recently, when the blackness and gloom of the unoccupied Mansion, with its tale of dread, seemed to have extended to men's minds and laid its grasp of uncanniness and uneasiness on business and pleasure. And now, to make the slough of despond deeper, had come the sharp, quick act of a murderer—above all, an unknown assassin—and a crime similar to one scarce forgotten.

The Mansion gate opened directly from River Road, and a walk of about two hundred yards brought the visitor to the front door. The back of the Mansion faced the river directly to the west, the balcony of the back parlor and dining-room half-circled the south and west sides of the house, and had evidently been much used. The woodwork was old and the flooring quite worn. The front of the [Pg 91]place was pillared in old Colonial style, and was of stone, hewn in the rough and built in a permanent fashion.

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Across River Road, right in front of the gate, came an uneven roll of the country, or break in the plateau. The ground billowed deeply for at least a quarter of a mile, parallel to the road. The slope from the road was gradual to a little pond of considerable depth at the bottom of the depression. On the farther side the ground rose more abruptly, but not so high as on the Mansion side. The pond itself was about one hundred feet in width; and one standing by the Mansion exit could see both the pond and the ascent beyond, and, over the crest of the billowy ground, the distant woods and the country to the east.

Down from the road a little path dipped, and at its foot a frail bridge crossed the pond; for here the two shores were quite close. Either shore projected into a point, and about fifty feet of bridge had been built with logs, resting half-way on a rude pillar of stones in the water. This bridge continued the path up the far slope and over the crest beyond. It was [Pg 92]a short cut to the country and the southern suburb of Mona.

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Within the grounds of the Mansion, extending northward to the Highway and the scene of the murder, and southward into the uninhabited country, was a forest of oak and of elm, interspersed with an occasional fir. One could easily wander between the trunks of these trees, but having entered a few rods, all traces would be lost of the outside world. It afforded an excellent shelter for anyone desiring to escape detection.

We noticed all these points as we drove to the Mansion next morning. We found the care-takers 

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