University of Virginia Library

26. CHAPTER XXVI.
THE MYSTERY.

I HAVE before me, as one of the original sources
of information for this history, a file of The
Wheat County Weakly Windmill for 1856. It is not
a large sheet, but certainly it is a very curious one.
In its day this Windmill ground many grists, though
its editorial columns were chiefly occupied with impartial
gushing and expansive articles on the charms of scenery, fertility
of soil, superiority of railroad prospects, admirableness
of location, healthfulness, and general future rosiness of the
various paper towns that paid tribute to its advertising columns.
And the advertising columns! They abounded in business announcements
of men who had “Money to Loan on Good Real
Estate” at three, four, five, and six per cent a month, and of
persons who called themselves “Attorneys-at-Law and Real
Estate Agents,” who stated that “All business relating to pre-emption
and contested claims would be promptly attended to”
at their offices in Perritaut. Even now, through the thin disguise
of honest-seeming phrases, one can see the bait of the land-shark
who speculated in imaginary titles to claims, or sold corner-lots
in bubble-towns. And, as for the towns, it appears from
these advertisements that there was one on almost every square

mile, and that every one of them was on the line of an inevitable
railroad, had a first-class hotel, a water-power, an academy,
and an indefinite number of etcæteras of the most delightful
and remunerative kind. Each one of these villages was in the
heart of the greatest grain-growing section of the State. Each
was the “natural outlet” to a large agricultural region. Each
commanded the finest view. Each point was the healthiest
in the county, and each village was “unrivaled.” (When one
looks at these town-site advertisements, one is tempted to think
that member serious and wise who, about this time, offered
a joint resolution in the Territorial Legislature, which read:
“Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives, That not
more than two thirds of the area of this Territory should
be laid out in town-sites and territorial roads, the remaining
one third to be sacredly reserved for agricultural use.”)

But I prize this old file of papers because it contains a
graphic account of the next event in this narrative. And
the young man who edited the Windmill at this time has
told the story with so much sprightliness and vigor that I can
not serve my reader a better turn than by clipping his account
and pasting it just here in my manuscript. (I shall also rest
myself a little, and do a favor to the patient printer, who will
rejoice to get a little “reprint copy” in place of my perplexing
manuscript.) For where else shall I find such a dictionariful
command of the hights and depths—to say nothing of the
lengths and breadths—of the good old English tongue? This
young man must indeed have been a marvel of eloquent
verbosity at that period of his career. The article in question
has the very flavor of the golden age of Indian contracts,
corner-lots, six per cent a month, and mortgages with waiver

[ILLUSTRATION]

THE EDITOR OF "THE WINDMILL."

[Description: 557EAF. Page 216. In-line engraving of wild-haired man hunched over a desk writing.] clauses. There is also visible, I fear, a little of the prejudice
which existed at that time in Perritaut against Metropolisville.

I wish that an obstinate scruple on the part of the printers
and the limits of a duodecimo page did not forbid my reproducing
here, in all their glory, the unique head-lines which precede
the article in question. Any pageant introduced by music is
impressive, says Madame de Stael. At least she says something
of that sort, only it is in French, and I can not remember it

exactly. And so any newspaper article is startling when introduced
by the braying of head-lines. Fonts of type for
displayed lines were not abundant in the office of the
Windmill, but they were very stunning, and were used also for
giving prominence to the cuphonious names of the several
towns, whose charms were set forth in the advertisements. Of
course the first of these head-lines ran “Startling Disclosures!!!!”
and then followed “Tremendous Excitement in
Metropolisville!” “Official Rascality!” “Bold Mail Robbery!”
“Arrest of the Postmaster!” “No Doubt of his Guilt!” “An
Unexplained Mystery!” “Sequel to the Awful Drowning Affair
of Last Week!” Having thus whetted the appetite of his
reader, and economized in type-setting by nearly a column of
such broad and soul-stirring typography, the editor proceeds:

“Metropolisville is again the red-hot crater of a boiling and
seething excitement. Scarcely had the rascally and unscrupulous
county-seat swindle begun to lose something of its terrific and
exciting interest to the people of this county, when there came
the awful and sad drowning of the two young ladies, Miss
Jennie Downing and Miss Katy Charlton, the belles of the
village, a full account of which will be found in the Windmill
of last week, some copies of which we have still on hand, having
issued an extra edition. Scarcely had the people of Metropolisville
laid these two charming and much-lamented young
ladies in their last, long resting-place, the quiet grave, when
there comes like an earthquake out of a clear sky, the frightful
and somewhat surprising and stunning intelligence that the
postmaster of the village, a young man of a hitherto unexceptionable
and blameless reputation, has been arrested for
robbing the mails. It is supposed that his depredations have

been very extensive and long continued, and that many citizens
of our own village may have suffered from them. Farther
investigations will doubtless bring all his nefarious and
unscrupulous transactions to light. At present, however, he is
under arrest on the single charge of stealing a land-warrant.

“The name of the rascally, villainous, and dishonest
postmaster is Albert Charlton, and here comes in the wonderful
and startling romance of this strange story. The carnival
of excitement in Metropolisville and about Metropolisville
has all had to do with one family. Our readers will remember
how fully we have exposed the unscrupulous tricks of the
old fox Plausaby, the contemptible land-shark who runs
Metropolisville, and who now has temporary possession of the
county-seat by means of a series of gigantic frauds, and of
wholesale bribery and corruption and nefarious ballot-box
stuffing. The fair Katy Charlton, who was drowned by the
heart-rending calamity of last week, was his step-daughter, and
now her brother, Albert Charlton, is arrested as a vile and
dishonest mail-robber, and the victim whose land-warrant he
stole was Miss Kate Charlton's betrothed lover, Mr. Smith
Westcott. There was always hatred and animosity, however,
between the lover and the brother, and it is hinted that the
developments on the trial will prove that young Charlton had
put a hired and ruthless assassin on the track of Westcott at
the time of his sister's death. Mr. Westcott is well known and
highly esteemed in Metropolisville and also here in Perritaut.
He is the gentlemanly Agent in charge of the branch store of
Jackson, Jones & Co., and we rejoice that he has made so
narrow an escape from death at the hands of his relentless and
unscrupulous foe.

“As for Albert Charlton, it is well for the community that
he has been thus early and suddenly overtaken in the first incipiency
of a black career of crime. His poor mother is said
to be almost insane at this second grief, which follows so suddenly
on her heart-rending bereavement of last week. We
wish there were some hope that this young man, thus arrested
with the suddenness of a thunderbolt by the majestic and firm
hand of public justice, would reform; but we are told that he
is utterly hard, and refuses to confess or deny his guilt, sitting
in moody and gloomy silence in the room in which he is confined.
We again call the attention of the proper authorities to
the fact that Plausaby has not kept his agreement, and that
Wheat County has no secure jail. We trust that the youthful
villain Charlton will not be allowed to escape, but that he will
receive the long term provided by the law for thieving postmasters.
He will be removed to St. Paul immediately, but
we seize the opportunity to demand in thunder-tones how
long the citizens of this county are to be left without the accommodations
of a secure jail, of which they stand in such
immediate need? It is a matter in which we all feel a personal
interest. We hope the courts will decide the county-seat
question at once, and then we trust the commissioners will
give us a jail of sufficient size and strength to accommodate a
county of ten thousand people.

“We would not judge young Charlton before he has a fair
trial. We hope he will have a fair trial, and it is not for us
to express any opinions on the case in advance. If he shall
be found guilty—and we do not for a moment doubt he will
—we trust the court will give him the full penalty of the law
without fear or favor, so that his case may prove a solemn and

impressive warning that shall make a lasting impression on the
minds of the thoughtless young men of this community in favor
of honesty, and in regard to the sinfulness of stealing.
We would not exult over the downfall of any man; but when
the proud young Charlton gets his hair cropped, and finds himself
clad in `Stillwater gray,' and engaged in the intellectual
employments of piling shingles and making vinegar-barrels,
he will have plenty of time for meditation on that great moral
truth, that honesty is generally the best policy.”