A Double Barreled Detective Story, by Mark Twain. Part I.

0:00K-pop demon hunters Haja Boy's breakfast meal and Huntrix meal have just dropped at McDonald's. They're calling this a battle for the fans. What do you say to that, Rumi? It's not a battle. So glad the Saja Boy could take breakfast and give our meal the rest of the day. It is an honor to share. No, it's our honor. It is our larger honor. No, really. Stop. You can really feel the respect in this battle. Pick a meal to pick a side. I participated in McDonald's while supplies last. My name's Mackenzie and I started to go fund me for the adoptive mother of a nonverbal, autistic child. The mother had lost her job because she wasn't able to find adequate care for this autistic child. So she really needed some help with living expenses, paying some back bills. So I launched a GoFundMe to help support them during this crisis. And we raised about $10,000 within just a couple of months.

1:02I think that the surprising thing was by telling a clear story and just like really being very clear about what we needed. We had some really generous donations from people who were really moved by the situation that this family was struggling with. GoFundMe is the world's number one fundraising platform trusted by over 200 million people. Start your GoFundMe today at GoFundMe.com. That's GoFundMe.com. GoFundMe.com. This podcast is supported by GoFundMe. This is part one, chapter one of a double barrel detective story. This is a LibraVox recording. All LibraVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibraVox.org, recording by John Greenman. A double barrel detective story by Mark Twain, part one, chapter one. We ought never to do wrong when people are looking. The first scene is in the country in Virginia, the time 1880. There has been a wedding between a handsome young man of slender means and a rich young girl.

2:07A case of love at first sight and a precipitate marriage. A marriage bitterly opposed by the girl's widowed father. Jacob Fuller, the bridegroom, is 26 years old, is of an old but unconsidered family, which had by compulsion emigrated from Sedgemour, and for King James Purse's prophet, so everybody said, some maliciously, the rest merely because they believed it. The bride is 19 and beautiful. She is intense, high strung, romantic, immeasurably proud of her cavalier blood, and passionate in her love for her young husband. For it's sake she braved her father's displeasure, endured his reproaches, listened with loyalty unshaken to his warning predictions, and went from his house without his blessing, proud and happy, in the proof she was thus giving of the quality of the affection, which had made its home in her heart. The morning after the marriage there was a sad surprise for her.

3:07Her husband put aside her prophet caresses and said, sit down. I have something to say to you. I loved you, and that was before I asked your father to give you to me. His refusal is not my grievance I could have endured that, but the things he said of me to you, that is a different matter. There you needn't speak, I know quite well what they were. I got them from authentic sources. Among other things he said that my character was written in my face, that I was treacherous, a decimbler, a coward, and a brute without sense of pity or compassion. The sedge Moore trademark, he called it, and white sleeve badge. Any other man in my place would have gone to his house and shot him down like a dog. I wanted to do it, and was minded to do it. But a better thought came to me, to put him to shame, to break his heart, to kill him by inches. How to do it? Through my treatment of you, his idol.

4:09I would marry you, and then have patience, you will see. From that moment onward, for three months, the young wife suffered all the humiliations, all the insults, all the miseries, that the diligent and inventive mind of the husband could contrive, save physical injuries only. Her strong pride stood by her, and she kept the secret of her troubles. Now and then the husband said, why don't you go to your father and tell him? Then he invented new tortures, applied them, and asked again. She always answered, he shall never know by my mouth, and taunted him with his origin. Said she was the lawful slave of a sion of slaves, and must obey, and would, up to that point but no further. He could kill her if he liked, but he could not break her. It was not in the sedge more breed to do it. At the end of the three months he said with a dark significance in his manner, I have tried all things but one, and waited for her reply.

5:13Try that, she said, and curled her lip in mockery. That night he rose at midnight and put on his clothes, then said to her, get up and dressed. She obeyed, as always, without a word. He led her half a mile from the house, and proceeded to lash her to a tree by the side of the public road, and succeeded. She screaming and struggling. He gagged her then, struck her across the face with his cow hide, and set his bloodhounds on her. They tore the clothes off her, and she was naked. He called the dogs off and said, you will be found by the passing public. They will be dropping along about three hours from now, and will spread the news. Do you hear? Goodbye. You have seen the last of me. He went away then. She moaned to herself, I shall bear a child to him. God grant it may be a boy. The farmers released her by and by, and spread the news, which was natural. They raised the country with lynching intentions, but the bird had flown.

6:15The young wife shut herself up in her father's house. He shut himself up with her, and thenceforth would see no one. His pride was broken, and his heart. So he wasted away, day by day, and even his daughter rejoiced when death relieved him. Then she sold the estate, and disappeared. End of chapter 1. This is chapter 2 of a double-barrel detective story. This Liebervox recording is in the public domain. A double-barrel detective story by Mark Twain, chapter 2. In 1886, a young woman was living in a modest house near a secluded New England village, with no company but a little boy about five years old. She did her own work, she discouraged acquaintanceships, and had none. The butcher, the baker, and the others that served her could tell the villagers nothing about her

7:15further than that her name was Stillman, and that she called the child Archie. When she came, they had not been able to find out, but they said she talked like a southerner. The child had no playmates and no comrade, and no teacher but the mother. She taught him diligently and intelligently, and was satisfied with the results, even a little proud of them. One day Archie said, Mama, am I different from other children? Well, I suppose not, why? There was a child going along out there, and asked me if the postman had been by, and I said yes, and she said how long since I saw him, and I said I hadn't seen him at all, and she said how did I know he'd been by them, and I said because I smelled his track on the sidewalk, and she said I was a dumb fool and made a mouth at me. What did she do that for? The young woman turned white and said to herself, it's a birthmark.

8:15The gift of the bloodhound is in him. She snatched the boy to her breast and hugged him passionately, saying, God has appointed the way. Her eyes were burning with a fierce light, and her breath came short and quick with excitement. She said to herself, the puzzle is solved now. Many a time it has been a mystery to me, the impossible things the child has done in the dark, but it is all clear to me now. She said him in a small chair and said, wait a little till I come dear, then we will talk about the matter. She went up to her room and took from her dressing table several small articles and put them out of sight. A nail file on the floor under the bed, a pair of nail scissors under the bureau, a small ivory paper knife under the wardrobe. Then she returned and said, there I have left some things which I ought to have brought down. She named them and said, run up and bring them dear. The child hurried away on his errand and was soon back again with the things.

9:19Did you have any difficulty dear? No mama, I only went where you went. During his absence she had stepped to the bookcase, taken several books from the bottom shelf, opened each, passed her hand over a page, noting its number in her memory, then restored them to their places. Now she said, I have been doing something while you have been gone Archie. Do you think you can find out what it was? The boy went to the bookcase and got out the books that had been touched and opened them at the pages which had been stroked. The mother took him in her lap and said, I will answer your question now dear. I have found out that in one way you are quite different from other people. You can see in the dark. You can smell what other people cannot. You have the talents of a bloodhound. They are good and valuable things to have, but you must keep the matter a secret. If people found it out, they would speak of you as an odd child, a strange child,

10:20and children would be disagreeable to you and give you nicknames. In this world one must be like everybody else if he doesn't want to provoke scorn or envy or jealousy. It is a great and fine distinction which has been born to you, and I am glad. But you will keep it a secret for mama's sake, won't you? The child promised without understanding. All the rest of the day the mother's brain was busy with excited thinkings, with plans, projects, schemes, each and all of them uncanny, grim and dark. Yet they lit up her face, lit it with a fell light of their own, lit it with vague fires of hell. She was in a fever of unrest. She could not sit, stand, read, so. There was no relief for her, but in movement. She tested her boy's gift in twenty ways, and kept saying to herself all the time, with her mind in the past, he broke my father's heart,

11:20and night and day all these years I have tried, and all in vain, to think out a way to break his. I have found it now, I have found it now. When night fell, the demon of unrest still possessed her. She went on with her tests. With a candle she traversed the house from garret to cellar, hiding pins, needles, thimbles, spools, under pillows, under carpets, in cracks in the walls, under the coal and the bin, then sent the little fellow in the dark to find them, which he did, and was happy and proud when she praised him and smothered him with caresses. From this time forward life took on a new complexion for her. She said, the future is secure, I can wait and enjoy the waiting. The most of her lost interests revived. She took up music again and languages, drawing, painting, and the other long discarded delights of her maidenhood. She was happy once more, and felt again the zest of life.

12:20As the years drifted by, she watched the development of her boy, and was contented with it. Not altogether, but nearly that. The soft side of his heart was larger than the other side of it. It was his only defect in her eyes. But she considered that his love for her and worship of her made up for it. He was a good hater, that was well, but it was a question if the materials of his hatreds were of as tough and enduring equality as those of his friendships, and that was not so well. The years drifted on. Archie was become a handsome, shapely, athletic youth, courteous, dignified, compatible, pleasant in his ways, and looking perhaps a trifle older than he was, which was sixteen. One evening his mother said she had something of grave importance to say to him, adding that he was old enough to hear it now, and old enough, and possessed of character enough, and stability enough,

13:20to carry out a stern plan, which she had been for years contriving and maturing. Then she told him her bitter story, in all its naked atrociousness. For a while the boy was paralyzed. Then he said, I understand. We are southerners, and by our custom and nature there is but one atonement. I will search him out and kill him. Kill him? No. Death is release, emancipation. Death is a favor. Do I owe him favors? You must not hurt a hair of his head. The boy was lost and thought a while. Then he said, You are all the world to me, and your desire is my law and my pleasure. Tell me what to do, and I will do it. The mother's eyes beamed with satisfaction, and she said, You will go and find him. I have known his hiding place for eleven years. It cost me five years and more of inquiry,

14:21and much money to locate it. He is a quartz miner in Colorado, and well to do. He lives in Denver. His name is Jacob Fuller. There it is the first time I have spoken it since that unforgettable night. Think. That name could have been yours, if I had not saved you that shame, and furnished you a cleaner one. You will drive him from that place. You will hunt him down and drive him again, and yet again, and again and again persistently, poising his life, filling it with mysterious terrors, loading it with weariness and misery, making him wish for death, and that he had a suicide's courage. You will make of him another wandering Jew. He shall know no rest anymore, no peace of mind, no placid sleep. You shall shadow him, cling to him, persecute him, till you break his heart, as he broke my fathers and mine.

15:22I will obey, mother. I believe it, my child. The preparations are all made. Everything is ready. Here is a letter of credit. Spend freely. There is no lack of money. At times you may need disguises. I have provided them. Also some other conveniences. She took from the drawer of the typewriter table several squares of paper. They all bore these typewritten words. Ten thousand dollar reward. It is believed that a certain man who is wanted in an eastern state is sojourning here. In 1880, in the night, he tied his young wife to a tree by the public road, cut her across the face with the cow hide, and made his dogs tear her clothes from her, leaving her naked. He left her there and fled the country. A blood relative of hers has searched for him for seventeen years. Address, blank, post office. The above reward will be paid in cash to the person who will furnish the seeker in a personal interview,

16:24the criminal's address. When you have found him and acquainted yourself with his scent, you will go in the night and placard one of these upon the building he occupies, and another one upon the post office or in some other prominent place. It will be the talk of the region. At first you must give him several days in which to force a sale of his belongings at something approaching their value. We will ruin him by and by, but gradually, we must not impoverish him at once. For that would bring him to despair and injure his health, possibly kill him. She took three or four more typewritten forms from the drawer, duplicates, and red one. Blank, blank, eighteen, blank. To Jacob Fuller, you have blank days in which to settle your affairs. You will not be disturbed during that limit, which will expire at blank, M, on the blank of blank. You must then move on. If you are still in the place after the named hour,

17:24I will placard you on all the dead walls, detailing your crime once more, and adding the date, also the scene of it, with all names concerned including your own. Have no fear of bodily injury, it will in no circumstances ever be inflicted upon you. You brought misery upon an old man, and ruined his life, and broke his heart. What he suffered, you are to suffer. You will add no signature. He must receive this before he learns of the reward-pluckard. Before he rises in the morning, lest he lose his head and fly the place penniless. I shall not forget. You will need to use these forms only in the beginning, once maybe enough. Afterwards, when you are ready for him to vanish out of a place, see that he gets a copy of this form, which merely says, move on. You have blank days. He will obey, that is sure. End of chapter 2

18:28This is part 1, chapter 3, of a double-barreled detective story. This Liebervox recording is in the public domain. A double-barreled detective story by Mark Twain, part 1, chapter 3, extracts from letters to the mother. Denver, April 3, 1897. I have now been living several days in the same hotel with Jacob Fuller. I have his scent. I could track him through ten divisions of infantry and find him. I have often been near him and heard him talk. He owns a good mind and has a fair income from it. But he is not rich. He learned mining in a good way by working at it for wages. He is a cheerful creature, and his 43 years sit lightly upon him. He could pass for a younger man. Say, 36 or 37. He has never married again, passes himself off for a widower. He stands well, is liked, is popular, and has many friends.

19:28Even I feel a drawing toward him, the paternal blood in me making its claim. How blind and unreasoning an arbitrary are some of the laws of nature, the most of them, in fact. My task is become hard now. You realize it? You comprehend and make allowances? And the fire of it has cooled more than I'd like to confess to myself. But I will carry it out, even with the pleasure paled the duty remains, and I will not spare him. And for my help a sharp resentment rises in me when I reflect that he who committed that odious crime is the only one who has not suffered by it. The lesson of it has manifestly reformed his character, and in the change he is happy. He, the guilty party, is absolved from all suffering. You, the innocent, are born down with it. But, be comforted, he shall harvest his share. Silver Gulch, May 19. I placarded form number one at midnight of April 3.

20:31An hour later I slipped form number two under his chamber door, notifying him to leave Denver at or before 1150 the night of the 14th. Some late bird of a reporter stole one of my placards, then hunted the town over and found the other one and stole that. In this manner he accomplished what the profession called a scoop. That is, he got a valuable item and saw to it that no other paper got it. And so his paper, the principal one in the town, had it in glaring type on the editorial page in the morning, followed by a Vesuvian opinion of our wretch, a column long, which wound up by adding a thousand dollars to our reward on the paper's account. The journals out here know how to do the noble thing when there's business in it. At breakfast I occupied my usual seat, selected because it affronted a view of Papa Fuller's face, and was near enough for me to hear the talk that went on at his table.

21:31Seventy-five or a hundred people were in the room, and all discussing that item, and saying they hoped the seeker would find that rascal, and remove the pollution of his presence from the town, with a rail, or a bullet or something. When Fuller came in, he had the notice to leave, folded up in one hand, and the newspaper in the other, and it gave me more than half a pang to see him. His cheerfulness was all gone, and he looked old and pinched and ashy. And then, only think of the things he had to listen to, Mama he heard his own unsuspecting friends describe him with epitons and characterizations drawn from the very dictionaries and phrasebooks of Satan's own authorized additions down below. And more than that, he had to agree with the verdicts and applaud them. His applause tasted bitter in his mouth, though, he could not disguise that from me, and it was observable that his appetite was gone, he only nibbled. He couldn't eat.

22:32Finally a man said, it is quite likely that that relative is in the room and hearing what this town thinks of that unspeakable scoundrel. I hope so. Ah, dear, it was pitiful the way Fuller winced and glanced around scared. He couldn't endure anymore and got up and left. During several days, he gave out that he had bought a mine in Mexico, and wanted to sell out and go down there as soon as he could, and give the property his personal attention. He played his cards well, said he would take forty thousand dollars, a quarter in cash, the rest in safe notes, but that as he greatly needed money on account of his new purchase, he would diminish his terms for cash in full. He sold out for thirty thousand. And then, what do you think he did? He asked for greenbacks, and took them, saying the man in Mexico was a new Englander, with a head full of crochets, and preferred greenbacks to gold or drafts.

23:32People thought it queer, since a draft on New York could produce greenbacks quite conveniently. There was talk of this odd thing, but only for a day. That is as long as any topic lasts in Denver. I was watching all the time. As soon as the sale was completed and the money paid, which was on the eleventh, I began to stick to Fuller's track without dropping it for a moment. That night, no, twelfth, for it was a little past midnight, I tracked him to his room, which was four doors from mine in the same hall. Then I went back and put on my muddy day laborer disguise, darkened my complexion, and sat down in my room in the gloom, with a grip sack handy, with a change in it, and my door ajar. For I suspected that the bird would take wing now. In half an hour, an old woman passed by carrying a grip. I caught the familiar whiff, and followed with my grip, for it was Fuller. He left the hotel by a side entrance, and at the corner he turned up

24:33an unfrequented street, and walked three blocks in a light rain, and a heavy darkness, and got into a two-horse hack, which of course was waiting for him by appointment. I took a seat, uninvited, on the trunk platform behind, and we drove briskly off. We drove ten miles, and the hack stopped at a way station and was discharged. Fuller got out, and took a seat on a barrow under the awning, as far as he could get from the light. I went inside, and watched the ticket office. Fuller bought no ticket. I bought none. Presently the train came along, and he boarded a car. I entered the same car at the other end, and came down the aisle, and took the seat behind him. When he paid the conductor, and named his objective point, I dropped back several seats, while the conductor was changing a bill, and when he came to me I paid to the same place, about a hundred miles westward. From that time, for a week on end, he led me a dance. He traveled here and there, and Yonder, always on a general westward trend,

25:36but he was not a woman after the first day. He was a laborer, like myself, and wore bushy false whiskers. His outfit was perfect, and he could do the character without thinking about it, for he had served the trade for wages. His nearest friend could not have recognized him. At last he located himself here, the obscurest little mountain camp in Montana. He has a shanty, and goes out prospecting daily, is gone all day, and avoids society. I am living at a miner's boarding house, and it is an awful place, the bunks, the food, the dirt, everything. We have been here four weeks, and in that time I have seen him but once, but every night I go over his track and post myself. As soon as he engaged a shanty here I went to a town fifty miles away, and telegraphed that Denver hotel, to keep my baggage till I should send for it. I need nothing here but a change of army shirts, and I brought that with me.

26:36Silver Gulch, June twelve. The Denver episode has never found its way here, I think. I know the most of the men in the camp, and they have never referred to it, at least in my hearing. Fuller doubtless feels quite safe in these conditions. He has located a claim, two miles away, in and out of the way place in the mountains. It promises very well, and he is working it diligently. Ah, but the change in him, he never smiles, he keeps quite to himself, consorting with no one. He who was so fond of company and so cheery only two months ago. I have seen him passing along several times recently, drooping, for lawn, the spring gone from his step, a pathetic figure. He calls himself David Wilson. I can trust him to remain here until we disturb him. Since you insist, I will banish him again, but I do not see how he can be unhappier than he already is. I will go back to Denver and treat myself to a little season of comfort,

27:39and edible food, and endureable beds, and bodily decency. Then I will fetch my things and notify poor Papa Wilson to move on. Denver, June 19. They miss him here, they all hope he is prospering in Mexico, and they do not say it just with their mouths, but out of their hearts. You know you can always tell. I am loitering here over long, I confess it. But if you were in my place, you would have charity for me. Yes, I know what you will say, and you are right. If I were in your place, and carried your scolding memories in my heart, I will take the night train back tomorrow. Denver, June 20. God forgive us, Mother, we are hunting the wrong man. I have not slept any all night. I am now awaiting at dawn for the morning train, and how the minutes drag, how they drag. This Jacob Fuller is a cousin of the guilty one. How stupid we have been not to reflect that the guilty one would never again

28:42wear his own name after that fiendish deed. The Denver Fuller is four years younger than the other one. He came here a young widower in 79, aged 21, a year before you were married. And the documents to prove it are innumerable. Last night I talked with familiar friends of his who have known him from the day of his arrival. I said nothing, but a few days from now I will land him in his town again, with the loss upon his mind made good, and there will be a banquet, and a torchlight procession, and there will not be any expense on anybody but me. Do you call this gush? I am only a boy, as you well know, it is my privilege. By and by I shall not be a boy anymore. Silver Gulch, July 3. Mother, he is gone. Gone and left no trace. The scent was cold when I came. Today I am out of bed for the first time since. I wish I were not a boy, then I could stand shocks better.

29:45They all think he went west. I start tonight in a wagon, two or three hours of that, then I get a train. I don't know where I am going, but I must go to try to keep still would be torture. Of course he has a face to himself with a new name and a disguise. This means that I may have to search the whole globe to find him. Indeed it is what I expect. Do you see, Mother? It is I that am the wandering Jew, the irony of it. We arrange that for another. Think of the difficulties, and there would be none if I only could advertise for him. But if there is any way to do it that would not frighten him, I have not been able to think it out. And I have tried to my brains are rattled. If the gentleman who lately bought a mine in Mexico and sold one in Denver will send his address to... To whom, Mother? It will be explained to him that it was all a mistake. His forgiveness will be asked, and full reparation made for a loss which he sustained in a certain matter.

30:49Do you see? He would think it a trap. Well, anyone would. If I should say, it is now known that he was not the man wanted, but another man, a man who once bore the same name but discarded it for good reasons, would that answer? But the Denver people would wake up then and say, oh ho! And they would remember about the suspicious greenbacks and say, why did he run away if he wasn't the right man? It is too thin. If I failed to find him, he would be ruined there. There were, there is no taint upon him now. You have a better head than mine. Help me. I have one clue and only one. I know his handwriting. If he puts his new false name upon a hotel register and does not disguise it too much, it will be valuable to me if I ever run across it. San Francisco, June 28, 1898. You already know how well I have searched the states from Colorado to the Pacific and how nearly I came to getting him once.

31:51Well, I have had another close miss. It was here yesterday. I struck his trail, hot on the street, and followed it on a run to a cheap hotel. That was a costly mistake. A dog would have gone the other way, but I am only part dog, and can get very humanly stupid when excited. He had been stopping in that house ten days. I almost know now that he stops long, nowhere, the past six or eight months, but is restless and has to keep moving. I understand that feeling, and I know what it is to feel it. He still uses the name he had registered when I came so near catching him nine months ago, James Walker. Doubtless the same he adopted when he fled from Silver Gulch. An unpretending man, and has small taste for fancy names. I recognize the hand easily, through its slight disguise, a square man, and not good at shams and pretenses. They said he was just gone on a journey, left no address.

32:52Didn't say where he was going. Looked frightened when asked to leave his address. Had no baggage but a cheap velice, carried it off on foot. A stingy old person and not much lost to the house. Old. I suppose he is now. I hardly heard. I was there but a moment. I rushed along his trail, and it led me to a wharf. Mother, the smoke of the steamer he had taken was just fading out on the horizon. I should have saved half an hour if I had gone in the right direction at first. I could have taken a fast tug and should have stood a chance of catching that vessel. She is bound for Melbourne. Hope Canyon, California, October 3, 1900. You have a right to complain. A letter a year is a posity. I freely acknowledge it, but how can one write when there is nothing to write about but failures? No one can keep it up. It breaks the heart. I told you, it seems ages ago now, how I missed him at Melbourne, and then chased him all

33:55over Australasia for months on end. Well, then, after that I followed him to India. Almost saw him in Bombay. Traced him all around, to Baroda. Raul Pindi. Lucknow. Lahore. Cornpore. Alahabad. Calcutta. Madras. Oh, everywhere. Week after week, month after month, through the Dastan Svelter. Always approximately on his track, sometimes close upon him, yet never catching him. And down to Ceylon, and then to... Never mind. By and by I will write it all out. I chased him home to California, and down to Mexico, and back again to California. Then I have been hunting him about the state from the first of last January down to a month ago. I feel almost sure he is not far from Hope Canyon. I traced him to a point thirty miles from here, but there I lost the trail. Someone gave him a lift in a wagon, I suppose. I am taking the rest now, modified by searchings for the lost trail.

34:59I was tired to death, mother, and low-spirited, and sometimes coming uncomfortably near to losing hope. But the miners in this little camp are good fellows, and I am used to their sort this long time back. And their breezy ways freshen a person up, and make him forget his troubles. I have been here a month. I am cabining with a young fellow named Sammy Hillier, about twenty-five, the only son of his mother, like me, and loves her dearly, and writes to her every week, part of which is like me. He is a timid body, and in the matter of intellect, well, he cannot be depended upon to set a river on fire. But no matter, he is well-liked. He is good and fine, and it is meat and bread, and rest and luxury to sit and talk with him, and have a comradeship again. I wish James Walker could have it. He had friends, he liked company. That brings up that picture of him, the time that I saw him last, the pathos of it.

36:00It comes before me often and often. At that very time poor thing, I was girding up my conscience to make him move on again. Hillier's heart is better than mine, better than anybody's in the community, I suppose, for he is the one friend of the black sheep of the camp, Flint Buckner, and the only man Flint ever talks with, or allows to talk with him. He says he knows Flint's history, and that it is trouble that has made him what he is, and so one ought to be as charitable toward him as one can. Now, none but a pretty large heart could find a space to accommodate a larger like Flint Buckner, from all I hear about him outside, I think that this one detail will give you a better idea of Sammy's character than any labored out description I could furnish you of him. In one of our talks he said something about, like this, Flint's, a kinsman of mine, and he pours out all his troubles to me, empties his breast from time to time, or I reckon it would burst.

37:01There couldn't be any unhappier man, Archie Stillman. His life has been made up of misery of mind. He isn't near as old as he looks. He has lost the feel of reposfulness and peace—oh, years and years ago. He doesn't know what good luck is. Never has had any. Often says he wishes he was in the other hell. He is so tired of this one—end of chapter 3. This is part 1 chapter 4 of a double-barreled detective story. This Liebervox recording is in the public domain. A double-barreled detective story by Mark Twain. Part 1 chapter 4. No real gentleman will tell the naked truth in the presence of ladies. It was a crisp and spicy morning in early October. The Lielex and LeBernams lit with the glory fires of autumn, hung burning and flashing in the upper air, a fairy bridge provided by kind nature, for the wingless wild things

38:05that have their homes in the treetops, and would visit together. The large and the pomegranate flung their purple and yellow flames in brilliant broad splashes along the slanting sweep of the woodland. The sensuous fragrance of innumerable deciduous flowers rose upon the swooning atmosphere. Far in the empty sky, a solitary esophagus slept upon motionless wing. Everywhere brooded stillness, serenity, and the peace of God. October is the time, 1900. Hope Canyon is the place, a silver mining camp away down in the Esmeralda region. It is a secluded spot, high and remote. Recent as to discovery, thought by its occupants to be rich in metal, a year or two's prospecting will decide that matter one way or the other. For inhabitants the camp has about two hundred miners, one white woman and child, several Chinese washermen, five squas, and a dozen vagrant buck Indians in rabbit skin robes, battered

39:10plug hats, and tin can necklaces. There are no mills as yet, there is no church, no newspaper. The camp has existed but two years, it has made no big strike. The world is ignorant of its name and place. On both sides of the canyon the mountains rise wall-like, three thousand feet, and the long spiral of straggling huts down in its narrow bottom gets a kiss from the sun only once a day when he sails over at noon. The village is a couple of miles long, the cabins stand well apart from each other. The tavern is the only frame house, the only house one might say. It occupies a central position and is the evening resort of the population. They drink there and play seven-up and dominoes, also billiards, for there is a table, crossed all over with torn places repaired with court plaster. There are some queues, but no leathers, some chipped balls which clatter when they run,

40:13and do not slow up gradually, but stop suddenly and sit down. There is part of a cube of chalk with a projecting jag of flint in it, and the man who can score six on a single break can set up the drinks at the bar's expense. Flint Buckner's cabin was the last one of the village going south. The silver claim was at the other end of the village, northward, and a little beyond the last hut in that direction. He was a sour creature, unsociable, and had no companionships. People who had tried to get acquainted with him had regretted it and dropped him. His history was not known. Some believed that Sammy Hillier knew it. Others said no. If asked, Hillier said no. He was not acquainted with it. Flint had a meek English youth of sixteen or seventeen with him whom he treated roughly, both in public and in private. And of course this lad was applied to for information, but with no success. Fetlock Jones, name of the youth, said that flint picked him up on a prospecting tramp,

41:19and as he had neither home nor friends in America, he had found it wise to stay and take Buckner's hard usage for the sake of the salary, which was bacon and beans. Further than this, he could offer no testimony. Fetlock had been in this slavery for a month now, and under his meek exterior he was slowly consuming to a cinder with the insults and humiliations which his master had put upon him. For the meek suffer bitterly from these herds, more bitterly perhaps than do the manlier sort, who can burst out and get relief with words or blows when the limit of endurance has been reached. Good-hearted people wanted to help Fetlock out of his trouble and tried to get him to leave Buckner, but the boy showed fright at the thought, and said he doesn't. Pat Riley urged him and said, �You leave the damn hunks and come with me, don't you be afraid I'll take care of him.� The boy thanked him with tears in his eyes, but shuddered and said he doesn't risk it.

42:20He said Flint would catch him alone some time in the night, and then, �Oh, it makes me sickness to Riley to think of it.� Others said, �Run away from him. We'll stake you, skip out for the coast some night, but all these suggestions failed. He said Flint would hunt him down and fetch him back just for meanness. The people could not understand this. The boy's miseries went steadily on week after week. It is quite likely that the people would have understood if they had known how he was employing his spare time. He slept in an out cabin near Flint's, and there, nights, he nursed his bruises and his humiliations, and studied and studied over a single problem. How he could murder Flint Buckner and not be found out. It was the only joy he had in life. These hours were the only ones in the twenty-four, which he looked forward to with eagerness, and spent, in happiness. He thought of poison. No, that would not serve.

43:21The inquest would reveal where it was procured, and who had procured it. He thought of a shot in the back in a lonely place when Flint would be homeward-bound at midnight, his unvarying hour for the trip. No, somebody might be near and catch him. He thought of stabbing him in his sleep. No, he might strike an inefficient blow, and Flint would seize him. He examined a hundred different ways none of them would answer. For in even the very obscurest and secretest of them there was always the fatal defect of a risk, a chance, a possibility that he might be found out. He would have none of that. But he was patient, endlessly patient. There was no hurry, he said to himself. He would never leave Flint till he left him a corpse. There was no hurry, he would find the way. It was somewhere, and he would endure shame and pain and misery until he found it. Yes, somewhere there was a way which would leave not a trace, not even the faintest clue

44:22to the murderer. There was no hurry. He would find that way, and then—oh, then—it would just be good to be alive. Meantime he would diligently keep up his reputation for meekness. And also, as always there to-for, he would allow no one to hear him say a resentful or offensive thing about his oppressor. Two days before the—before mentioned October morning, Flint had bought some things, and he and Fetlock had brought them home to Flint's cabin, a fresh box of candles, which they put in the corner, a tin can of blasting powder, which they placed upon a candle box, a keg of blasting powder, which they placed under Flint's bunk, a huge coil of fuse which they hung on a peg. Fetlock reasoned that Flint's mining operations had outgrown the pick, and that blasting was about to begin now. He had seen blasting done, and he had a notion of the process, but he had never helped in it. His conjecture was right, blasting time had come.

45:24In the morning the pair carried fuse, drills, and the powder can to the shaft. It was now eight feet deep, and to get into it, and out of it a short ladder was used. They descended, and by command Fetlock held the drill, without any instruction as to the right way to hold it, and Flint proceeded to strike. The sledge came down, the drill sprang out of Fetlock's hand almost as a matter, of course. You mean, geez, son of a n***a! Is that any way to hold a drill? Pick it up! Stand it up! They're hold fast! Ten, and you, I'll teach you, at the end of an hour the drilling was finished. Now then, charge it! The boy started to pour in the powder, idiot, a heavy bat on the jaw laid the lad out. Get up! You can't lie sniveling there. Now then, sticking the fuse first, now put in the powder. Hold on, hold on! Are you going to fill the hole all up? Of all the sap-headed milk-sops, like, put in some dirt, put in some gravel, tamp it

46:27down! Hold on! Hold on! Oh, great Scott! Get out of the way! He snatched the iron and tamped the charge himself, meantime cursing and blaspheming like a fiend. Then he fired the fuse, climbing out of the shaft, and ran 50 yards away, Fetlock following. They stood waiting a few minutes, then a great volume of smoke and rocks burst high into the air, with a thunderous explosion. After a little, there was a shower of descending stones. Everything all was serene again. I wish to God you'd been in it, remarked the master. They went down the shaft, cleaned it out, drilled another hole, and put in another charge. Look here! How much fuse are you proposing to waste? Don't you know how to time a fuse? No, sir. You don't. Well, if you don't beat anything I ever saw. He climbed out of the shaft and spoke down—well, idiot, are you going to be all day? Cut the fuse and light it! The trembling creature began. If you please, sir, I—you talk back to me!

47:28Cut it and light it! The boy cut and lit. Great, Scott! A one-minute fuse! I wish you were in! In his rage he snatched the ladder out of the shaft and ran. The boy was a guest. Oh my God! Help! Help! Save me! He implored. But what can I do? What can I do? He backed against the wall as tightly as he could, the sputtering fuse frightened the voice out of him. The breath stood still. He stood gazing and impotent, in two seconds, three seconds, four. He would be flying toward the sky, torn to fragments, then he had an inspiration. He sprang at the fuse and severed the inch of it that was left above ground and was saved. He sank down, limp, and half lifeless with fright, his strength all gone, but he muttered with a deep joy. He has learnt me. I knew there was a way, if I would wait. After a matter of five minutes, Buckner stole to the shaft, looking worried and uneasy, and peered down into it.

48:29He took in the situation. He saw what had happened. He lowered the ladder, and the boy dragged himself weakly up it. He was very white. His appearance added something to Buckner's uncomfortable state, and he said, with a show of regret and sympathy, which sat upon him awkwardly from lack of practice. It was an accident, you know? Don't say anything about it to anybody. I was excited, and didn't notice what I was doing. You're not looking well. You've worked enough for today. Go down to my cabin and eat what you want, and rest. It's just an accident, you know, on account of my being excited. It scared me, said the lad, as he started away. But I learnt something so I don't mind it. Damn easy to please, muttered Buckner, following him with his eye. I wonder if he'll tell? Mightn't he? I wish it had killed him. The boy took no advantage of his holiday and the matter of resting. He employed it in work.

49:29Eager, and feverish, and happy work. A thick growth of chaperale extended down the mountainside clear to Flint's cabin. The most of Fetlocks' labor was done in the dark intricacies of that stubborn growth. The rest of it was done in his own shanty. At last all was complete, and he said, if he's got any suspicions that I'm going to tell on him, he won't keep them long, tomorrow. He will see that I am the same milk-sop as I always was all day and the next, and the day after tomorrow night there'll be an end of him, and nobody will ever guess who finished him up, nor how it was done. He dropped me the idea his own self, and that's odd. CHAPTER V The next day came and went.

50:35It is now almost midnight, and in five minutes the new morning will begin. The scene is in the tavern billiard room. Tough men in rough clothing, slouch hats, breaches stuffed into boot tops. Some with vests, none with coats, are grouped about the boiler-iron stove, which has ruddy cheeks and is distributing a grateful warmth. The billiard balls are clacking. There is no other sound, that is, within. The wind is fitfully moaning without. The man looked bored, also expectant. A hulking broad-shouldered miner of middle age with grizzled whiskers and an unfriendly eye set in an unsociable face, rises, slips the coil of fuse upon his arm, gathers up some other personal properties and departs without word or greeting to anybody. It is flint buckner. As the door closes behind him a buzz of talk breaks out. A regularist man that ever was, said Jake Parker, the blacksmith, you can tell when it's twelve, just by him leaving, without looking at your water-berry.

51:40And it's the only virtue he's got as far as I know," said Peter Hawes, minor. "'He's just a blight on this society,' said Wells Fargo's man, Ferguson, if I was running this shop-bide and make him say something, some time or other, or vemos, the ranch." This was a suggestive glance at the barkeeper, who did not choose to see it. Since the man under discussion was a good customer, and went home pretty well set up every night, with refreshments furnished from the bar. "'Hey,' said Ham Sandwich, minor, "'does any of you boys ever recollect of him asking you to take a drink?' "'Hymn,' flint buckner,' laura. This sarcastic rejoinder came in a spontaneous general outburst in one form of words or another from the crowd. After a brief silence, Pat Riley, minor, said, "'He's just a fifteen-puzzle-at-cush, and his boy's another one. I can't make them out.' Or anybody else, at Ham Sandwich, and if they are fifteen-puzzles, how are you going

52:44to rank up that other one when it comes to a one wrought down solid mysteriousness? He lays over both of them. Easy, don't he? You bet. Everybody said it. Every man but one. He was the newcomer, Peterson. He ordered the drinks all around and asked who number three might be. All answered at once. Archie Stillman. Is he a mystery, asked Peterson? Is he a mystery? Is Archie Stillman a mystery?" said Wells Fargo's man, Ferguson. Why? The fourth dimension's foolishness to him, for Ferguson was learned. Peterson wanted to hear all about him. Everybody wanted to tell him. Everybody began. But Billy Stevens, the barkeeper, called the house to order and said one at a time was best. He distributed the drinks and appointed Ferguson to lead. Ferguson said. Well, he's a boy. And that is just about all we know about him. You can pump him till you're tired, it ain't any use.

53:44You won't get anything, at least about his intentions, or line of business, or where he's from, and such things as that. And as for getting at the nature and get up of his main big chief mystery, why, he'll just change the subject. That's all. You can guess till you're black in the face. It's your privilege. But suppose you do. Where do you arrive at? No-wares, near as I can make out. What is his big chief one? Sight, maybe. Hearing, maybe. Instinct, maybe. Magic, maybe. Take your choice. Grown-ups. Twenty-five. Children and servants. Half price. Now, I'll tell you what you can do. You can start here and just disappear. You can go and hide wherever you want to. I don't care where it is, nor how far. And he'll go straight and put his finger on you. He don't mean it. I just do, though. Whether there's nothing to him. Elemental conditions is nothing to him. He don't even take notice of them.

54:45Oh, come. Dark? Rain? Snow? Hey! It's all the same to him. He don't give a damn. Oh, say, including fog, perhaps? Fog. He's got an eye that can plunk through it like a bullet. Now, boys, on a bright, what's he giving me? It's a fact! They all shouted. Go on, Wells Fargo. Well, sir. You can leave him here, chatting with the boys, and you can slip out and go to any cabin in this camp and open a book, yes, sir, a dozen of them, and take the page in your memory, and he'll start out, and go straight to that cabin, and open every one of them books at the right page, and call it off, and never make a mistake. He must be the devil. More than one has thought it. Now, I'll tell you a perfectly wonderful thing that he'd done. The other night he, there was a sudden, great murmur of sounds outside. The door flew open, and an excited crowd burst in, with the camp's one white woman in the lead, and crying, my child! My child!

55:46She's lost and gone! For the love of God helped me to find Archie Stillman! We've hunted everywhere!" said the barkeeper. Sit down. Sit down, Mrs. Hogan, and don't worry. He asked for a bed three hours ago, tuckered out, tramping the trails the way he's always doing, and went upstairs. Ham sandwiched, ran up and roused him out. He's in number fourteen. The youth was soon downstairs, and ready. He asked Mrs. Hogan for particulars. Bless you, dear, there ain't any. I wish there was. I put her to sleep at seven in the evening, and when I went in there an hour ago to go to bed myself she was gone. I rushed for your cabin, dear, and you wasn't there, and I've hunted for you ever since, that every cabin down the gulch, and now I've come up again, and I'm that distracted and scared and heartbroken, but thanks to God I found you at last, dear, heart, and you'll find my child. Come on, come quick! Move right along. I'm with you, madam. Go to your cabin first. The whole company streamed out to join the hunt.

56:47All the southern half of the village was up, a hundred men strong, and waiting outside. A vague, dark mass sprinkled with twinkling lanterns. The mass fell into columns by threes and fours to accommodate itself to the narrow road, and strode briskly along southward in the wake of the leaders. In a few minutes the Hogan cabin was reached. "'There's the bunk,' said Mrs. Hogan. "'There's where she was. It's where I laid her at seven o'clock. But where she is now, God only knows,' Handme a lantern,' said Archie. He set it on the hard earth floor and melt by it, pretending to examine the ground closely. "'There's her track,' he said, touching the ground here and there, and yonder with his finger. Do you see?' Several of the company dropped upon their knees and did their best to see. One or two thought they discerned something like a track. The others shook their heads and confessed that the smooth, hard surface had no marks upon it, which their eyes were sharp enough to discover.

57:47One said, "'Maybe a child's foot could make a mark on it, but I don't see how,' young Stilman stepped outside, held the light to the ground, turned leftward, and moved three steps, closely examining. Then said, "'I've got the direction! Come along! Take the lantern, somebody!' He strode off swiftly southward, the files following, swaying and bending in and out with the deep curves of the gorge. Thus a mile and the mouth of the gorge was reached. Before them stretched the sage-brush plain, dim, vast and vague. One called a halt, saying, "'We mustn't start wrong now! We must take the direction again!'' He took a lantern and examined the ground for a matter of twenty yards, then said, "'Come on! It's all right!' and gave up the lantern. In and out among the sage-brushes he marched, a quarter of a mile, bearing gradually to the right. Then took a new direction and made another great semi-circle, then changed again, and moved

58:48west nearly half a mile and stopped. She gave it up here, poor little chap. Hold the lantern, you can see where she sat. But this was in a slick, alkyly flat which was surfaced like steel, and no person in the part he was quite hardy enough to claim an eyesight that could detect the track of a cushion on a veneer like that. The bereaved mother fell upon her knees and kissed the spot, lamenting. "'But where is she, then?'' someone said. "'She didn't stay here! We can see that much anyway!'' Stillman moved about in a circle around the place with a lantern, pretending to hunt for tracks. "'Well,' he said presently in an annoyed tone, "'I don't understand it!' He examined again. No use. She was here. That's certain. She never walked away from here, and that's certain. It's a puzzle. I can't make it out. The mother lost heart, then. "'My God, oh blessed Virgin, some flying beast has got her. I'll never see her again!'

59:49"'Ah, don't give up,' said Archie. We'll find her. Don't give up. God bless you for the words, Archie stillman, and she seized his hand and kissed it fervently. Peterson, the newcomer, whispered satirically in Ferguson's ear, wonderful performance to find this place, wasn't it? Hardly worthwhile to come so far, though. Any others suppositious place would have answered just as well, hey?' Ferguson was not pleased with the innuendo. He said with some warmth, "'Do you mean to insinuate that the child hasn't been here? I tell you the child has been here. Now if you want to get yourself into as tidy a little fuss as, all right,' saying out stillman. "'Come, everybody, and look at this. It was right under our noses all the time, and we didn't see it. There was a general plunge for the ground at the place where the child was alleged to have rested, and many eyes tried hard and, hopefully, to see the thing that Archie's finger was resting upon. There was a pause, then a several barrelled sigh of disappointment.' Pat Riley and Ham sandwich said in the one breath, "'What is it, Archie?

1:00:52There's nothing here. Nothing? Do you call that nothing?' And he swiftly traced upon the ground a form with his finger. There. Don't you recognize it now? This engine billy's track! He's got the child! God be praised from the mother! Take away the lantern! I've got the direction! Follow! He started on a run, racing in and out among the sage pushes a matter of three hundred yards, and disappeared over a sand wave. The others struggle after him, caught him up, and found him waiting. Ten steps away was a little wicky up, a dim and formless shelter of rags and old horse blankets, a dull light showing through its chinks. You lead, Mrs. Hogan, said the lad. It's your privilege to be first. All followed the sprint she made for the wicky up, and saw, with her, the picture its interior afforded. Engine billy was sitting on the ground. The child was asleep beside him. The mother hugged it with a wild embrace which included Archie stillman.

1:01:54The grateful tears running down her face, and in a choked and broken voice she poured out a golden stream of that wealth of worshiping endearments, which has its home in full richness nowhere, but in the Irish heart. I, find her, by and by, it is ten o'clock, billy explained. She sleep out yonder, very tired, face wet, been crying, suppose, fetch her home, feed her, she heaped much hungry, go sleep-gain. In her limitless gratitude the happy mother waved rank and hugged him to, calling him, the angel of God in disguise. And he probably was in disguise if he was that kind of an official. He was dressed for the character. At half past one in the morning the procession burst into the village, singing, when Johnny comes marching home, waving its lanterns and swallowing the drinks that were brought out all along its course. It concentrated at the tavern, and made a night of what was left of the morning.

1:02:56End of chapter five and end of part one. Spring weekends are all about family, sunshine and evenings on the patio. Before the barbecue starts, I like to stop by my local total wine and more to pick up a great bourbon, maybe a single barrel I already love, or something new to try with dinner. With so many bottles to choose from, it's easy to discover a favorite or something new for everyone to enjoy. Final you love and love what you find, only a total wine and more. Curbside pick up and delivery available in most areas, visit total wine.com to learn more. Spirits not sold in Virginia and North Carolina, drink responsibly B-21. Spring weekends are my favorite. The artist full of blooms, the grill is fired up and the family gathers around the patio table. Before everyone arrives, I stop by my local total wine and more to pick up a few bottles of wine, usually a cabernet I already love, and sometimes a new fine to share. Find what you love and love what you find, only at total wine and more. Visit total wine.com to learn more.

1:03:58Spirits not sold in Virginia and North Carolina, drink responsibly B-21.