Adjoining Colton's sleeping-apartment, on the second floor, was a small room with a window looking out on the back yard, and with one door opening from the hall. In this room, let partly into the wall, was an iron safe in which the old man kept "the little money" that he had decided to invest in real estate. The window was protected by upright iron bars. At night, a gas-jet, turned low, threw dismal shadows about the room, and it was the old man's habit to light the gas at bed-time and to turn it off the first thing at morning. He had lighted the gas shortly after returning from Witherspoon's house and had gone to bed, and it must have been about one o'clock when the household was startled by the report of a pistol. Brooks and his wife, whose room was on the same floor, ran into the old man's room. The place was dark, but a bright light burned in the vault-room. Into this room they ran, and there, lying on the floor, with money scattered about him, was the old man, bloody and dead, with a bullet-hole in his breast. But where was Mrs. Colton? They hastened back to her room and struck a light. The old woman lay across the bed, unable to move—paralyzed.
The first discovery made by the police was that the iron bars at the window, four in number, had been sawed in two; and then followed another discovery of a more singular nature. In the window, caught by the sudden fall of the sash, was a black frock coat. In one of the tail pockets was a briar-root pipe. The sash had fallen while the murderer was getting out, and, pulled against the sash, the pipe held the garment fast. One sleeve was torn nearly off. In a side pocket was found a letter addressed to Dave Kittymunks, general delivery, Chicago, and post-marked Milwaukee. Under the window a ladder was found.
At the coroner's inquest, held the next day, one of the servants testified that three days before, while the old man and Brooks were at the store and while the ladies were out, a man with black whiskers, and who wore a black coat, had called at the house and said that he had been sent to search for sewer-gas. He had an order presumably signed by Mr. Colton, and was accordingly shown through the house. He had insisted upon going into the vault-room, declaring that he had located the gas there, but was told that the room was always kept locked. He then went away. The servant had not thought to tell Mr. Colton.
A general delivery clerk at the post-office testified that the letter addressed to Dave Kittymunks had passed through his hands. The oddness of the name had fastened it on his memory. He did not think that he could identify the man who had received the letter, but he recalled the black whiskers. The letter was apparently written by a woman, and was signed "Lil." It was an urgent appeal for money.
CHAPTER XIX.
ARRESTED EVERYWHERE.
"Who is Dave Kittymunks?" was a question asked by the newspapers throughout the country. Not the slightest trace of him could be found, nor could "Lil" be discovered with any degree of certainty. But one morning the public was fed to an increase of appetite by an article that appeared in a Chicago newspaper. "Kittymunks came to Chicago about five months ago," said the writer, "and for a time went under the name of John Pruett. Fierce in his manner, threatening in his talk, wearing a scowl, frowning at prattling children and muttering at honest men, he repelled every one. Dissatisfied with his lot in life, he refused, even for commensurate compensation, to perform that honest labor which is the province of every true man, and like a hyena, he prowled about growling at himself and despising fate. The writer met him on several occasions and held out inducements that might lead to conversation, but was persistently repulsed by him. He frowned upon society, and set the grinding heel of his disapproval on every attempt to draw him out. Was there some dark mystery connected with his life? This question the writer asked himself. He execrated humanity; and, moody and alone, the writer has seen him sitting on a bench on the lake front, turning with a sullen look and viewing with suppressed rage the architectural grandeur towering at his back."
The article was written by Mr. Flummers. As the only reporter who could write from contact with the murderer, his sentences were bloated into strong significance. Fame reached down and snatched him up, and the blue light of his flambeau played about him.
"Pessimist as he is"—Flummers was holding forth among the night reporters at the central station—"Pessimist as he is, and a skeptic though he may be, papa goes through this life with his eyes open. Idle suggestion says, 'Shut your eyes, papa, and be happy,' but shrewdness says, 'Watch that fellow going along there.' I don't claim any particular credit for this; we are not to be vain of what nature has done for us, nor censured for what she has denied. We are all children, toddling about as an experiment, and wondering what we are going to be. Some of us fall and weep over our bruises, and some of us—some of us get there. He, he, he."