store after daybreak, and he said. as he'd chanced to be near the gulch 'bout one in the morning. It warn't easy to get at his story, he seemed so uncommon scared; but he told us, at last, as he'd heard the fearfulest screams in the stillness of the night. There weren't no shots, he said, but scream after scream, kinder muffled, like a man with a serapé over his head, an' in mortal pain. Abner Brandon and me, and a few more, was in the store at the time; so we mounted and rode out to Scott's house, passing through the gulch on the way. There weren't nothing partic'lar to be seen there no blood nor marks of a fight, nor nothing; and when we gets up to Scott's house, out he comes to meet us as fresh as a lark. "Hullo, Jeff!" says he, pistols after all.

no need for the

Come in an' have

a cocktail, boys." "Did ye see or hear nothing as ye came home last night?" says I. "No," says he; "all was quiet enough. An owl kinder moaning in the Flytrap Gulch that was all. Come, jump off and have a glass." "Thank ye," says Abner. So off we gets, and Tom Scott rode into the settlement with us when we went back.

'An allfired commotion was on in Main-street as we rode into it. The 'Merican party seemed to have gone clean crazed. Alabama Joe was gone, not a darned particle of him left. Since he went out to the gulch nary eye had seen him. As we got off our horses there was a considerable crowd in front of Simpson's, and some ugly looks at Tom Scott, I can tell you. There was a clickin' of pistols, and I saw as Scott had his hand in his bosom too. There weren't a single English face about. "Stand aside, Jeff Adams," says Zebb Humphrey, as great a scoundrel as ever lived, "you hain't got no hand in this game. Say, boys, are we, free

Americans, to be murdered by any darned Britisher?" It was the quickest thing as quickest thing as ever I seed. There was a rush an' a crack; Zebb was down, with Scott's ball in his thigh, and Scott hisself was on the ground with a dozen men holding him. It weren't no use struggling, so he lay quiet. They seemed a bit uncertain what to do with him at first, but then one of Alabama's special chums put them up to it. "Joe's gone," he said; "nothing ain't surer nor that, an' there lies the man as killed him. Some on you knows as Joe went on business to the gulch last night; he never came back. That 'ere Britisher passed through after he'd gone; they'd had a row, screams is heard 'mong the great flytraps. I say agin he has played poor Joe some o' his sneakin' tricks, anʼ thrown him into the swamp. It

ain't no wonder as the body is gone. But air we to stan' by and see English murderin' our Own chums? I guess not. Let Judge Lynch try him, that's what I say." Lynch him!" shouted a hundred angry voices-for all the rag-tag an' bobtail o' the settlement was round us by this time. "Here, boys, fetch a rope, and swing him up. Up with him over Simpson's door!" "See here though," says another, coming forrards; "let's hang him by the great flytrap in the gulch. Let Joe see as he's revenged, if so be as he's buried 'bout theer." There was a shout for this, an' away they went, with Scott tied on his mustang in the middle, and a mounted guard, with cocked revolvers, round him; for we knew as there was a score or so Britishers about, as didn't seem to recognise Judge Lynch, and was dead on a free fight.

'I went out with them, my heart bleedin' for Scott, though he didn't seem a cent put out, he didn't. He were game to the backbone. Seems

kinder queer, sirs, hangin' a man to a flytrap; but our'n were a reg'lar tree, and the leaves like a brace of boats with a hinge between 'em and thorns at the bottom.

'We passed down the gulch to the place where the great one grows, and there we seed it with the leaves, some open, some shut. But we seed something worse nor that. Standin' round the tree was some thirty men, Britishers all, an' armed to the teeth. They was waitin' for us evidently, an' had a businesslike look about 'em, as if they'd come for something and meant to have it. There was the raw material there for about as warm a scrimmidge as ever I seed. As we rode up, a great red-bearded Scotchman-Cameron were his name-stood out afore the rest, his revolver cocked in his hand. "See here, boys," he says, "you've got no call to hurt a hair of that man's head. You hain't proved as Joe is dead yet; and if you had, you hain't proved as Scott killed him. Anyhow, it were in self-defence; for you all know as he was lying in wait for Scott, to shoot him on sight; so I say agin, you hain't got no call to hurt that man; and what's more, I've got thirty six-barrelled arguments against your doin' it." "It's an interestin' pint, and worth arguin' out," said the man as was Alabama Joe's special chum. There was a clickin' of pistols, and a loosenin' of knives, and the two parties began to draw up to one another, an' it looked like a rise in the mortality of Montana. Scott was standing behind with a pistol at his ear if he stirred, lookin' quiet and composed as having no money on the table, when sudden he gives a start an' a shout as rang in our ears like a trumpet. "Joe!" he cried, "Joe! Look at him! In the flytrap!" We all turned an' looked where he was pointin'. Je

rusalem! I think we won't get that picter out of our minds agin. One of the great leaves of the flytrap, that had been shut and touchin' the ground as it lay, was slowly rolling back upon its hinges. There, lying like a child in its cradle, was Alabama Joe in the hollow of the leaf. The great thorns had been slowly driven through his heart as it shut upon him. We could see as he'd tried to cut his way out, for there was a slit in the thick fleshy leaf, an' his bowie was in his hand; but it had smothered him first. He'd lain down on it likely to keep the damp off while he were awaitin' for Scott, and it had closed on him as you've seen your little hothouse ones do on a fly; an' there he were as we found him, torn and crushed into pulp by the great jagged teeth of the man-eatin' plant. There, sirs, I think you'll own as that's a curious story.'

'And what became of Scott ? asked Jack Sinclair.

Why, we carried him back on our shoulders, we did, to Simpson's bar, and he stood us liquors round. Made a speech too-a darned fine speech-from the counter. Somethin' about the British lion an' the 'Merican eagle walkin' arm in arm for ever an' a day." And now, sirs, that yarn was long, and my cheroot's out, so I reckon I'll make tracks afore it's later;' and with a Good-night! he left the room.

'A most extraordinary narrative!' said Dawson. Who would have thought a Dianoa had such power!

'Deuced rum yarn!' said young Sinclair.

'Evidently a matter-of-fact truthful man,' said the doctor.

'Or the most original liar that ever lived,' said I.

I wonder which he was.

CHAPTER I.

THOUGH the plague of tourists has not yet fallen upon it, there exists within the narrow seas no more picturesque little town than Monkmoor. It lies among hills on the borders of Shropshire and Herefordshire, some thirty miles from Shrewsbury. The latter Monkmoor yields to as the county town; but it solaces itself with thoughts of the days when its gray old castle was a princely residence, and when it lorded it far and wide over the marches of Wales. Of its priory but a name is left; of its castle, ruins such as Kenilworth can do no more than match; of its church, well, the townsmen say it is the second parish-church in England, and look with scorn on the tall spire of St. Mary's at Shrewsbury. Whether it is the second parishchurch in England, I know not: only one finer have I seen; so that, as far as I know, that may be so; but St. Mary's it certainly does excel, save in painted glass. Honour where honour is due. But, grand as are the wooded hills rising around it, interesting as are its historical monuments, Monkmoor lies out of the road of the crowd of travellers, and only a few, a very few, artists come hither in summer, attracted chiefly by some old timber houses equal to any that Chester can show. Notwithstanding, one August morning two years ago, Eustace Walters, a young barrister of moderate family and more moderate fortune, found himself standing under the Butchers' Row outside the Angel Hotel at MonkCHRISTMAS, '80.

moor. He had been merely passing along the Shrewsbury and Hereford Railway, intending to spend some weeks of the summer vacation on the Wye, when the sight of the old castle framed in Mary Knoll Woods had attracted him, and, rejoicing in unencumbered youth, he had determined to stay and see the place. This was the third day of his stay, and it was a wet one he had seen the castle; he had seen the church; he had admired the black-and-white houses, and the shield-bearing panels at the Bull; he had heard all-and that was very little-that was to be heard about the Priory. Finally, as he remarked to the Boots, the billiard-table was only moderate, and games with the marker are apt to become monotonous. So the Boots regarded him with a doubtful air; the Angel would gladly have had tourists as thick as locusts, and, failing that, wished to do the best by such stray ones as lighted down; wherefore, as I remarked, the Boots was looking doubtful what amusement he should suggest to carry the solitary guest over another day. He looked down the street, but the Broad Gate gave him no inspiration; nor, when he looked up, did the Butter Cross. But his memory proved true to him

the lions of Monkmoor were not exhausted.

'I do declare, sir,' said he, with a hearty slap on his thigh, 'you've never seen the museum. It's just the day for it, with the rain stopping everything else, or you might have gone to Titterstone Hill, or to Wigmore Castle, or tried for a

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