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THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 1929. d The I RED LAMP I I w I if By ' ill MARY ROBERTS RINEHART Copyright by Geo. H. Bores Compeer WNU Service SYNOPSIS Events of the story, from June to September, as set forth in the journal of William A. Porter, professor of Eng lish literature: jrtfE—The professor’s uncle. Horace Porter, died under somewhat mysteri ous circumstances at Bis home. Twin Hollows, which Is now Professor Por ter’s property. Jane, the professor’s wife, has psychic Qualities. She insists Uncle Horace, then dead for a year was at his class reunion, and a snap shot she takes seems to prove her right. Cameron, a fellow professor of Porter’s and president of the Society for Psychical Research, inclines to the idea of psychic photography. Mrs. Porter shows a pronounced disinclina tion to spend the summer vacation at Twin Hollows. A letter Horace Porter had been writing at the time of his sudden death, reveals he had been in terested in spiritualism and makes mention of some implied “danger.” and of the “enormity of an idea.” A “small red lamp’’ is also mentioned. Mrs. Porter's reluctance to live at Twin Hol lows cannot be overcome, and. with Edith. Porter’s niece, they take up Their residence in the Podge house of the estate. Warren Haliiday. in love with Edith, comes to live in a boat rcv.se near the Lodge. A reference Pro lessor Porter had once made to a cer tain cabalistic design returns to plague him. He finds in the village a super ptPicn that there is something mys terious about the red lamp. There are mysterious happenings, and Mrs. Por ter is sure Uncle Horace’s spirit is hov ering about them. A number of sheep are killed in the vicinity, by some un known person. -July 1. More sbeep were killed last night. The Livingstones have lost a dozen ot their blooded stock, and several farm ers have suffered. In each case the method is the same; the sheep are neatly stabbed in the jugular vein and then as neat ly laid out in a row. We are buying no mutton from the local butcher! I assured Thomas this morning that 1 had not lighted the red lamp again, bat he did not smile. He is quite ca pable of believing, I dare say, that I have summoned a demon 1 cannot control. Bat he tells me that a county de tective from town, sent by tbe sheriff, is coming ont to look Into the matter. And there is a certain relief In this. It seems to me that we have to do with some form of religious mania, | symbolistic in its manifestation. The sheep Is the ancient sacrifice of many faiths. This belief is strengthened by Thom as’ statement that in each case save the first one there has been left on a nearby rock or, in one instance, on a fence, a small cabalistic design rough ly drawn in chalk. . . . Eight p. m. I feel like a man who has dreamed oi some horrible or gro tesque figure, and wakes to find it perched on his bed host. The detective sent by Benchley, the sheriff, has just been here, a man named Greenough, a heavy-set indi vidual with a pleasant enough man ner and a damnable smile, behind which he conceals a considerable amount of shrewdness. He had, of course, gathered togeth er tbe local superstitions, and he was inclined to be facetious concerning my ownership of the red lamp. But he was serious enough about the business that had brought him. “It’s probabiy psychopathic,” he said, “and the psychopath is a poor v \V. ) v'-O W- 0/ T- , 'Va ... JsSfgS&l / :r H ’r-V ?-v" 1 ' * <s**%£* I A Small Cabalistic Design Roughly! Drawn in Chalk. ' } individual to let loose in any commu nii.v, especially when he’s got a knife.’ My own suggestion of religious ma nia seemed to interest him. “It’s possible,” he said. “It’s 8 decor time in the world, Mr. Porter j 1 V«ip!e seem ready to do anything ! tli.rk anything to esenoe reality. Auc: i from that to delusional insanity ism very far. Now I’ll ask you something, Did you ever hear of a circle, witl a triangle inside it?” I suppose 1 started, and I had a quick impression that his eyes were on me, shrewdly speculative behind his glasses. But the next moment he had reached into his pocket and drawn out a pencil and an envelope “Like this,” he said, and drawing the infernal symbol slowly and painstak ingly, held it out to me. To save njy life I could not keei my hand steady; the envelope visibly quivered, and I saw his eyes on it. “What do you mean, bqar of it?” ll asked. And then it came to me sud denly that that ridiculous statemem of mine bad somehow got to the fel low’s ears, and that be was quietly hoaxing me. “Good Lord!” I said, and groaned. So you’ve happened on that too I” “So you know something about it?* he said quietly, and leaned forward “Now, do you mind telling me whai you know?” He had not been hoaxing me. There was a enrious significance in his man ner, in the way be was looking ai me, and it persisted while I told my absurd story. Told it badly, I realize and haltingly; that 1 had picked ut a book on Black Magic somewhere oi other, and bad as promptly forgottei It, save for one or two catch phrase* and that infernal symbol of a triangle In a circle; how I had foolishly re peated them to a group of women and now seemed likely never to heai the last of it “As I gather, the Lear woman ha* spread it all over town,” I said. “She dabbles in spiritualism, or something and it seems to have appealed to hei imagination.” “It has certainly appealed to some body’s imagination,” he said. “That’. 1 the mark our friend the sheep killei has been leaving.” He was very cordial as he picket up his hat and prepared to depa-t He was sorry to have had to trouble me; nice little place I had there. He understood I was fighting shy of the other house. He would do the same thing; he didn’t believe in ghosts, bui he was afraid of them. And so out onto the drive, leaving me with a full and firm conviction that be suspects me of killing some forty odd sheep in the last few nights, probably in the celebration of some Black Mass of my own psychopathic devising. July 2. Larkin thinks he has rented the house. I made a telephone message from him the excuse to go to town this morning. Mr. Bethel, the prospec tive tenant, was not present, but his secretary was, a thin boy with a bad skin and with his hair pomaded until it looks as though it is painted on his head. He smoked one cigarette after another as we talked. If tomorrow is fair, Mr. Bethel will motor out and look over the property. It appears that he is in feeble health. If it is not, Gordon, the secretary, will come alone. It develops that, al though the boy is a local product, and not one to be particularly proud of Mr. Bethel comes from the West; Cameron’s note to Larkin merely in troduced him, but assumed no re sponsibility. As, however, he offers the rent in advance, the matter of ref erence becomes, as Larkin says, an unimportant detail. ] get the impression from the see retary that the old man is writing a book, and wishes to be undisturbed, and if his choice of a secretary fairly represents him, he will be. From Larkin I learned that he had heard of the circle in a triangle from Helena Lear herself, at a dinner ta ble. and that he has no idea that it is at all widespread. He regards the use of it by the sheep-killer as purely coincidence, which greatly cheers me. Nevertheless, I went to the Lears and lunched there. Helena has agreed to spread the thing no further, and I came away with a great sense of re lief. Into the bargain, Lear tells me that Cameron, after studying the pho tograph 1 sent him, is inclined to think it is the result of a double ex posure. No more sheep were killed last night. I understand Greenough has put guards on all the nearby flocks, and advised outlying farms to do the same thing. Maggie Morrison told us this morning that they were.doing it, but in. I gathered, a half-hearted man ner. Most of them believe that, by his very nature, the marauder is im pervious to shot and shell. One curious thing, however, has been brought in by Starr, who stopped I on his way past today. In a meadow | not far from the Livingstone place ! two large stones, which had lain there ! for years, have been moved together | and stood on their edges, and a flat i slab of rock laid across them. On i top of this, when it was found, there lay a small heap of fine sand. One can figure, of course, that here is an altar, erected by the same un balanced inind which has been killing the sheep. But no offering has yet been laid on it. Later: Haliiday spent the evening ] here, and I walked back with him. : He tells me that on his first night in | the boathouse, he saw a light mov -1 ing over the salt marsh, about three hundred feet away. At first he thought it was some one i on the way to the beach, with a flash- j j light or a lantern, and he watched j j with some curiosity. Earlier iu the evening he had himself walked along the edge of the swamp and decided it was not passable. But half way through the marsh the light stopped and then disappeared. I “I decided the chap, whoever it. was, ; was* in trouble,” he said, “so I called : to him. But there was no answer, i-- - i THE CHATHAM RECORD, PITTSBQRO, N. C and the light didn’t appear again.” “Marsh gas, probably,” I explained “Methane, <l. H., of course.” “Marsh gas burns with a thin blue flame, doesn’t it? This was a small light, rather white. I waited an hour or so, but it didn’t show again.” I have, since my return, looked up the boob on the Oakville phenomena which I discovered on the desk of the main house. It is not significant, but it is interesting, to find that Mrs. Riggs produced fleeting lights, some times of a bluish-green, from the cab inet, again a sparkling point which | generally localized itself near her head. But I cannot find any record of a light persisting for any length of time, or following a definite course. July 3. The house is rented. As it rained this morning, the secretary came alone, and seemed very well satisfied. But at the last moment my con science began to worry me, and per haps too, for none of onr motives are nnmixed, I was afraid he suspend something. He made some observa tion about the rent being low for a property of that sice, and glanced at me as he said it, so I plunged. “I think Td better be honest with you, even If It costs me money,” I said. “The house is cheap because it —well, It isn’t an easy house to rent.” “Too lonely, eh?” “Partly that, and partly because— a portion of the house is very old, and there have been some stories about it circulating in the neighbor hood for years.” “Ghost stories?” “You can call them that. I don’t believe anyone claims to have seen anything. The reports are mostly of raps and various noises.” He seemed to take a peculiar, al most a furtive, enjoyment out of my statement, my confession, rather. “Hot dog!” he said. “Well, raps won’t bother me, and Mr. Bethel’s got a deaf ear; he can turn that up at night if they worry him.” So the house is rented, unless something unexpected turns up, and I have done my part. But I confess to an extreme distaste for the sec retary and Edith may find herself with a small problem on her hands. For just before we left he spied her on the float, and gave her a careful inspection. “That looks pretty good to me,” he said. And although his gesture em braced the water front his eyes were on her. I have arranged with Annie Coch ran, following Gordon’s query about a servant, to resume her old position at the main house. She refuses to re main after dark, but I presume this will be satisfactory. She will also commence tomorrow to get the house in readiness. With that strange swiftness with which news travels in the country, already the word has gone out that the place is rented, and I lay to that our sudden popularity this afternoon. The first to arrive was Doctor Hay ward, nervous and jerky, fiddling with his collar, and when for a moment excluded from the talk, gnawing ab stractedly at his finger ends. He ad ddressed himself mostly to Jane — there is a certain type of medical man who wins his way into families by the favor of women, and is more at his ease with them than with its men folk —and only beat a circuitous route to the subject uppermost in his mind, which clearly was that an el derly invalid had taken Twin Hollows and would probably require a phy sician. In the course of this roundabouf talk, however, I came finally to the conclusion tnat, like the detective he was watching me. And, as had happened with Greenough, I became absurdly self-conscious. Once I men tioned the matter of the sheep, hut he rather dexterously sidestepped it, and finally brought the talk around to the renting of the house. But 1 am cod fident that Greenough has beeD to him about me. and has asked him to give him an opinion on my mental balance. I was on guard after that; deter mined to exhibit myself iD my most rational manner. But there is some thing upsetting in the mere thought that one’s sanity is being brought in to question. Hayward left finally, when the Liv ingstones arrived. “You must take good care of this fine husband of yours, Mrs. Porter,’ he said, holding her hand in the pa ternal fashion of his type. “He’s prob ably been overdoing it a bit.” The result of which is that Jane herself has taken to watching me quietly, and that she suggested this evening that I take a course of bromide for my nerves. (Continued Next Week) ——<s> Add Windy Scribbler First prize for descriptive expres sions having been already awarded by the Greensboro Daily News to the one who recently called disorderly conduct “blustery behavior,” we beg to present a close second in the per son of the paragrapher of the Ral eigh Times, who called the man giv ing a worthless check “a windy scribbler.” Brother, we call that pic turesque language.—Roxboro Cou rier. €> AUTO KNOWN BETTER Here lies the chap who died for a motto — . He made the blindfold test while ■** driving an auto. —The Pathfinder. They haven’t the Daughters of the Revolution in Mexico, but we fancy the mother must live down there somewhere. —Boston Transcript. 1 HUMAN DESTINY | By HARRY R. CALKINS S WNU Service The Birth of a Republic WITH Napoleon 111 the captive of the Germans and Paris surren dered, the French people in February, 1871, elected a majority of monarchists to the national assembly because they wanted peace, although they really favored a republic, and thus was pre cipitated the brief but bloody war known as “the Commune.” France, and especially Paris, was In miserable condition. Napoleon 111 had plunged the country Into war with Prussia, and the tremendous war ma chine of Bismarck had blasted his hopes. Paris had been besieged for five months and its inhabitants re duced to abject suffering. After the city’s surrender and the capture of Napoleon 111 at Sedan, a truce was granted to allow formation of an assembly to treat for peace. The monarchist party, supporters of the Bourbon family, favored peace at most any price, but republican leaders wanted to renew the war. The people, normally for a restoration of the re public, nevertheless were sick and tired of war. They elected 500 mon archists to the assembly and 200 re publicans. During the great siege there had been set up in Paris a directing com mittee of workingmen, most of them Socialists, who joined with another committee of Republican guardsmen in taking over the actual government of the city. This government included bourgeois radicals and Anarchists as well as Socialists. , The national assembly sat at Ver sailles and ordered resumption of pay ment of rents and notes, which had been suspended during the siege, and stopped the daily wages of the na tional guardsmen. This worked hard ships on the thousands of unemployed. | The commune of Paris revolted and declared Paris a free and sovereign city, proposing that France should consist of a loose federation of self governing communes. Nearly all of France arose against this blow at nationalism, and the as sembly sent troops against Paris, al ready the most cruelly battered city of modern times. The brief battle was terrible in its ferocity. Public build ings were fired, the archbishop was assassinated, prisoners were massa cred, piles of dead lay everywhere. More than 15,000 Parisians were de stroyed and hundreds were deported or Imprisoned after two months oi war. Jor Economical Tran*portation V n jnßiF y * before you buy your next automobile .... \ * r •- V a The COACH *595 4 The ROADSTER . . . . The PHAETON . ... 3*3 ; The $<Q% COUPE The $67% SEDAN The Sf>ort S6Q% CABRIOLET . . . o^3 The Convert- s'7'? ible LANDAU . . < The S%Q% Sedan Delivery . . The Light $A r*tf\ Delivery Chassis . The , . s%d% ' 1 l /2 Ton Chassis . . -ft-* The 1 J'? Ton s.<7 r r\ Chassis with Cab . Ail prices f. o. b. factory, Flint, Mich. C O M PAR E the de’ivered price as well as the list price in considering , , automobile values. Chev-* rolet’s delivered prices include ‘ only. • reasonable , charges for delivery and financing. ECONOMY MOTOR CO., Siler City, N. C. STOUT MOTOR CO., MILLS MOTOR CO., Goldston, N. C. Pittsboro, N. C. ■ A SIX IN THE. PFiICE RANGE OF THE; FOUR! New School Bill Had Many Daddies Lots of people have been wonder ing who really wrote the new school law for North Carolina. The Ral eigh correspondent of the Greens boro News gives the following in formation in his Saturday letter: President B. B. Dougherty, of the Appalachian Training School, is not the author of the new school bill, universal as the tradition has be come in two weeks, but he is the author of sections 15 and 10 which make the law existing regarding sal ary schedules of teachers and super intendents, he told the Daily News bureau today. And he believes he should be crowned with bays rather than pelted with bad eggs. Mr. Dougherty discloses the daddy ship of that bill. It has many fath ers. Judge Nat Townsend wrote a whole bill from which the new meas ure received much heft. Senator Tom Johnson, now Judge Johnson, wrote section four which imposes upon the equalizing board the duty of study ing and comparing the cost of op erating the public schools in the sev eral counties of the state, as assem bling such information and data, relative to cost of school supplies? equipment and current expenses of operation, material which is designed to ascertain for the board of equali zation, what should be the proper standard of cost for operating the public schools of each of the several counties in the state. This section further provides for examination in to the several county budgets, into supervision and cost of transporta tion, and provides for refusal to pay any voucher to any county that fails to conduct its school administration in a business like manner. Senator B. S. Womble, a third father of the bill, put the teaching standards into the bill, and former Representative A. McL. Graham, of Sampson, member of the equalizing board, wrote the sections relating to distribution of the fund. A. E. Woltz, another member, put his hands to the plow and did not look [ back. Frank W. Hancock, Granville representative, revised the whole bill after it was given to him; State Superintendent A. T. Allen put in sections 16 and 17 at the bequest of the senate, these sections dealing with the number of teachers and the number of pupils in the elementary and high schools. Mr. Dougherty put in the provision that there should be a fund of $300,000 to lift the teaching personnel up to the average. He added this in section 10, then put on section 15, which fixes the schedule of salaries recom mended by the state board of edu cation, making the law what hither to had been advice. Senators Brawley and Weaver add ed the sections which take out the learn whij over 300,000 have alreadq chosen the New Chevrolet Six Since January first, over 300,000 people have chosen the Chevrolet Six. And every day sees an increase in this tremendous public acceptance — —for the new Chevrolet not only brings the enjoyment of six-cylinder performance within the reach of every body everywhere, but gives the Chevrolet buyer a greater dollar value than any other low-priced car. Just consider what you get in the Chevrolet Six! The smoothness, flexibility and power of a six-cylinder engine which delivers better than tiventy miles to the gallon. The beauty and luxury of bodies by Fisher with adjustable driver’s seat. The effortless control of big, quiet, non-locking 4-wheel brakes and ball bearing . steering. Then consider Chevrolet prices! And you will discover that this fine quality Six can actually be bought in the price range of the fourl Come in. Let us prove that; anyone who can afford any car can afford a Chevrolet Six! PAGE THREE seven big cities of the seven richest counties not participating in the fund, thus making them a law unto themselves. $ - FARM LANDS AND TAXES (Sanford Express) Looking over the columns of the Harnett County News a few days ago we noticed that practically all of one page_ of that most excellent county paper was devoted to the pub lication of land sale notices. We had thought that Lee county was in bad enough shape in this respect, but we have reached the conclusion that con ditions are much worse in Harnett if we are to judge by the columns of that paper. It looks like many of the farmers throughout this section are going to lose their farms and become renters, or that they will have to quit farm ing and drift into the towns, as many have done during the past few years. We had thought that the ability to borrow money from the Federal Land Banks would prove a blessing to the farmers, but we are forced to the conclusion that in many instances it has proven a hindrance instead of helpful. When this money was borrowed from the Federal government it was understood that it was to be used in improving the farms and making them more pro ductive. Had this been done in every instance the farmers would have been greatly benefitted by it and in much better shape today. We are told that some of the farmers have bought automobiles with these loans, and are unable to keep up the in terest to say nothing of paying back the principal. We know of one far mer who owns one of the best farms in this part of the State who secured a loan from a Federal Land Bank. He has been forced to quit farming, move to another state and engage in some other kind of business in order to raise the money to pay off the debt on his farm. The farm has been handed down from generation to generation and he is loath to give it up.- Some farmers have used the loan in the right way and are better off 'by it. The government would prefer that the farmers'keep their land and not become renters, . but it must protect the interest of the tax payers who have made it possi ble for it to make these loans. The big taxes which farmers have to pay on their land has made the ownership of much of the farm land undesirable. The tax value of the land is in many instances entirely too high, so high in, fact that the land cannot be sold at all. It is frozen property. Often the land cannot be rented for enough money to pay the taxes. A few years ago everybody wanted to buy farm land, now nobody wants to buy it, and the government would rather not own it.
The Chatham Record (Pittsboro, N.C.)
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April 11, 1929, edition 1
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