Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 141: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

MYSTERY OF VOODOO MANOR. room was impregnable of lock and was with- out secret panels or passageways. I found that the fresh white walls of the house and the recently sown ground were absolutely unmarked around the window beneath. And above, a dusty roof proved conclu- sively that the crime was not committed by dropping a line down opposite the win- dow. “That left only one recourse. I looked beyond the window. The nearest tree, however, shoots up a straight trunk af an oblique angle from the windew. And the trunk was unmarked by any clew to in- uicate that a person had tried to scale it. ven with such indices, it would have told little. angle, out of alignment with the window, and full twenty feet away from it.” The man still gazed at Nancy, a quiet, unblinking stare. Not unmindful of this, she went on: **So E looked elsewhere. You will all re- member that while below the window and . around the tree lies freshly planted ground, yet there is a peninsula of old grass run- ning from. the old lawn out under a big branch of the tree, fully nine feet in length. ¥ examined this neck of- grass ostree & for foot-prints. “And I found them. But they were something more than ordinary foot-tracks. By the character of the deeply embedded - toes—there were no heel-prints—I knew that the assassin had been running swiftly as far forward on the neck of grass as he could without leaving any incriminating “marks on the newly planted earth beyond. “The toe marks gave me a startling theroy as to the crime’s possible commit- ment. The overhead branch projects from the trunk in a line parallel to the window. So, if you follow me, while the tree is not in alignment with the window, a spot some feet out on the branch is. You see, from the position of the tree, I had previously thrown it out of my considerations. This branch, too, though opposite the window was a soodly distance from it. “ Even a long ladder placed against the branch would be of little use to the slayer intent on killing Miss Loring with an opal- eyed knife. Gravity and the . distance would For the tall tree trunk was out of * be against his flinging the ee uner- ringly.” “ But the marks of running feet on the neck of sod underneath this branch?” I reminded her, “ Ah, yes,” Nancy replied. the strange explanation.” “This 3s CHAPTER XXI. THE CRIME FROM THE CLOUDS. = HE wily villain probably scaled the TT wall by means of a rope flung into. the branch of a pine tree hanging over it. But this plotting criminal Erne along more rope with him, coiled and ready. He is very expert in the use of those long and sinewy fingers. And as I told you, his plan had been perfected by preliminary practice when he had previously glimpsed the position of the knife belonging to Miss Loring on its silver tray.” Stebbins’s eyes were popping out ridicu- lously in his mental struggle to follow Nancy. “ With a supple, expert cast he flings his rope above his head until it snakes around and over the big tree branch. It was weighfed so that it could be played by skill- ful manipulation to return within reach. Then he fastens one end of it with a slip- noose. “By climbing up this rope he can easily tie the other end to the branch, taking care that the distance between the two rope ends is directly opposite the window. This leaves him with the loop falling from the tree trunk just the right distance below the branch and above the grassy neck of the old lawn. “In other words, he looped a rope swing te that branch so that it came exactly — opposite the window. It was then a simple matter to seat himself in it, run back smartly along the neck of grass to get the swing under momentum, and then, as his running start comes to the end of the grass, to pull up his feet like any swinger. —_ : shoots high in the air and nearly on an_ eye level as the sill of the window int Room Number 13.” — — — Stebbins struck bie: knee a feavendan oO cComicbooks:co ~~