LITMIR.BIZ

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this morning. Indeed, we have received information that this afternoon the Chief Commissioner of Police is issuing placards broadcast warning everyone generally, in the event of another tragedy, not to crowd round but to stand clear of the body and give the dogs a chance.

      "We can rest confident that the authorities are in every way alive to the needs of the situation, and it is up to us loyally and manfully to support them. How then can we help? In many ways. Firstly, each district must organise its own local Vigilance Society. Great credit is due in this respect to Mr. Peter Wacks, of Bowden, for being first in the field.

      "On Saturday this gentleman was instrumental in forming the first Committee of Public Safety in his own district. Following upon an outdoor meeting at the station gates, at which we understand he made an impassioned and eloquent appeal for unity, he at once got together a small band of local stalwarts, and by now has each road in his neighborhood under special and particular control. And this is what all other parts of Adelaide and its suburbs must do. Special constables must be enrolled everywhere—armlets must be given out, and truncheons must be provided. Public meetings must be called at once, and within three or four days at most a new and easy running machinery should be at the service of the regular police.

      "A word now for our guidance as to the probable personality of the madman we are looking for. It was not for nothing that we referred above to the nauseating details of his crimes. A man cannot commit nine murders and leave behind nothing that cannot be deduced from the environment and methods of his savagery.

      "What do we gather from these cases then?

      "He is certainly a young man—probably well under thirty; almost certainly, too, he is of a wiry and slight build, and undoubtedly he is an athlete.

      "The testimony of young Ferguson in that respect is most important and the authorities have carefully been over the ground with him where he was chased. It is a good two hundred yards from where he points out he first saw the man running on him to where he had out-distanced him and was safe. As we remarked before, it is most significant that Ferguson was only just able to hold his own for the first half of the pursuit, and it proves conclusively that the man we are looking for is a first-class runner.

      "Ferguson is one of the best sprinters in St. Peter's School—if not, indeed, the very best. He can do the hundred yards in less than eleven seconds and in the intercollegiate sports last year he also swept the board in all the races up to the half-mile. So there can be no doubt whatever that the man who chased him is something of a runner, and good runners, as we all know, are nearly always built on the light side and are rarely of more than medium height.

      "It fits in, too, with everything that his footsteps were noiseless. Probably he is wearing rubber soles, or at least his heels are of rubber, and he is very light on his feet.

      "In general appearance he must be quite harmless and ordinary-looking, for it is a sinister fact that he has apparently been able to approach all his victims without exciting any suspicion or distrust.

      "We have said he is probably of the wiry type, for fairly strong he certainly must be. The deadly blows with which he does his ghastly work are conclusive evidence that the man is no weakling.

      "Now as to the weapon he is using. All the medical testimony goes to prove that it is a short bar of iron with a smooth round knob at the end. The bar is not more than twelve inches long at most, and it is probably a part of some piece of disused machinery. It cannot be more than twelve inches long, for he must be carrying it about under his coat or in one of his pockets. Detective-Inspector Miles distinctly warned us all at the inquest last Thursday to beware of any man who was not walking with his hands both free from his pockets.

      "One word now in conclusion as to what may still be before us.

      "Unhappily these crimes all show an upward and progressive tendency. The first one was probably unpremeditated or, at any rate, was not undertaken with the confidence of the later ones. Poor old Alderman Bentley was struck three times, and the first two were feeble blows. In all the other cases, except in that of Mr. Van Dene, one blow and one only was inflicted. Indeed, it looks each time as if the madman had just waited and struck at his leisure—without any haste or indecision.

      "Then, as to when he has committed his crimes. Here again we regretfully notice a progressive confidence and boldness in his actions. The first three murders were carried out on lonely park lands, in comparatively unfrequented spots. Then we have the attempt on the Port road, then the murder on the sands at Grange. Next he actually enters a private garden at Toorak and completes his ghastly work on a verandah. Then he kills on an open public road—a well frequented road, even at night—and kills, moreover, within a few yards and almost in the presence of another man whose nearness he must have realised. The next night he actually penetrates into a private house, and last night he again chances discovery by attacking in a main thoroughfare.

      "We dwell on these things because, unhappily, we must henceforth be prepared for greater boldness still on the part of the maniac, and must realise that we are not even safe in our own homes unless behind closed and barred doors.

      "Now for a few simple suggestions.

      "People should not be foolhardy enough to sleep outdoors unless they have a good dog with them. No one should go out alone at night, and any promenader by himself after dark should be at once regarded with suspicion. Every house door should be locked after sunset and all families should provide themselves with a loud whistle. Any suspicious or unnatural conduct on the part of any individual should be at once reported to the police.

      "We share with our readers the horror of the dreadful possibilities that lie over us, and we realise to the full the mental anguish of living under this reign of terror, but we must all be brave about it, and, we insist again, it can be only a matter of time, and perhaps very little time, before our anxieties will be over for ever and the normal condition of safe untroubled life will be resumed again in all respects."

      Oh, what a dreadful thing it is for me to read this now, and what a hateful memory it calls up of all those days. Why do I not tear it up? I cannot, for its very horror fascinates me, and it has become, like my own thoughts, part of myself.

      But I don't always think I was THE MAN. Sometimes I am at peace for a while, a very little while.

      I kneel in chapel with my wife and boys. I hear the gentle voices mingling with my own, the music of the organ soothes me, and my thankful heart rejoices that my fears are baseless and imaginary and I am only a morbid dreamer after all.

      And then—then I pass my hand upon my thigh and feel the callous where the bullet struck me and—I know it is all true—all true.

      I fall violently to my prayers.

      CHAPTER II.—MY EARLY DAYS.

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      I was always such a coward.

      I had no parents that I could remember and it was an old maiden aunt who brought me up.

      She was poor and kept a little greengrocer's shop in Hindmarsh, a suburb of Adelaide, just off the great Port road.

      My childhood days are chiefly memories of the smell of stale vegetables and the worries of very unhappy days at school.

      I was a thin, white-faced little fellow and it seemed the mission in life of all other boys to tease me and make me cry. It was good sport to them to bully me, for I was always so afraid of everyone, with timid, nervous ways that made me an endless source of amusement to the school.

      There was something about me that aways prevented my making friends and no one ever gave me any pity in my troubles. The other boys never seemed to leave me in peace. They took away my marbles and broke up my few occasional toys. They stole my sweets from me, and if ever I brought my dinner with me to school I had to eat it stealthily away from everyone, or it would have been seized at once by my tormentors and passed round. Looking back, it seems strange that I never retaliated, and, I think, never even complained. I seemed to have no spirit

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