The Indianapolis Journal

STORIES ABOUT MANIACS

Nothing So Dangerous and Terrible as a
Human Being Bereft of Reason.

Two Thrilling Adventures Detailed—How
Mrs. James Saved Her Children and Her-
self—Miss Moloney's Narrow Escape.

Or have we eaten of the insane root
That takes the reason prisoner
—Shakespeare.

It is hard to find a person of any age who
has not, at some time, had a more or less
hair-raising experience with a madman,
and the fear which one person whose mind
is aberrated can excite in a whole drove of
nerve-suffering humanity is something
direful to contemplate.

Mrs. James, now a resident on North Illi-
nois street, several years ago lived on a
farm near Hazelrigg Station, in Boone
county. Now she is one of the most par-
ticular women in Indianapolis about hav-
ing every door to her house securely
locked, and every night, the last thing be-
fore the household retires, a close inspec-
tion is made of the doors and windows.
This extreme caution is the result of a
fright Mrs. James received from a crazy
man while living near Hazelrigg Station.
One afternoon, after a hard rain that
had drenched the thirsty soil and swollen
the creeks, Mrs. James was sitting
alone in the sitting-room of her home. Her
children, the oldest of whom was but
seven years of age at the time, were at
school and her husband and brother were
working in a mill about a mile distant. As
the day was warm and the weather pleas-
ant the doors were open to admit the
balmy, flower-laden breezes, and no
thought was given to a possible rude
awakening from the comfortable surround-
ings. All at once, however, Mrs. James
heard a stealthy step in the room, and,
looking up, saw standing before her a man
whose appearance was anything but pleas-
ing. He was big and powerfully built.
red-headed and sardonic looking. He had
a mean glitter in his eyes, which were con-
stantly on the gallop, displaying the un-
settled condition of his mind. On his back
was slung a rough-looking carpet-bag.
Mrs. James did not scream because she was
too badly frightened, but in a faltering,
unsteady voice she managed to ask the fel-
low what he wanted.

"Something to eat," was his answer.

"What will you have?" was the next
question.

Mush and milk.

I have no fires burning and cannot pre-
pare you mush and milk. I can give you
anything you want cold.

I want mush and milk an' you're going
to make it." the man replied, "Now you'd
better get to work."

But I have no meal in the house; I can-
not prepare the mush without meal. I can
give you bread and milk

"Mush and milk. mush, mu-s." the fel-
low kept growling, and his brow darkened.
Matters were truly about to reach a climax.
Something must be done and that very
quickly to appease the variable fancy of
the maniac. In a case like that the person
in the power of an insane man revolves
thought very rapidly. Mrs. James was no
exception. She began to think what she
could do. At this time they were in the
dining-room on either side of a large dining
table. The fellow was growing impatient
and started around the table toward Mrs.
James. The crisis was coming.

"Wait a minute," she exclaimed ready to
fall to the floor from fear, "and I
will get
you something you will like."

He halted and gazed at her in a knowing
manner as much as to say that no ruse or
trick would be tolerated. Mrs. James flew
to the cupboard and in a moment went
toward the man with a tempting looking
plate of home-made bread in one hand and
a bowl of milk in the other.
It was evident that the man was suffer-
ing from the pangs of hunger from the
look that came into his eyes, but without
making any attempt to take the proffered
feast he said there was not enough bread
on the plate. Mrs. James then went to the
cupboard again and when she returned the
plate of bread was surmounted by a large
loaf. This seemed to please the maniac
hugely and he quietly acquiesced in Mrs.
James's request to seat himself on the back
porch to eat his meal.
Just at that critical period Mrs. James es-
pied her three small children coming home
from school through the orchard. The first
thing she thought of was to keep the maniac
from seeing them, and, wild with terror,
she motioned for the children to go around
to the front of the house. Happily they
understood their mother's warning, and got
into the house without attracting the at-
tention of the man, who sat gormandizing on
the porch. Slipping into the front part of
the house, Mrs. James told her eldest child,
a bright girl of seven, that the man was
crazy, and instructed her to run as quickly
as possible to the mill and tell her father.
The child, as some children will, seemed to
grasp the situation as readily as one of
more mature years would, and, without
consuming time in asking questions, start-
ed for the mill to inform her father of the
peril of her mother and sisters. As soon as
the child was on her way, Mrs. James
quietly locked and barred all the doors
and windows, and, gathering her wonder-
ing little ones about her, went upstairs.
From the window she could see her little
daughter making her way along the muddy
road, and it then began to dawn upon her
what a perilous trip it was. The creek was
very high, owing to the heavy rains, and
in order to get to the other side the child
would have to cross over a log. From her
improvised observatory, however,
the
anxious mother saw
the child cross the
creek in safety, but at that moment her
horror was increased by the sound of the
maniac's voice, and his loud pounding on
the doors. He had finished his meal, and
again wanted to enter the house. From one
door to another he went, pounding with
his rough fists against the panels, and
every moment the fear-stricken woman
above expected to hear the crash of the
door falling in. She had a double agony to
bear then. Not alone did she fear for her
own safety, but for that of her young chil-
dren.
While she thus waited in suspense that
was horrible, the noise below ceased. To
add to the joy of the moment—the relaxa-
tion from a dreaded expectancy—Mrs.
James, looking from the window, saw her
stalwart brother coming toward the house
on a dead run. He had seen the child be-
fore she had reached the mill, and, going
to meet her, had learned of the presence of
the crazy man, and had hurried on toward
the house. Passing through the orchard, he
picked up a hatchet with which to defend
himself, in case of a conflict, but, when he
got to the house, no one was to be found.
Mrs. James hurriedly unlocked the doors
and let her brother in, to whom she re-
counted her experience as best she could
under the press of excitement and nervous
prostration.
A search was then made for the ugly cus-
tomer, who had caused the fright, but he
could not be found. On the porch were
the empty plate and bowl where he had
left them. It was afterward learned that
he had gone to a neighbor's house, a half
mile distant, where he had secured some-
thing more to eat. Soon thereafter he
was taken in custody, and it was found
he was an escaped inmate of an Ohio insane
asylum.

When Miss Kate Moloney, a very pretty
young actress, who played with Booth and
Barrett a few years ago, was a little girl
eight years old she was boarding in a Swiss
pension situated in a little mountain vil-
lage surrounded by a dense wood. The
people of the village had been terrified
for some time by what was thought
to be a wild animal that had been
killing sheep in the edges of the woods.
Several armed parties had gone out hunt-
ing for the animal, but had never been
successful, though the remains of sheep
and lambs had been found along its trail
all mangled and torn. Miss Moloney
roomed alone at the far end of the pension,
a
two-storied house that com-
prised two long
wings built at
right angles. Directly at the rear of her
room was a roof of a porch. On this roof
Miss Moloney's window opened.
One morning the little girl awakened
with that peculiar sense of the nearness of
some human being. Opening her eyes she
was terrified to see lying across the foot of
her bed the body of a man terribly
emaciated, with matted hair standing out in
all directions, with a wild, unearthly look
in his eyes, which roamed vacantly about
the room. The child seemed to instinctively
realize that if his eyes ever lighted on her
be would pounce upon her. Attached to
one of his ankles was a ball and chain.
With one wild shriek she bounded for
the door, burst through it and began a life-
and-death race down the long corridor.
The
being
was
after
her. She
heard the clanking
ball
and chain
bouncing on the floor immediately behind
her, gaining on her every step. She turned
the corner of the corridor and ran to the
landlord's room, at the end of the other
wing.
She
succeeded in bursting open the
door just in time to escape him.
The landlady locked it on the in-
side and, he pounded on it until
others were aroused and he was captured.
It was found that he had escaped from an
asylum for the insane in a neighboring town,
and that it was he who had been killing
the sheep.