Was it a ghost? The murders in Bussey's wood

by Henry Johnson Brent

There was one other case of suspicion, but no arrest; and as it illustrates the uncertainty of circumstantial evidence somewhat, and is a little singular, I will relate it. A young fellow of variegated habits worked in a large rifle establishment near one of the city limits, distant from the scene of the murders some four or five miles. One of his habits was to rove into the suburbs, seeking his recreation according to his fancy. This fact was a strong circumstance against him; for at that time the theory of the twofold character of the crime had not been relinquished. Up to the period of the murders, this youth was the life of the establishment where he was employed, full of tricks, and jokes, and happy, ceaseless good-humor. On the morning of the 12th of June, he was absent at roll-call; but at one o’clock in the afternoon he was there and answered to his name. Whatever had happened, a great change had come over him. He was no more the jubilant and frolicsome madcap of the day before, but sullen to moroseness, and his face was strongly sunburnt, and altogether his whole appearance and behavior indicated a transformation as singular as it was sudden. When questioned, he admitted that he had been in the woods somewhere, but would speak no more upon the subject. In search of any, the slightest clue to the discovery of the mystery, the police soon came into the possession of these facts, and suspicion fell darkly around him. Upon farther inquiry, it appeared that he had converted two files into poniards,—one he had given to a friend, the other he had kept. The day afterward, while the police were making these investigations, and keeping him, as they thought, unconscious of the fact, he disappeared, and has not been heard of from that day to this. One of the dirks when applied to the wounds fitted exactly. I have seen the one he had given to his comrade, now in the desk of the chief. A long, ugly weapon it is, sharp at the point, and double-edged, equal to a bowie-knife ere yet it has arrived at the point of complete perfection of destruction.

But he was not the man. Why he fled we may conjecture. Doubtless he had heard of the advance of the authorities upon his steps, and feeling that appearances were against him on the first blush of the investigation, and not being logically disposed to examine into the importance of minutes and hours wherein lay his absolute defence, he fled affrighted at his dangerous position. He was innocent, because he answered his name at one o’clock. Had he done those murders he never could have reached his workshop at that hour unless he had hired the magic of a necromancer, or been mounted on the fleetest horse that ever won a race; for the murders were accomplished soon after one o’clock. Had he not answered to his name at the hour mentioned, he would have been arrested, though still he would not have been guilty. It was another man who did those deeds.

X.
WAS IT A GHOST?

And after that a heavy silence fell over the mysterious murders of the Joyce children. The officers of justice, to whom I spoke during that time, looked wise and watchful, and held to the belief that the malefactor would yet be found.

I come now to a portion of my story that I assure my reader is, in every respect, true. I know that only one-eighth, or even a lesser moiety of the world, will give me credence; not that they will directly question my plighted word, but they will question the philosophy of which my experience is a phase; but who knows but that it may be an actual substantiation? So assured was I that no deception was practised upon me, that it was only the other day that I made a statement of it to Mr. Kurtz, the chief of police, to whom I had occasion to speak of my design to write a narrative of my knowledge and experience in relation to the unhappy incidents of the murder, putting it to his discretion whether I should go on and give my writing to the public. I had some misgiving as to the propriety of saying anything of such importance while it remained in its present apparent quiescence; and though it is not essential to my purpose to repeat our conversation, I feel at liberty to say that he favored my design most cordially. But with regard to my revelation to him of what I shall soon put my reader in possession of, he did not evince that unpleasant scepticism which so often borders upon the insolent, and listened to my narration with the evidences of a respect that at least bore the semblance of belief. I must confess, however, that he somewhat startled me when, at the conclusion of my recital, he put to me this practical question: “Do you think you could recognize the man?” That question, the reader will perceive anon, was somewhat of a staggerer; but I rallied under the belief that the head dealer in the positive had not quite grasped the peculiar significance of my revelation, and since then I have seen something—a something which he has in his desk, and which may appear hereafter—that would, if I deem it necessary to test my idea, perhaps enable me to say to him, “I can.”

It was quite three weeks after the blood of the unhappy Joyce children had been mixed with the leaves and oozings of that mysterious wood,—when everything was falling back, in our country side, to the old order of simple occurrences,—that, upon a still and clear night, I went out of the cottage where I still lived, and, taking the two dogs with me, strolled down through the stable-yard, and past the garden, until I came to the brow of the hill that formed the apex of my friend’s grass-lands. The brow of the hill was flat all about me, commencing its declension some hundred and fifty feet eastwardly from where I stopped, and at the base running off into a meadow, the opposite side of which was overlooked by the Bussey wood; and, from where I stood, several pines rose out of the even surface of the forest, marking, as with an uplifted hand spread out, the place where the murder of the girl had been done. I have to be particular in my description seemingly to tediousness, but the singularity of what transpired leaves me no choice; for better, on such a matter, not to speak at all than not to speak explicitly. I resume. The grass was short on the brow of the hill, not over a few inches in length, improving in quality as the descent reached the valley. There was a tree near me; but that I left behind, putting it in my rear some ten paces, when I stopped. On my left was Motley’s wood,—so often mentioned,—drawing up with its intense shadows, close to the dividing wall. From the wall to where I stood all was clear and distinct, save where the shadows, or, more properly speaking, the shade fell over the ground, though in that shade there was a secondary light which artists and all thorough students of nature will recognize. The wall and the wood on my left ran down to that corner at the creek, which was only a short distance, about fifty feet, from the spot where the boy had fallen. Some two hundred and fifty yards away, and close to the corner just mentioned, was a clump of trees, and then straight before me, without an intervening object, the dark wood and the hand-like pines, that gloomed, in deeper gloom than night itself imparts, with all her shadows, over the gory rock of the girl’s death-bed. My purpose was simply to take the cooler air from the winnowing trees; for the room where I had been sitting with the family was oppressive with lamp-light and the encased atmosphere. I had become so accustomed to the dread localities, that habit had destroyed, with the first surprise and horror, all the keen sensations of a mysterious and indescribable neighborhoodism to the scene. Indeed, I had begun to look upon the whole affair as a story that had been told to me by some such person as the “Ancient Mariner.” Had it been otherwise, I never could have been induced to stay another moment in that house. I beg to assure everybody that when, at that hour of half-past eight o’clock, I left the parlor to stroll to the brow of the meadow hill, I did not have one thought in my head that connected itself with the murders. Other affairs had turned up, in which I was personally interested, and my mind, though not dwelling upon them at the moment, felt, if it felt anything at all, the reverberations of mental discussions upon the topics I have just spoken of as of personal interest. I think now, remembering everything, that if I had any peculiar sensation, it was not superior to that of the two dogs who kept close to my heels,—for I was there to enjoy the sensuous and physical boon of air; they, indeed, governed by a higher motive, the society of man. I was, consequently, if I may say so with perfect self-respect, in a complete condition of animal existence, and not prepared for or expecting anything beyond the ordinary condition of animal and vegetable life. I was, in fine, nearly upon a level with the inanimate existences around and about me. I am unwillingly compelled to remind the reader that it was the habit of my host, who did business in the city, of leaving the train at Laurel Hill Station, at nine o’clock, as a general thing, and keeping the main road until he got to the bottom of the hill near to where the brook, so often mentioned, crosses the road, entered the lowlands at the outskirts of Bussey’s wood, and thence following the path which led by the boy’s murder-place, and up the hill-side covered by the Motley wood, keeping close to the wall until he reached that point of the wall near which I was standing, passed over it, and was home. It must also be borne in mind that the two dogs loved their master with a steadfast affection; in the case of the serene Jack it was a very jump-about, capering, stump-tail, demonstrative love. Whenever they saw him in the distance nearing home, or knew by instinct that he was approaching, though for the moment hidden by the intervening trees or rocks, they would break away from my minor and only temporary bonds, and rush to meet him exultingly, and then ensued a scene of wild confusion and barbaric dog-taming. These two facts remembered, I will advance with my narrative.

MAP OF THE LOCALITIES.

1. Steam-Car Line.	10. Where the Apparition stood.
G. Horse-Car Line.	11. Where the Girl’s body was discovered.
2. Motley-House.	12. The Gate on Dedham Wood.
3. Gate leading into Pasture and Bussey Wood.	13, 13. Public road to Dedham.
4, 4, 4, 4. Returning route of my host.	14, 14, 14, 14, 14. Bussey’s Wood.
5. Bridge over public road.	15. Motley’s Wood.
6. Spot where the Boy’s body was found.	16. The Wall.
7. Arch Bridge.	17. Fence between Bussey’s Wood and the Howard property.
8. Flat Bridge.	Arrow. The Creek.
9. Where I stood.	- - - - - - My route at night to the Murder-Rock.

Knowing that my host was irregular as to his hours of return home at night,—sometimes arriving by another than the nine-o’clock train,—I was not surprised when I saw a figure lean over the wall for an instant within about twenty feet of me, pause a moment, and then cross over to the side on which I was. Seeing that he stopped, I spoke aloud these words, and none other, thinking of none other: “Hallo, Dan, is that you?”—for, though I could discover the figure and recognize its movements, there was too great a shade thrown over the wall to enable me to distinguish even the lineaments of a face so familiar to me as were those of my friend. To my appeal there was no reply, and then in an instant the impression came upon me that if it really was my friend, he was making an essay upon my nerves. So up to this moment I never had a thought apart from him. I did not notice the conduct of the dogs, or even think of them, for if I had done so, I never would have inquired if it was “Dan;” for they would have been away from me at the first footfall after he had passed the vicinity of the low bridge down in the hollow of the hill; or, having not done that, they would have been at the wall the moment his face looked over it. Nor did I observe that they kept unusually close to me. I did not even think that, if it was not him, it was extraordinary that the dogs did not, without more ado, make their assault; for as a vigilance committee they were extremely zealous in the discharge of their duty, and woe betide the trespasser upon those limits after dark if they once got scent of him! That sedate and usually almost apathetic Jack was equal to a cherubim with a flaming sword; and as to Jack the fighter, his mind was strictly judicial with regard to trespass. It was not till afterward, when the climax of this abrupt and singular apparition was reached, that my attention was directed to the behavior of my two companions. While I stood perfectly motionless, waiting for some recognition of my appeal, the figure advanced slowly in a direct line from the wall, leaving the shadow, and stopped before me, and not twenty feet away from me. I saw at once that it was somebody I had never seen before. When in the light, without even a weed to obstruct my vision, as soon as he stopped, I called again: “Speak, or I will fire!” I am not naturally of a blood-letting disposition, but somehow or other that threat came from me without any power or will of my mind to arrest it. It was an unmeaning and perhaps a cowardly speech, for he was alone, while I was armed with two powerful dogs, either one of whom would have vanquished him, had I but said the word. Nor had I a pistol to carry out, had I been so rash as to intend it, my foolish demonstration. It was at this period I observed especially the behavior of the dogs. Up to this time they had been quiescent, lying upon the grass in the full enjoyment of its freshness; but now they both got up, and I felt on each side of me the pressure of their bodies. They were evidently frightened, and, by the casual glance I gave them, induced to do so by the sensation of their touch, I saw that they were looking with every symptom of terror at the figure that stood so near us without a motion. And the figure. It never once turned its head directly toward me, but seemed to fix its look eastward over where the pine-trees broke the clear horizon on the murder-hill. This inert pose was preserved but for a moment; for, as quick as the flash of gunpowder, it wheeled as upon a pivot, and, making one movement, as of a man commencing to step out toward the wall, was gone! To my vision it never crossed the space between where it had stood and the outline of the shade thrown by the trees upon the ground. One step after turning was all I saw, and then it vanished. Can I describe this figure you will ask; and my reply is that I can, but not exactly in such a way as to satisfy the chief’s business-like interrogatory. Before I go any farther, I must say that, as I had nothing to do in getting up this apparition, I do not see how any one can poke fun at me simply because I was there to see it. A man sees a star fall; he has no agency in the eccentric transaction, and is he to be ridiculed because there happens to be a tack loose in the celestial carpet whose dropping out he witnesses and tells of, and happens not to be astronomer enough to explain? Here was a moral and physical tack loose somewhere and somehow, and I had struck my vision on its point. What I saw I relate exactly as it happened, and nothing more, though I may be induced to meet the usual objections to the possibility of its occurrence, in a later portion of this narrative. I could, if I felt so inclined, stop my recital and talk by the folio about this affair; but it was a very different matter at the moment when that something, which would not reply to me, stood in the night light, clear and distinct as a marble statue, and cast one glance over toward the hill that held among its gray rocks a stain that would last there forever. But I half promised to describe this figure, this appearance, this apparition, and a few words will answer. It looked like painted air to begin with. An artist, sitting by my side and following my ideas, might render it to the life or death; but he would have to blend his matter-of-fact pencil with the vague vehicles of spiritualistic imagination. In the first place, there was no elaborate toilet; indeed I could not make out the fashion of the garment, taking it for granted that it was draped in the usual costume, being too absorbed by the complex and somewhat agitated train of thought which, commencing with the assumption that it was my friend, and which was suddenly relinquished, leaving me exposed to the rapid transitions of intellectual deductions so singularly called into action and so totally at variance with my habitual mental or nervous equanimity. I felt as a drowning man might feel who, admitting the fact that the water has got the master of him, lets that primary incident take care of itself, and looks only to some object by whose aid he may relieve himself from the desperate catastrophe. I was occupied more in the effort to recognize a human being in the figure that was before me than in making a tailor’s analysis of his apparel. One thing was evident,—he looked dark-gray from head to foot. Body he had, and legs, and arms, and a head; but the face I could not distinctly see, as he turned it from me; but there was an outline such as can be traced in shadows thrown by a dim lamp upon a rough-plastered wall,—and that is all I can say about it. Of course it is unsatisfactory, but I had no means or time for a fuller diagnosis.