've got to get back to the store," ha said. He opened the door and then with the portentousness of an antique old man who was about to drop a curtain on the comedy com-edy he waited until he was certain that he had my attention and Arthur's and Sarah was unprepared, for the missile in his sling. "When you want to make me take that dishwater," he sulci, "just call it bean soup and I'll probably think it's better than the last you cooked." Simon departed hurriedly but satisfied. Sarah remained Imperturbable, scrubbing her teeth. Simon had the advantage. She could only refuse to acknowledge it Arthur and I waited without speaking. Sarah rinsed .her teeth In cold water and put them back in her mouth. "A man's an awful fool." she said, "and my man is worse than ordinary. Are you both going to bed? " " I am for a few minutes or hours," said Arthur, " not to bed, but In on the couch." " What kept you up so over to the house? Sarah asked. "Phil will tell you," said Arthur. "He didn't lose much sleep." " He went in the " setting " room, closed the door and went to sleep on the couch. Sarah said that if I would get some cherries she would make some cherry pies. " The birds are getting them," she said. " and Simon puts of' picking them. The first thing he knows he won't have any for his cherry bitters." " Are Simon's bitters really bitter? " I asked. " A teetotaler could cure a spell of stomach ache with them," said Sarah. " Simon's right smart, but if he thinks I Son't know the smell of corn liquor he's an awful fool. A man is an awful fool." I got a ladder and picked cherries, to the annoyance of the robins and biuejays. With two bucketfuls I returned to the kitchen and helped Sarah take out the pits. Then I sat and watched her roll the crust, profoundly-content profoundly-content to be in such an atmosphere, sitting in one of the rocking chairs and looking at Sarah, the durable human fact, at work which means simple human pleasure. A person who has been little in touch with the processes of fruition and husbandry, who :. He showed him the stock and made f amiable effort to interest him. - s&fMK&fe raid went with him and said nothing. ' C-?". ' V K aoked and was silent. I thought I never ' f'2-i SW t seen such bright beady eyes in a face so J ,i rwlse sullen and morose. Inactive oppo- Bfc L, rffrT " I i n to everything genial and Wdial was JWM ' W cssed in Gerald's features and attitude ?Clff ' JKt It'-' .you saw hi. eye.. fM V" 9V V!5? ,ey revealed hard, shifty cunning and ac- . 0 M Jlf, Y ;veness, low cunning and determined pur- Mf Vi V? Mf' V 11 can't be done." a. rfffM' TyV & M,"l wd said finally in JZiWl M V At ?l Wl S jSS 4 ,a,r to Hope. - "I'm , W WM M k ? JtW 3 y, dear, but I really lW'i V ' f A t& t know what to d, , Mi' f" j I ff Hi ZMl tept;! 1, At - .:Sl Pi " She put it on the sheepskin, but, just at the contact with the wool, f sharply drew it back as if in reaction to a shock." m - has known nothing of its long hours, hard toil, taciturnity, monotony, and weariness, may love a brief but seemingly intimate touch with jiroductlveness. To pick the cherries cher-ries was an illusion of such a nature. "What did keep you up at the house?" Sarah asked as she rolled her crust. " Y'ou know what Jasper Lord said of Hope's brother," I suggested. " I heu'd what he said. I want to know what Arthur has on his mind and what scared him and what happened." I tried to tell her what Arthur had in his thought and what I had in mine. " There is something the matter," I said. " Hope Browning has been terrified in some way by something. I don't know what it is. I know I have heard strange noises at the house. I know that I had a fantastic idea. And I know that Arthur said that in the dark he touched something living that was hairy and he did not believe in the idea I had and yet he had the experience. So I don't know anything." Sarah rolled her crust and lifted it into her pie tins, pinching the edges. She put in the cherries and sprinkled sugar over them, Whenever Sarah thus worked she was a perfect Gibraltar of enduring human benevolence. benevo-lence. She worked and nothing, you knew that absolutely nothing, could destroy her significance. It was out of human consideration considera-tion that Sarah baking cherry pies could be removed permanently from the kitchen. She and it were too solid in their importance. They represented the permanent essence of life. Sarah cannot die, I thought as I watched her at work. A neurotic person with a distorted dis-torted perspective, with an agonized imagination, imagi-nation, with a subjective world all askew and an objective' world all horrid, would find asylum in Sarah's kitchen be cured there and be given that normality of benevolent Illusion needed for healthy life. Sarah was unflinching. I knew that she had gone, years before, to a tooth puller, and. sitting down In his chair, had endured the extraction of twelve teeth without a Jump, without a sound the pulling of one after another and arose unsteady from the shock but indomitable. "I can't seem to get any one to tell me what did happen," she said, returning to that subject. - "They tell me what they think happened, hap-pened, but not what did." " When we do not know what happened and can only think what happened, how can we tell more than we know or anything but what we think? " I asked. " I can think for myself," said Sarah, " but I wasn't at the house Christmas eve and I wasn't there last night." Sarah put her pies in the oven, took her pipe from the top of the chest of drawers, filled it from a tin can of tobacco, took a paper spill from a glass Jar on a shelf near the range, lighted the spill at the range, lighted her pipe, and sat down in a rocking chair for a smoke. What, after all, had happened? In the first place Hope had been hit In the mouth and nearly strangled by a thief. That was her story. It was ration. Such things could and did happen. We did not want them to happen to Hope, but they did not terrify a whole life. Hope had 'been attacked by some man Jn a southern pine grove. Some inexplicable sounds and movements had astonished and dismayed us at Quatuck. To explain it there was Gerald, the ferocious lout with his sullen cupidity aroused by a valuable diamond he wanted, a coarse realist and sensualist, desperate des-perate for means of satisfying his longing for gross indulgences which required money. It was explicable and then inexplicable Hope in her perfect happiness, Richard in his perfect happiness, Quatuck with its serenity, seren-ity, Joviality, and cordiality human relations in their greatest beauty and with the resultant resul-tant beauty of their happiness then the Inexplicable In-explicable terror and threat, disorder, and dismay then, In the Parr kitchen, the ln-tcrutable ln-tcrutable Sarah who knew and waited. " I may have told you what I think," I aid, "but also I have told you all I know. I told you what I thought happened, but also what happened." Sarah smoked and said nothing. " I also think that while we are guessing, you know," I said. Sarah did not indicate even by a quicker puff at her pipe or by a longer rock of her chair that she was at all interested In my speculations. " What I wish," I said, " is that Hope would tell Richard. If It is Gerald, why doesn't she tell Richard? I can see why she should protect her brother and her husband from each other's animosity up to a certain extent. ex-tent. But after a while devotion of such nature becomes wrong because It leads to worse and avoidable consequences. I can't see at all if this is really a terrible animal thing like an ape why she shouldn't tell instantly in-stantly and we'd get rid of the thing somehow some-how at sometime. Arthur Is right. If we think of an outre explanation we rob Hope of a moral justification and we know it is her whole life to act on moral impulses whether they sacrifice her or not." Sarah got up and'laid her pipe aside. She did not knock out the ashes on the heel tap, but laid it aside as it was, for later relighting. She opened her oven and looked at her Pies. " I ought to have set some bread last night," shetsaid, "and I didn't. I'll have to make some baiting powder biscuit, but there's honey and maple sirup to have to them." I knew I might as well stop letting buckets down into Sarah's well. They came up empty and would continue to come up empty. '"Did you say Hope and Richard were going go-ing away again?" Sarah asked. " Richard wants to close the house up long enough to get rid of all the servants again," I said, " and long enough to take Hope to the mountains for a month or two. He thinks the servants have become excited and' ( nervous and that they will fix a tradition on the house something uncanny and ghastly." " They never do keep their hired girls and hired men long," said Sarah, getting out the flour sack, the wooden mixing bowl, rolling pin, and flour sifter. " I never knew any one to treat servants better than Hope and Richard do," I suggested. sug-gested. "I guess they are real clever to them," said Sarah, " but they don't keep the same ones." "Richard always seems to thank any one who does anything for him." " Yes, he's real clever." " He and Hope are so happy together," I said. " Richard always was a good provider," said Sarah. "I don't know what I'm thinking think-ing of getting the flour out. I can't make these biscuit for an hour and a half yet. It's only 4 o'clock, and Arthur's asleep and when ho wakes up he's got to see the Clayton Clay-ton girl who broke her arm, and Simon won't close the store till 5:30." She took up her pipe again and lighted another an-other spill at the range. " The wood is getting low," she said. " You. Phil, go out and got me an armful from the wood pile." When I came back she said: " If you'd get about three more arrnfuls the box would be full and that chore would be done for the night and Simon would be much obliged." I filled the box. I understood why rachard so liked personally to have charge of the wood supply. It promoted a senso of primitive primi-tive luxury, it recalled the chores of boyhood, boy-hood, it suggested usefulness In connection with the simplest essentials. When the box was filled, Sarah wan tod m to go over to the store and get some powder. r 1 I " It's all," she said. That was an errand which could hM done leisurely In five minutes and re'' : a half hour. Simon was piaylng with old man Hart. Five children Wert ' ' ing two for the mall, one for salt r,uik for a spool of thread, and on0 fr apples, for snlts and net, a dish wiij ' much thought of in the community J Simon's detachment, when he did d himself as he did a dozen times aday-j ; his commercial and governmental pUrs, ' was a complete thing. When he eampi,lt"! came back gropingly. I think the. tBo ' dren who came for the mail went home salt pork and thread and that the niaji, 1 where the dried apples and the sai was wanted, but after a half hour 1 sa' baking powder and carried it In trlunipv Sarah. " Arthur got up and went to (tee the c ton girl, who's got a broken' arm," Bald Sj,.'v " They live a mile and a half down th t and he walked. He's got to stay them u " an hour or Mrs. Clayton will think he'i ' earning his money. She doesn't think t much of a doctor, anyway, because -wouldn't cure her chickens of the pip" "Did Arthur ever ask Hope to him?" I. asked, "before she lnanloi R ard." "He wanted her," said Sarah. ' " Didn't she care for him?" " I guess she fancied him a little." " But she fancied Richard more? " "I guess it didn't make much differs-What differs-What a woman wants is a good provider r a steady man. Any one will do If he i Tides. They're all alike." " But you believe in love," I suggested. " He didn't give you the right baklns : a fler," said Sarah. " I'll take It jack." " It will do. He might send a codfish li with you the next time. He's got twoM-powders twoM-powders and he knows the kind I want 1' It." " But you believe in love," I Insisted. " If you're trying to rile me, Philip," t-; Sarah, " you can't do it. What won!; woman married since she was 18 have to: with such nonsense? It's something :. children find printed on the pepper? hearts, isn't, it? I've seen them." "But you love Simon, don't you?" I;: sisted. " I'm a church member," tald Si-, sternly, " and I'm married to Simon, who a been a thorn at times but mainly a provider. We have been decent peoyle a. no one could ever truthfully say a t against us. I don't know what you are Ui ing about, but I'll have you know tla: never loved anybody. I'm a Methodist." " But," I persisted, thinking I miflit ( fuse her, " Jacob served fourteen years ' Rachel." " I never heard that he complained at: having Leah," she said. I remained, interested to know what Sj-thought Sj-thought of such a devotion as I had to: to' perceive Arthur had given Hope all i life unselfish, unassertive, endurlng-al ' nothing, merely being. I knew liat tes was fond of Arthur. The stern, reprea old woman might have been different If r: had borne children, but I believe that i: would have survived even such expert untouched. "You don't believe," I said, "that a r: could want a particular woman and n; want to commit his life to any other bc.'-particular bc.'-particular one." " I know Arthur never married, If l- ; what you mean, but I'm not a man. K that one man's the same as another, K" one's a good provider and the other'ia; one. I've never wanted for a pound o! i pork or a pound of sugar. We've hai place and we . haven't owed anybody It' We've had a place to sleep and enough tn-,What tn-,What more do a man and woman wan'. what does it matter what man and ' woman are together if they are ns Christians and behave themselves?" Sarah emotionally was as primitive toplasm. I knew I knew by this tirae--tho great, absorbing sentiment of An-life An-life was fastened upon Hope not mo;. ' despairingly, or even unhappily, butcer-and butcer-and I thought eternally. He did not bay at the moon. He i'" have a mean idea. He was not co-agonlzed. co-agonlzed. He could be happy "a f but he was so in love with Hope, hJJ ' in love with her so long, would remain K with her so long, that It was and wo'J-main wo'J-main the essence of his lite to love hr-. hr-. Arthur came back before Simon 1 ' the store and sat for a while In silence u-kitchen, u-kitchen, watching Sarah at work. " You know." he said, finally. "I from that nap with a queer vrt of lotion lo-tion regarding this thing." I knew what " this thing" was. " Occasionally," he said, "I " wake up with a vividness of Ideas ' hnvo at any other lime. This ' most terrifying." " Anything you are going to tell' I-" I-" No, It isn't a thing I'm fiolns to te-too te-too preposterous, but It's also too P-I've P-I've thought It all over and the v.'0"-about v.'0"-about it is that its plausibility outg-'' prepostorousnes!". I'll ' llls' There are three explanations at Q" It's one of three." I To be continued (, Coi.vvuM. mil), It Cliff"' Ri,B1"'" |
