The Filigree Ball: Being a full and true account of the solution of the mystery concerning the Jeffrey-Moore affairGreen, Anna Katharine
General
The Filigree Ball: Being a full and true account of the solution of the mystery concerning the Jeffrey-Moore affair
Green, Anna Katharine
Detective and mystery stories
“A strange coincidence marks the death of Albert Moore in his brother’s
house yesterday. He was discovered lying with his head on the identical
spot where General Lloyd fell forty years before. It is said that this
sudden demise of a man hitherto regarded as a model of physical
strength and endurance was preceded by a violent altercation with his
elder brother. If this is so, the excitement incident upon such a break
in their usually pleasant relations may account for his sudden death.
Edward Moore, _who, unfortunately, was out of the room when his brother
succumbed—some say that he was in his grandfather’s room above_—was
greatly unnerved by this unexpected end to what was probably merely a
temporary quarrel, and now lies in a critical condition.
“The relations between him and the deceased Albert have always been of
the most amicable character until they unfortunately fell in love with
the same woman.”
Attached to this was another slip, apparently from a later paper.
“The quarrel between the two brothers Moore, just prior to the younger
one’s death, turns out to have been of a more serious nature than was
first supposed. It has since leaked out that an actual duel was fought
at that time between these two on the floor of the old library; and
that in this duel the elder one was wounded. Some even go so far as to
affirm that the lady’s hand was to be the reward of him who drew the
first blood; it _is no longer denied that the room was in great
disorder when the servants first rushed in at the sound he made in
falling_. Everything movable had been pushed back against the wall and
an open space cleared, in the center of which could be seen one drop of
blood. What is certain is that Mr. Moore is held to the house by
something even more serious than his deep grief, and that the young
lady who was the object of this fatal dispute has left the city.”
Pasted under this was the following short announcement:
“Married on the twenty-first of January, at the American consulate in
Rome, Italy, Edward Moore, of Washington, D. C., United States of
America, to Antoinette Sloan, daughter of Joseph Dewitt Sloan, also of
that city.”
With this notice my interest in the book ceased and I prepared to step
down from the chair on which I had remained standing during the reading
of the above passages.
As I did so I spied a slip of paper lying on the floor at my feet. As
it had not been there ten minutes before there could be little doubt
that it had slipped from the book whose leaves I had been turning over
so rapidly. Hastening to recover it, I found it to be a sheet of
ordinary note paper partly inscribed with words in a neat and
distinctive handwriting. This was a great find, for the paper was fresh
and the handwriting one which could be readily identified. What I saw
written there was still more remarkable. It had the look of some of the
memoranda I had myself drawn up during the most perplexing moments of
this strange case. I transcribe it just as it read:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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