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THE LAST STROKE

_A DETECTIVE STORY_

BY LAWRENCE L. LYNCH

(E. MURDOCH VAN DEVENTER)

_Author of_ "_No Proof_," "_Moina_," _&c., &c._

LONDON:
WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED,
WARWICK HOUSE, SALISBURY SQUARE, E.C.
NEW YORK AND MELBOURNE.




CONTENTS.


                              PAGE
CHAPTER I.
SOMETHING WRONG                  1

CHAPTER II.
FOUND                           12

CHAPTER III.
NEMESIS                         28

CHAPTER IV.
FERRARS                         39

CHAPTER V.
IN CONSULTATION                 52

CHAPTER VI.
"WHICH?"                        64

CHAPTER VII.
RENUNCIATION                    75

CHAPTER VIII.
TRICKERY                        90

CHAPTER IX.
A LETTER                       101

CHAPTER X.
THIS HELPS ME                  117

CHAPTER XI.
DETAILS                        127

CHAPTER XII.
"FERRISS-GRANT"                135

CHAPTER XIII.
THE "LAKE COUNTY HERALD"       148

CHAPTER XIV.
A GHOST                        157

CHAPTER XV.
REBELLION                      175

CHAPTER XVI.
"OUT OF REACH"                 185

CHAPTER XVII.
RUTH GLIDDEN                   196

CHAPTER XVIII.
SUDDEN FLITTINGS               208

CHAPTER XIX.
THROUGH THE MAIL               221

CHAPTER XX.
A WOMAN'S HEART                237

CHAPTER XXI.
"QUARRELSOME HARRY"            250

CHAPTER XXII.
IN NUMBER NINE                 269

CHAPTER XXIII.
TWO INTERVIEWS                 279

CHAPTER XXIV.
MRS. GASTON LATHAM             292

CHAPTER XXV.
THE LAST STROKE                301




THE LAST STROKE.




CHAPTER I.

SOMETHING WRONG.


It was a May morning in Glenville. Pretty, picturesque Glenville, low
lying by the lake shore, with the waters of the lake surging to meet it,
or coyly receding from it, on the one side, and the green-clad hills
rising gradually and gently on the other, ending in a belt of trees at
the very horizon's edge.

There is little movement in the quiet streets of the town at half-past
eight o'clock in the morning, save for the youngsters who, walking,
running, leaping, sauntering or waiting idly, one for another, are, or
should be, on their way to the school-house which stands upon the very
southernmost outskirts of the town, and a little way up the hilly
<DW72>, at a reasonably safe remove from the willow-fringed lake shore.

The Glenville school-house was one of the earliest public buildings
erected in the village, and it had been "located" in what was
confidently expected to be the centre of the place. But the new and
late-coming impetus, which had changed the hamlet of half a hundred
dwellings to one of twenty times that number, and made of it a quiet and
not too fashionable little summer resort, had carried the business of
the place northward, and its residences still farther north, thus
leaving this seat of learning aloof from, and quite above the newer
town, in isolated and lofty dignity, surrounded by trees; in the
outskirts, in fact, of a second belt of wood, which girdled the lake
shore, even as the further and loftier fringe of timber outlined the
hilltops at the edge of the eastern horizon and far away.

"Les call 'er the 'cademy?" suggested Elias Robbins, one of the builders
of the school-house, and an early settler of Glenville. "What's to
hinder?"

"Nothin'," declared John Rote, the village oracle. "'Twill sound
first-rate."

They were standing outside the building, just completed and resplendent
in two coats of yellow paint, and they were just from the labour of
putting in, "hangin'" the new bell.

All of masculine Glenville was present, and the other sex was not
without representation.

"Suits me down ter the ground!" commented a third citizen; and no doubt
it would have suited the majority, but when Parson Ryder was consulted,
he smiled genially and shook his head.

"It won't do, I'm afraid, Elias," he said. "We're only a village as yet,
you see, and we can't even dub it the High School, except from a
geographical point of view. However, we are bound to grow, and our
titles will come with the growth."

The growth, after a time, began; but it was only a summer growth; and
the school-house was still a village school-house with its master and
one under, or primary, teacher; and to-day there was a frisking group of
the smaller youngsters rushing about the school-yard, while the first
bell rang out, and half a dozen of the older pupils clustered about the
girlish under-teacher full of questions and wonder; for Johnny Robbins,
whose turn it was to ring the bell this week, after watching the clock,
and the path up the hill, alternately, until the time for the first bell
had come, and was actually twenty seconds past, had reluctantly but
firmly seized the rope and began to pull.

"'Taint no use, Miss Grant; I'll have to do it. He told me not to wait
for nothin', never, when 'twas half-past eight, and so"--cling, clang,
cling--"I'm bound"--cling--"ter do it!" Clang. "You see"--cling--"even
if he aint here----" Clang, clang, clang.

The boy pulled lustily at the rope for about half as long as usual, and
then he stopped.

"You don't s'pose that clock c'ud be wrong, do yo', Miss Grant? Mr.
Brierly's never been later'n quarter past before."

Miss Grant turned her wistful and somewhat anxious eyes toward the
eastern horizon, and rested a hand upon the shoulder of a tall girl at
her side.

"He may be ill, Johnny," she said, reluctantly, "or his watch may be
wrong. He's sure to come in time for morning song service. Come, Meta,
let us go in and look at those fractions."

Five--ten--fifteen minutes passed and the two heads bent still over book
and slate. Twenty minutes, and Johnny's head appeared at the door, half
a dozen others behind it.

"Has he come, Johnny?"

"No'm; sha'n't I go an' see----"

But Miss Grant arose, stopping him with a gesture. "He would laugh at
us, Johnny." Then, with another look at the anxious faces, "wait until
nine o'clock, at least."

Johnny and his followers went sullenly back to the porch, and Meta's lip
began to quiver.

"Somethin's happened to him, Miss Grant," she whimpered; "I know
somethin' has happened!"

"Nonsense," said Miss Grant. But she went to the window and called to a
little girl at play upon the green.

"Nellie Fry! Come here, dear."

Nellie Fry, an a, b, c student, came running in, her yellow locks flying
straight out behind her.

"What is it, Miss Grant?"

"Nellie, did you see Mr. Brierly at breakfast?"

"Yes'm!"

"And--quite well?"

"Why--I guess so. He talked just like he does always, and asked the
blessin'. He--he ate a lot, too--for him. I'member ma speakin' of it."

"You remember, Nellie."

Miss Grant kissed the child and walked to her desk, bending over her
roll call, and seeming busy over it until the clock upon the opposite
wall struck the hour of nine, and Johnny's face appeared at the door,
simultaneously with the last stroke.

"Sh'll I ring, Miss Grant?"

"Yes." The girl spoke with sudden decision. "Ring the bell, and then go
at once to Mrs. Fry's house, and ask if anything has happened to detain
Mr. Brierly. Don't loiter, Johnny."

There was an unwonted flush now upon the girl's usually pale cheeks,
and sudden energy in her step and voice.

The school building contained but two rooms, beside the large hall, and
the cloak rooms upon either side; and as the scholars trooped in, taking
their respective places with more than their usual readiness, but with
unusual bustle and exchange of whispers and inquiring looks, the slender
girl went once more to the entrance and looked up and down the path from
the village.

There was no one in sight, and she turned and put her hand upon the
swaying bell-rope.

"Stop it, Johnny! There's surely something wrong! Go, now, and ask after
Mr. Brierly. He must be ill!"

"He'd 'a sent word, sure," said the boy, with conviction, as he snatched
his hat from its nail. But Miss Grant only waved him away and entered
the south room, where the elder pupils were now, for the most part,
assembled.

"Girls and boys," she said, the colour still burning in her cheeks,
"something has delayed Mr. Brierly. I hope it will be for a short time
only. In the meantime, until we know--know what to expect, you will, of
course, keep your places and take up your studies. I am sure I can trust
you to be as quiet and studious as if your teacher was here; and while
we wait, and I begin my lessons, I shall set no monitor over you. I am
sure you will not need one."

The pupils of Charles Brierly were ruled by gentleness and love, and
they were loyal to so mild a ruler. With low whispers and words of
acquiescence, they took up their books, and Miss Grant went back to her
more restless small people, leaving the connecting door between the
north and south rooms open.

Mrs. Fry's cottage was in the heart of the village, and upon the
hillside, but Johnny stayed for nothing, running hither, hat in hand,
and returning panting, and with a troubled face.

"Miss Grant," he panted, bursting into her presence with scant ceremony,
"he aint there! Mrs. Fry says he came to school before eight o'clock. He
went out while she was combin' Nellie's hair, an' she aint seen him
since!"

Hilda Grant walked slowly down from her little platform, and advanced,
with a waving movement, until she stood in the doorway between the two
rooms. The colour had all faded from her face, and she put a hand
against the door-pane as if to steady herself, and seemed to control or
compose herself with an effort.

"Boys--children--have any of you seen Mr. Brierly this morning?"

For a moment there was an utter silence in the school-room. Then,
slowly, and with a sheepish shuffling movement, a stolid-faced boy made
his way out from one of the side seats in Miss Grant's room, and came
toward her without speaking. He was meanly dressed in garments
ill-matched and worse fitting; his arms were abnormally long, his
shoulders rounded and stooping, and his eyes were at once dull and
furtive. He was the largest pupil, and the dullest, in Miss Grant's
charge, and as he came toward her, still silent, but with his mouth half
open, some of the little ones tittered audibly.

"Silence!" said the teacher, sternly. "Peter, come here." Her tone grew
suddenly gentle. "Have you seen Mr. Brierly this morning?"

"Uh hum!" The boy stopped short and hung his head.

"That's good news, Peter. Tell me where you saw him."

"Down there," nodding toward the lake.

"At the--lake?"

"Yep!"

"How long ago, Peter?"

"'Fore school--hour, maybe."

"How far away, Peter?"

"Big ways. Most by Injun Hill."

"Ah! and what was he doing?"

"Set on ground--lookin'."

"Miss Grant!" broke in the boy Johnny. "He was goin' to shoot at a
mark; I guess he's got a new target down there, an' him an' some of the
boys shoots there, you know. Gracious!" his eyes suddenly widening,
"Dy'u s'pose he's got hurt, anyway?"

Miss Grant turned quickly toward the simpleton.

"Peter, you are sure it was this morning that you saw Mr. Brierly?"

"Uh hum."

"And, was he alone?"

"Uh hum."

"Who else did you see down there, Peter?"

The boy lifted his arm, shielding his eyes with it as if expecting a
blow.

"I bet some one's tried ter hit him!" commented Johnny.

"Hush, Johnny! Peter, what is it? Did some one frighten you?"

The boy wagged his head.

"Who was it?"

"N--Nothin'--" Peter began to whimper.

"You must answer me, Peter; was any one else by the lake? Whom else did
you see?"

"A--a--ghost!" blubbered the boy, and this was all she could gain from
him.

And now the children began to whisper, and some of the elder to suggest
possibilities.

"Maybe he's met a tramp."

"P'r'aps he's sprained his ankle!"

"P'r'aps he's falled into the lake, teacher," piped a six-year-old.

"Poh!" retorted a small boy. "He kin swim like--anything."

"Children, be silent!" A look of annoyance had suddenly relaxed the
strained, set look of the under teacher's white face as she recalled, at
the moment, how she had heard Mr. Samuel Doran--president of the board
of school directors--ask Mr. Brierly to drop in at his office that
morning to look at some specimen school books. That was the evening
before, and, doubtless, he was there now.

Miss Grant bit her lip, vexed at her folly and fright. But after a
moment's reflection she turned again to Johnny Robbins, saying:

"Johnny, will you go back as far as Mr. Doran's house? Go to the office
door, and if Mr. Brierly is there, as I think he will be, ask him if he
would like me to hear his classes until he is at liberty."

Again the ready messenger caught up his flapping straw hat, while a
little flutter of relief ran through the school, and Miss Grant went
back to her desk, the look of vexation still upon her face.

Five minutes' brisk trotting brought the boy to Mr. Doran's door, which
was much nearer than the Fry homestead, and less than five minutes found
him again at the school-house door.

"Miss Grant," he cried, excitedly, "he wa'n't there, nor haint been; an'
Mr. Doran's startin' right out, with two or three other men, to hunt
him. He says there's somethin' wrong about it."




CHAPTER II.

FOUND.


"I suppose it's all right," said Samuel Doran, as he walked toward the
school-house, followed by three or four of the villagers, "called"
because of their nearness, rather than "chosen"; "but Brierly's
certainly the last man to let any ordinary matter keep him from his
post. We'll hear what Miss Grant has to say."

Miss Grant met the group at the gate, and when she had told them all she
had to tell, ending with the testimony of the boy Peter, and the
suggestion concerning the target-shooting.

"Sho!" broke in one of the men, as she was about to express her personal
opinion and her fears, "that's the top an' bottom of the hull business!
Brierly's regularly took with ashootin' at a mark. I've been out with
him two or three evenin's of late. He's just got int'rusted, and forgot
ter look at his watch. We'll find him safe enough som'e'res along the
bank; let's cut across the woods."

"He must have heard the bell," objected Mr. Doran, "but, of course, if
Peter Kramer saw him down there, that's our way. Don't be anxious, Miss
Grant; probably Hopkins is right."

The road which they followed for some distance ran a somewhat devious
course through the wood, which one entered very soon after leaving the
school-house. It ran along the hillside, near its base, but still
somewhat above the stretch of ground, fully a hundred yards in width,
between it and the lake shore.

Above the road, to eastward, the wooded growth climbed the gentle upward
<DW72>, growing, as it seemed, more and more dense and shadowy as it
mounted. But between the road and the river the trees grew less densely,
with numerous sunny openings, but with much undergrowth, here and there,
of hazel and sumach, wild vines, and along the border of the lake the
low overhanging scrub willow.

For more than a fourth of a mile the four men followed the road, walking
in couples, and not far apart, and contenting themselves with an
occasional "hallo, Brierly," and with peering into the openings through
which they could see the lake shore as they passed along.

A little further on, however, a bit of rising ground cut off all sight
of the lake for a short distance. It was an oblong mound, so shapely, so
evenly proportioned that it had became known as the Indian Mound, and
was believed to have been the work of the aborigines, a prehistoric
fortification, or burial place.

As they came opposite this mound, the man Hopkins stopped, saying:

"Hadn't a couple of us fellers better go round the mound on t'other
side? Course, if he's on the bank, an' all right, he'd ort to hear
us--but----"

"Yes," broke in the leader, who had been silent and very grave for some
moments. "Go that way, Hopkins, and we'll keep to the road and meet you
at the further end of the mound."

They separated