good deal of property, I
had no ready money, and I could not work my plantation properly for want
of it. I had purchased seven slaves from a man in New Orleans, and I
could not pay for them. He was pressing me for the money, about twelve
hundred dollars, and I came down to the bank to get the money from
George. I had only three hundred dollars in bank, and so I gave my note
for the remainder. While George was counting out the money, I was taken
with a sort of insanity, and I struck him with a large hammer which
happened to be at hand. Then I carried off the money and buried it,
since which time I have never touched it. It has been a curse to me.
This is all I have to say now."

I turned to Mr. Bannatine and said:

"I have now done all that I can do in this matter, I think."

"Yes, you have completed your task, and the law must now take its
course," he replied. "Mr. Ringwood, you had better take charge of Mr.
Drysdale."

Drysdale rose from his chair, wearily, and said:

"I am glad the end has come at last. This affair has been killing me by
inches, and I am glad I have confessed."

The sheriff then touched him on the shoulder and said that he must go.

"Yes, I am ready," he replied, "but please let me speak a few words
privately, to Mr. Andrews; I want to send a message to my wife," he
added, with a sob.

He and Andrews then stepped into the small private office, and Andrews
closed the door behind him.

"Andrews, my friend," said Drysdale, convulsively, "I beg you to break
this news to my poor wife. God help her and the children. Tell her that
I feel better for having confessed, and whatever happens she must keep
up her courage. Now, my dear friend, good bye. Tell the sheriff to come
here and take me to jail."

He wrung Andrews' hand warmly as the latter stepped to the door, but
before the latter had reached us, we heard the ringing report of a
pistol shot. We made a simultaneous rush for the little room, but we
were too late. There, quivering on the floor, with a bullet in his
brain, lay the murderer of George Gordon. The crime and the avengement
had occurred in the same building, only a few feet separating the spot
where the two bodies had fallen. The somnambulist had walked on earth
for the last time.

THE END.

THE MURDERER AND THE FORTUNE TELLER.

_CHAPTER I._

One sultry day in the summer of 185-, I arrived in Chicago, from a tour
I had been making through the Southern States. I