Once more the strident call of the telephone broke in, and Aurora Lane stepped aside.

"It's Miss Julia," said she excitedly, turning upon her son eyes suddenly grown large. "Why, it's something awful! Don—a terrible thing has happened—last night."

"What's wrong—what's happened?" he demanded.

"Mr. Tarbush—the city marshal—why, you know—he was killed—murdered—last night—found this morning! It was about one o'clock, as near as they can tell, Miss Julia says. It's all over town."

An exclamation left the young man's lips. "What's that? Murdered?"

"Yes, yes—wait——" She spoke on into the telephone. "Yes, Julia, Don and I were just at breakfast—no, we've not been on the street yet—one o'clock, you said? That was when we were just coming home from the library!"

"Mother," said Don, "that's right! It must have been just about one o'clock, wasn't it?"

She looked at him steadily for a time, as she dropped the receiver, her own face a trifle pale. "Yes—we hadn't gone to sleep at the time it happened. He was killed right in front of his own house, Miss Julia says."

"And where is that?—you see, I don't know much about the town."

"Beyond the square, about three blocks from the farther corner—the little house with the low fence in front, and the deep front yard."

"We didn't pass that when we came up from the station?"

"No, we came another street. But, Don——"

"Yes?"

"When you were running last night, you must have passed right close to there! You didn't see anything strange?"

"Of course not! I'd have looked into it. I don't recall that particular house.

"Well," he added, after a moment's silence, "in spite of all that happened yesterday between him and us, I'm not going to call him anything but a good man—now."

She looked at him strangely—studied his face steadily.

"I'll be going out now, I think—I'm going to run over to see Julia for a time. Please don't go out on the street, Don. Stay right here. We got into trouble enough yesterday."

"You needn't fear," said he. "There's nothing and nobody in this town I want to see. I'll be glad when I shake the dust of it off my feet—when I once get squared away in my own business you shall leave this place and live with me."

And then, as there came to him again and again the anticipated pain of parting with the one he himself loved, he came up to his mother and put his arms once more upon her shoulders. Again her hands found his hair. She cast a quick glance about her, as though in his defense.

"Don," said she, "I think I'll never get over thinking of you as just a boy, a little boy."

He tried to smile. "Pity you didn't drown me in the pool yonder," said he.

It was the most cruel thing he could have found to say, although he spoke only in his own bitterness, careless, as a man so often is, of a woman's hurts. But she left him without comment; and soon he had resumed his own restless walking up and down in the narrow quarters which seemed to him such a prison.

Meantime all Spring Valley was afoot and agog over this news. It was the most sensational thing that had happened, as Aaron Craybill said, since Ben Wilson's wife went crazy out on the farm, come four years ago, and killed her four babies, and hid in the haystack until they found her three days later, and sent her to the asylum. And so forth, and so forth.

All the good folk met in groups at home or in the streets, so that within an hour after breakfast there was not a soul in all Spring Valley did not know that the town marshal had just been killed by some unknown person for some unknown reason. The news seemed dulling, stupefying. The clerks who opened the drug stores around the public square, the only shops open of the Sunday, were slow in their sweeping out that morning. Pedestrians on the streets walked slowly. The entire life of the town seemed slow. The sluggish, arresting solemnity of death sat upon all the little community.

Spring Valley had no daily newspaper, and even the weekly Clarion, a production of some six pages, had its trials in making a living there, so close was the village to larger towns which reached out and covered most of its commercial needs in this time of telegraph and trolley. The editor of the Clarion was, naturally, the correspondent of the largest daily of the near-by metropolis. Twice in all his life he had had opportunity for a first page story in the great city daily. His first metropolitan opportunity was when the aforementioned farmer's wife had killed her children, some four years ago. And now here was something quite as big. Editor Anderson sat at his own breakfast table for more than half an hour pondering on the opening sentence which he was going to write in his dispatch to the morning daily.

By eleven-thirty he had written his story, and had taken it down to the station agent for transmission by wire; and that worthy told him that as soon as Number Five got by he would begin to send the message. "I can't stop for anything so long as that now," said he.

It was somewhat longer as written than as printed, but Mr. Anderson described the murder of the city marshal in the following terms:

The progressive little city of Spring Valley, Jackson County, this state, was electrified this morning by the startling news of the murder of the well-known city marshal, Mr. Joel Tarbush, a man of sterling qualities, who has held the office for many years, and who had endeared himself in the hearts of the community not only for his discharge of his official duties, but for his kindliness of heart. The funeral will occur tomorrow afternoon at half-past three. Reverend William D. Rawlins will give the funeral address.

The city of Spring Valley is all excitement at this writing. No trace of the cowardly assassin has yet been found, and the entire affair remains shrouded in the deepest mystery, which not even the keenest intellects have been able to penetrate. There is no one who can ascribe a motive sufficient to inspire the murder of so respected and harmless a citizen.

Some have ascribed the fiendish act to some hobo or tramp who may have taken revenge on the marshal for some real or fancied injury in the past. But no one can recall any instance in which the deceased has ever incurred the enmity of any such characters, so that all remain at a loss how to account for this act. There seems to have been no eyewitness, and therefore all is but mere conjecture.

Your reporter was among the first at the premises early this morning, and thus gained all the information that can be secured at this writing. He has interviewed Miss Audrey Tarbush, daughter of the deceased, who had for many years kept house for him in their residence on Mulberry Street, about five blocks from the courthouse, where the deceased had a small garden and raised vegetables and flowers which he sold in the best families of our flourishing city.

Miss Audrey Tarbush, when interviewed by our reporter, said that she had last night, according to her usual custom, retired at the hour of half-past nine. She did not attend the exercises at the city library, where most of the elite of the town were present last night, because of a headache from which she suffered. She left the front door unlocked, as was her custom, for the entry of her father when he had finished the duties of his day's work. Usually, Marshal Tarbush came home at about ten o'clock, and himself then retired. On this night, by reason of certain extraordinary occurrences during the preceding day, he thought it wise to remain out later than usual. This was in accordance with his well-known courage and his conscientious endeavor to protect the residents of the city against any possible danger.

It was about a quarter after one o'clock, as near as Miss Audrey Tarbush can recall, that she was awakened by the sound of footfalls on the front porch. She called out, "Who's there?" but got no answer. As she went to the door her father succeeded in opening it and staggered in. He sank down into a chair near the center table. She saw then that he was very pale, and had a wound upon his head from which blood was still flowing. Much alarmed, she inquired of him what had occurred. The deceased was unable to answer. He seemed to be approaching a sort of coma.

"Who was it? Who did it?" Miss Audrey Tarbush demanded of him. It was a dramatic situation.

The deceased was unable to make an intelligent reply. "Someone hit me," he muttered. That was all he could manage to say, and that was all she could catch of his last words. Before long his head sank forward and he breathed his last almost in her arms. Unassisted she was able to carry the body of her father to the near-by sofa.

At that late hour the telephone operator had gone home, so she was unable to call any of the neighbors by means of the telephone. She does not recall how long she was alone with the dead body of her esteemed parent, but after a time her cries from the front porch were heard. The neighbors came to her assistance, but nothing could be done.

Examination of the remains of the deceased revealed a long and ragged wound over the upper and left-hand part of the head, breaking the cuticle for a distance of some four or five inches. The marshal's hat had been on when he was struck. The skull was broken for a distance of more than two inches, according to the examination of Dr. Amos N. Beals, who examined the body, the left parietal bone being crushed in as by some heavy instrument.

Your reporter deduces the following theory of the crime. At a late hour, after City Marshal Tarbush had finished his duties in the public square, he went towards his home, the public meeting at the library having by this time been dismissed. At a distance of perhaps fifty feet west of the front gate of his own home the deceased was approached by some miscreant, who with some heavy blunt instrument struck him down from behind, and who then made his escape, leaving no sign behind him. No club or weapon of any kind was found.

After receiving his death blow this estimable citizen seems to have walked, steadying himself against the top rail of the fence, until he reached the gate. The bloody finger prints upon the top of the fence were no doubt made by his own fingers, which he must have raised up to his head. He was able to enter his own gate, come up his own walk, and ascend his own front steps. Up to that time no one can tell the story. What ensued after that has been told by your reporter in the interview with Miss Audrey Tarbush, his loving daughter.

So ended a long and honorable life. The pallbearers will be chosen from leading citizens of the town, but their names have not yet been determined. He will be buried by the Knights Templar, to which order he belonged, probably on Sunday afternoon, because, although such haste may appear unseemly, this early funeral will allow a representative attendance of all the members of the order, including practically all our leading citizens, with their full music, so that the concluding exercises may thus show a greater tribute of respect, the attendance at any later day being sure to be far less general.

Your reporter has interviewed prominent citizens as to the cause of this crime which has so shocked our community. When approached by your reporter, Judge William Henderson, well-known candidate for the United States senatorship, former member of the Republic State Central Committee and prominent citizen in this state, said, "I cannot hazard even a guess at the perpetrator of this ghastly crime which has so shocked our community."

The story written by Mr. Anderson ended at this point. As printed it ended considerably in advance of this point; but at least, as he later told his wife, he had done his best to give his paper a good story. By the time his message was waiting in the hands of the station agent, telephone wires were busy between Spring Valley and other larger towns. The early afternoon papers in Columbus were on the streets by eleven-thirty with big headlines, and a few lines of type about the murder of "County Sheriff Abel Tarbush of Spring Valley, Jackson County, for which murder four tramps had been suspected and placed in jail." The deceased was described as a prominent Mason. By that time the star reporters of the morning dailies were on the through train, Number Five, bound east from Columbus to Spring Valley, as many learned by telephone; so that the arrival of Number Five this day would be a matter of special importance.

Of exact details in all these matters, Don Lane knew but little. It was for reasons of his own, easily obvious, that he went down to the little station to meet the through train from the West. Anne Oglesby was coming!

His mother did not accompany him, of course, and he therefore was quite alone. Of all those whom he encountered hurrying in the same direction, all those who packed the little platform and who stood here and there in groups speaking solemnly one with the other, he could count not a friend, not an acquaintance. Dully he felt that here and there an eye was turned upon him, that here and there a word was spoken about him. He dismissed it as part of the aftermath of his own troubles of the previous day. He walked nervously up and down, impatiently looking westward down the line of rails, his own contemptuous hatred for all these lost in the greater emotion that filled his heart. Anne was coming—she was almost here! And he must say good-by.

Meantime, in the courthouse, there was going forward due action on the part of the officers of the law intrusted with the solution of such mysteries as this murder. The sheriff, a large and solid man, Dan Cowles by name, was one of the first to inspect the premises where the crime had been committed. Shortly after that he went over to the office of Blackman, Justice of the Peace and coroner, who by ten o'clock that morning had summoned his jury of six men—Nels Jorgens, the blacksmith; Mr. Rawlins, the minister of the Church of Christ; Ben McQuaid, the traveling man; Newman, the clothing merchant; J. B. Saunders, the Knight Templar; Jerome Westbrook, clerk in the First National Bank.

It chanced that the county prosecutor, a young man by the name of Slattery, was out of town at this time, so that the executive side of the law for a moment hesitated. The sheriff therefore called up Judge Henderson and asked his presence at the courthouse for a consultation. The two were closeted for some time in the sheriff's office. At this time the deliberations of the coroner's jury would have been well advanced; therefore, Sheriff Cowles took up the telephone and called up Coroner Blackman at the Tarbush residence, just as the latter was upon the point of calling for a verdict of the jury in the accustomed words, "Murder at the hands of party or parties unknown."

"Wait, Mr. Coroner!" said Sheriff Cowles. "There's going to be some more witnesses. Keep your jury together."

A few moments later the long shrieking whistle of Number Five was heard as she came up out of the Paw Paw Creek bottoms, climbing the hill at the brick yards, and swung around the curve through South Spring Valley into the stretch of straight track leading down to the station. As the grinding brakes brought the heavy train finally to a standstill, three or four young men swung down from the day coaches—reporters from outside towns.

Don Lane elbowed his way to the edge of the platform. His eye was searching eagerly along the train exits for someone else—someone else whom he longed and yet dreaded to see.