Page:The Black Cat v01no02 (1895-11).pdf/36



NEVER recall it without shuddering, though it happened over thirty years ago.

I was then a young man, occupying a position of trust in the banking firm of Dillard & Hatch. One day I was sent to carry five thousand dollars in gold to Caleb Parton, a very eccentric man living in an isolated house in a wild, hilly part of West Virginia.

Parton was the bank's heaviest depositor, and his wealth was said to aggregate a half million. The day before, his servant, a large negro, had appeared at the bank with a message requesting Dillard to send him eight thousand dollars in gold. He arranged that I was to be the one to carry the amount to him, and further suggested that I should make the trip in a wagon, so that I could take back a cask of rare old wine, which he begged to be permitted to present to the firm.

It was a hard journey over rough, stony roads, which were seldom traveled, except by the plodding mountain folk of that region; and not until two hours after sunset did I reach the queer stone dwelling where Caleb Parton lived a hermit-like existence, shut away from all the world. The place was a lonely one, in the heart of an uninhabited, hilly tract of country covered with extensive forests.

I was impressed with the deepest sense of this loneliness, as I drew rein before the solitary stone house. Hitching the horse to a tree, I was guided up the indistinct path by a meager, yellowish light that struggled through the panes of an upstairs window.

Although I knocked loudly at the door, it was fully ten minutes before I heard any sound within. Then, half cautiously, the thick oaken door opened, and a dark-faced, wiry man, somewhere be tween fifty and sixty, looked out at me. 34