Show oui author of the hie raise lallie voces r aces 1 the lone wolf volf etc illustrated by w A cright Cy ight 1920 by the author THE AMATEUR SLEUTH synopsis vaguely conscious of a double personality but without any idea 0 of its meaning the girl leonora makes her accustomed way into the street of strange faces in tile the underworld underworld of 0 new york mario larlo joins her greatly in love and nd swing seeing the fine qualities which I 1 the girl really possesses marlo mario seeks to turn her from the path of inevitable destruction she promises sea to marry him at cafe gathering place of 0 criminals Te leonora onora meets tier her partner red carnethan Car Carn ehan and Ms bis associates and is ceased accused L of betraying a fellow cri criminal m anal to the police slie she savagely defends herself police crash int into 0 the room and two are killed by carnahan Carn ehan leonora inora and the rest escape in her studio priscilla llla maine wealthy artist awakes from troubled sleep with a distinct feet feeling of hiving having her life linked with leondras Leo noras priscila has painted a picture 0 herself in fancy dress a gipsy which his a strange effect on her unnerved and tearful fearful that hi her er mind Is affected priscilla calls I 1 to 0 her aid a dear friend fr lenil dr philip fosdick ahr Is in love with her he la in stunned to find that her dream dram story of the police fight Is confirmed by the newspapers cllia cilia tells him about the mystery of her bar mother who died when the she was born he sees the effect of the painting and pronounces it a case of auto hypnosis n II if AUTO HYPNOSIS continued 1 I wonder priscilla llla sipped her ten tea maybe youre right but still I 1 dont see sec why illy I 1 go on with the paint painting ing just jest one more day phillp philip confound you out philip exploded with an irritated laugh you know how hard bard it Is for or me to refuse you anything but its no good this time lime cilia I 1 wont have you agitating yourself with that painting till youve entirely recovered poise for that matter it would be better for you to keep away from the studio altogether for a few days youve been living entirely too much within yourself get out and about see people go to restaurants tau rants and plays and dances 11 more how flow can I 1 enjoy such things with this trouble V just it until we find the explanation which may take time youre bound to keep worrying unless you yon go out more into the world im in earnest earliest about this priscilla prom ie 1 to keep away from the studio tor for at least three days if 3 ou insist she conceded with a suspicion of a pout PI 1 I presume ive got to do as the doctor orders then settled sett lerlo philip asserted with reckless complacence THE prescription priscilla llla had a pensive moment she echoed her thought 1 I wonder if one way po do you think you could get at the truth philip it if you were to hypnotize and aid then cross examine me id rather not except as it ft last re s hypnotism deni demands ands such com r lete surrender to the will of the hypnotist it tends to undermine the independence of the ego which Is essential to the right development of the individual but what list else con can we do many things to begin with I 1 want to take this ibis story home with me ine and go over it word by word As it stands in its intrinsic significance its an absolutely unique human document utterly artless and honest the clue we neil may be lu in it in some unconscious betrayal of cepres repressed ed emotion or bestre it may lie hidden in some turp turi of phrasing even in some it unusual word the word you 0 ordinarily use to express your thought such things can only be got at through cloae study what else oli oil plain sleuthing for one like digging into the mystery of your parents marriage finding out why they were unhappy and especially who vibo your mother was and what sort of family she had bad behind her whether in short its possible that youve inherited some psychic tradition there are families for instance that alint hand down from generation to generation the clairvoyant tendency we vve know by the name of second sight finally we may find the pollee police useful priscilla started sharply the police she repealed in a tone lone of protest why not philip tapped the manuscript of the dream story if you actually old did through some freak of activity traveling clairvoyance or whatever it Is have bave firsthand know knowledge ledue of this Bl elinsky business well weil his cie only name mentioned and if you remembered his accurately and we plainclothes men ennis and corbin corban and Rl storis a aby hy the others he be real mimes dames of real persons as well english addle an and inez harry the not and ami charlie the coke red bed carne ako struck by ft a circumstance whose significance I 1 ance had till now escaped him lie paused for thought unheeding the signs of betrayed by priscilla 1 I say if you dreamed true neither of the policemen volio entered that upstairs room lived to tell nhat they found thele then lit elinsky Is credited with two murders of which lies hest innocent I 1 fancy police bead headquarters quarters will be deeply interested it if I 1 can persuade them red carnethan Carn chan ehan was the author of the killings in nistor ls cup and saucer clattered you I 1 she cried her eyes vi wide ide her features drawn with dismay you do that philip dont you un understand deesta nd dont you know what will liappes if you to do red hesitate an instant if he thought id if lie he thought leonora had bad told hed croak I 1 mean hed kill her philip PhIIIP I oh come philip put down ills his cup and tried to speak reassuringly youre taking this too seriously im not it Is serious its life or death she was suddenly on tier her feet gesticulating in a manner utterly out of character philip got up to face her and tried to interrupt but she listen its the way they do with squealers squeal ers informers that Is people who tell I 1 know what im talking about they kill them or get them killed easy cilia dont lose your head she even hear reds suspicious already she declared hes rowed a lot with leonora about marlo mario he told me I 1 mean I 1 remember his telling leonora he thought marlo mario was a dick a detective and it if he be caught her talking to him again or anything happened to make him think shed talked too much hed kill her first and marlo next she abrew threw out hands that shook with passionate anxiety promise me q v I 1 va plo 1 oh come youre taking this thib too seriously you wont go 90 to the pollee police phillp philip tor for my sake cake tor for leondras Leo noras for marlos for marlos marios sake philips eyes darkened to be sure id forgotten about marlo mario and he seems to be rather a more important personage than I 1 1 I she loves him philip and he loves lovei leonora Leonn ra and hl his influence le Is good for her I 1 know it if you wont tell I 1 dont know how I 1 know but I 1 do marlo mario will find a way to save tier her hell I 01 get her away from those others and murry marry her and all make her good gild and make her happy too give him give both of them a chance philip please if anything should happen to either of them 1 I 0 sellia the imperative tone shocked her into momentary silence but her at allude remained that of supplication she still trembled in frantic anxiety and ami lie sought his generosity with pleading hands you wont you promise not to go to headquarters 1 I promise for the time beins being at least feast ill keep away from rom the police hut hat on one condition are you yes yes philip you must stop this fretting take things quietly awl and you must come sway away fro inthe studio with me at once ill see you home and this evening if aunt esther will have me ill drop round for dinner after that it if youve nothing else arranged we vve might do a play if you like ill score scare up some others find and make it a box party and afterward wo we con can drop in at the club de for a dance what do you say the panic in her eyes gave way to balze then to dawning comprehension she sr oled feebly her hands sketched a big sign of apology anil and chagrin ive been silly again 1 what have I 1 been saying philip it matter will alil you give me tills this evening and best to help me enjoy it it sounds awfully jolly and im sure do me heaps of good philip tier her eyes were dangerously kind hind dont think me ungrateful youre toure so good to me youre such a dear 1 I know said philip with a rueful s smile mile but I 1 hope that hint wont be my only epitaph CHAPTER FOUR the haunting portrait 1 I IN THE AIR that was the alie year of the impetuous spring march brewed weather whose gollen graciousness she stole from may april brought times of summer hi hiat heat at such as that afternoon when priscilla fell asleep in the studio and dreamed tier her dream of terror days followed as rare unseasonable enough but sweet with the warn warm delight of louth anticipating the richness of ma gurity with nights of wonder whose ands winds walked suavely beneath skies of velvet purple dense and sort soft topcoats and heavy wraps went early and to limbo summer furs appeared to stress the delicacy of summery frocks shop windows bloomed with displays of sheer and dainty fabrics exquisitely tinted like beds of exotic flowers floers under glass in between them the file avenue saw confused jand and distracting shows of living flowers drifting up and down eddying in groups pausing lightly and by day and night as well the town abandoned itself to such frivolity as had no precedent in the maddest chapters of its LI history StOrY between twelve and twelve it was difficult to secure a table at any of the more favored restaurants unless one had bad been thoughtful enough to make reservation long in advance plays offering the sorriest of entertainment prospered beyond belief at one tit in the morning rushing tides of motorcars rendered the passage of fifth avenue as perilous as at five in the evening the more retiring social life was proportionately more gay and restless its brief post lenten season incandescent with ith a brilliance unparalleled in the memory of the most elderly idler everywhere there was endless feasting dancing coquetry laughter love in idleness announcements of engagements popped in well nigh continuous fusillade and after dark all the kindly shadows in the parks were with the voices of humbler sweethearts love was in the air as omnipresent as the dust of gold sprayed into the night by flaming sky signs it found few immune none quite insensible to the preoccupation it imposed so generally even priscilla though she made no sign 11 II ANALYSIS love worried philip fosdick with relentless lent less importunity whether he were behind the desk in his bis consultation room doing his best to give his best to those unfortunates who sought him out to lay open distressed hearts and bespeak his sympathy and healing counsel or whether he sat in solitude cudgeling cud geling his wits for insight into the mystery that shadowed the happiness of the woman he loved the problem mocked his shrewdest efforts practice and study personal contact and observation together with close examination of cases recorded by others had long since made him as he believed familiar with every phase of psychosis hysteria and neurosis as well as with these phenomena which will 1 I tit at times develop in persons of seemingly normal idiosyncrasy from simple dreaming to somnambulism in all its guises with hallucination trance ecstasy telepathy and and the various forms of hypnosis however nearly akin they might be to more than one of these what fosdick for want of a better name continued with priscilla to term her dreams persisted in defying clas glassill sIll cation by virtue of a perverse sort of intrinsic for they were in no sense true dreams having none of the features pecullar peculiar to those fantastic inventions of the mind uncensored by b waking consciousness they were utterly without traceable relation to tn anything in the memory of the subject or her personal circumstances and en froument fron ment nor were they as Is every ordinary dream a jumble of condensed denied and disfigured impressions unintelligible but to the trained perceptions of the analyst on the contrary they were viere as communicated to fos dick alck coherent oh erent dramatic picturesque convincing reports of happenings aich which it if they fell short of the rounded completeness of the invented story were mere strikingly like reels teely viewed in some cinema of entrancing interest further lar scilla was not hysterical neurotic or anemic neither was she blie of unsound mind hallucinations trance mince ind gild eeb ecstasy taisy take shape only to in the he inias inala of mental menial and physical states the man mail who since tier earliest days hud had adored and watched over her knew few winds minds more clear of vision un prepossessed by illusions or capable of straight honest reasoning put but it was nut not more sane than tier her well nourished groomed anti and guarded body to a certainty however the dreams were telepathic and fos dirk dick hud bud already seen they could be stimulated by autosuggestion auto suggestion as when priscilla had suffered a sense of translated identity while puzzling over her portrait of leonora so too without question they tell fell within the definition of as any direct sensation or perception of or conditions con dillong independent of the th toe channels of the senses sen ud and also under such circumstances mat no DO known mind external to the percipient Dl ants a can be suggested us to ti e source of the knowledge thus gained lined but in either case the link jink was aas missing there was waa no known mind with which could conceivably communicate with such intimate lotin inte sym whilst she slept but only leo ii oras but ans as leonora anything more than a fancy born of subliminal recognition tion by priscilla Irl scilla of the fact that she was the vessel of a dual personality or if there were a real leonora what was the file nature of the affinity that linked tier her mind with Priscilla 87 indisputably leonora was to priscilia lining ing fact a dissociate personality lending leading an independent and factual existence on oil the other hand constantly by word of mouth find and in writing priscilla Priscil ln referred to leonarn I bonora as her other self a plain find and direct lead to the solution expressed by the term dual personality and as phllip had told the girl in the unconsidered ancon eldered spontaneous phraseology of a naive subject t the key to the riddle may frequently be found and yet fosdick had repeatedly to remind himself the projection of a secondary f personality through any considerable distance in space or the creation of a new and strange environment viron ment for its activities was a phenomenon iio menon as yet even to be suggested toy the most pretentious charlatan or the most credulous pseudoscientific pseudo scientific student of the file psychic nevertheless lie he felt constrained provisionally to adopt the hypothesis of dual personality and upon it base the beginnings of his survey ill III THE AMATEUR SLEUTH dredging the past for the truth about mother brought to light nothing that seemed helpful in twenty odd years new york itself had changed almost beyond recognition and the constitution of its society had been made over again and again till few of the original elements remained then too the memory of man Is peculiarly culi cull arly brief concerning the troubles of others henry hobart maine one of the most successful of american portrait painters and in his day a conspicuous figure in the social life of the city nevertheless had made few close friends and of these only one had survived him by a year or two philips father aunt mrs trowbridge being duly pumped proved to be as ignorant as the |