bereavements, over which he was brooding,
police station a little later. “The paranoiac
had clearly upset his mind, although to the
ordinarily conceives himself to be appointed
untrained observer he showed no symptom of
of heaven to remove objectionable characters.
his malady. It was only when my men gained
The murderers of our Presidents have been
access to his home that they unearthed
paranoiacs who believed themselves fulfilling
positive evidence, and discovered a secret
a high and godly duty. But here is a man who
room in one of the turrets where he had a
acts from the reverse motive. Sane in most
“throne of Satan” and went through mystic
respects, the monomania obsesses him that he
ceremonies in which were revealed to him the
is the ruler over Hades, and that he must fight names of his prospective victims. These
the legions of good. This was the theory that
names he wrote in red ink on a sheet of paper,
forced itself upon me when first these crimes
and crossed them off in black as he murdered
were brought to my notice. The victims were
them. When he got Louise Dennison’s card he
all arrayed against the instincts of the Devil.
took it up to the turret room and there added
The first, you recall, was the widow—a her fictitious name to his fateful list before he philanthropist who had founded an asylum for
went down to see her. The Chief of Police
homeless children. Here was typified Charity.
now has the list, taken from the person of
The second victim was a child—standing for
Abburton himself.”
Innocence. The candy-poisoning was
“Along with the gold cross of the
perpetrated with the idea of torturing and Mother Superior,” added the Chief.
putting to death more than one little child who
“It was a fearful strain to keep watch
might get the dosed buttercups. This maniac
on the maniac,” resumed Hazard. “There was
had secured some of these candies, poisoned
no telling which would prove his next victim,
them, and smuggled them back into the and to arrest him without conclusive evidence containers on the counter. A simple expedient
might give him a chance to escape indictment
for the cunning but cruel mind of a paranoaic.
and thus remain a frightful hazard to
Then followed the assassination of the Litchfield. Paranoia is a most difficult thing to clergyman, who was a godly man, you prove. So I resolved to bait him with this plea remember, representing Faith. Next came the
from the Society for the Extension of
murder of the young girl, who, in the lunatic’s Religion. The widow Blauvelt, I discovered,
distorted vision, required removal as a type of had been to see him in behalf of her orphan
Purity. Finally, the Mother Superior asylum, on the day she was killed. The represented perhaps Pity for the woes of men
Reverend Dr. Mathewson likewise had sought
Short Stories
10
funds of him for the church on that very
gratitude of Litchfield.”
Sunday he was shot down in the dark.
“The Devil’s curses on the girl!” came
Analogies, my friends! I try to reason from
the wailing voice from below.
such analogies, for the human mind, however
“Louise Dennison fears neither man
erratic, always comes back to certain starting
nor Satan!” said Hazard, as he lighted another
points. The more you study the morbid cigar. “And as for our friend of the lower histology of the brain, the more you see that
regions, his curse, so long a deadly menace to
these microscopic tissue structures in different Litchfield, need no longer trouble you. If only craniums simply repeat the same general he were the Devil in reality!”
story.”
“In which case,” observed the Chief of
“In my opinion,” observed the Chief
Police, “Felix Hazard would find no further
“this girl, Louise Dennison, in allowing cause for the exercise of his weird detecting herself to be used as a murder bait, ran a
talents.”
terrible risk and deserves the everlasting
The Brain Jungle by Edward Mott Woolley Page 3