The Unquestioned Alibi
| Author | T. Morris Longstreth,Henry Vernon |
| Published date | 01 July 1931 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X3100400309 |
| Date | 01 July 1931 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
The
Unquestioned Alibi 1
By
T.
MORRIS
LONGSTRETH
AND HENRY VERNON
WHE N a small town, anywhere, is lifted from its everyday
obscurity into the spotlight of modern publicity, its
inhabitants may be expected to behave abnormally for a while.
Yavo was no exception.
In
the spring of one of the War
years this small Saskatchewan village showed all the signs of
the feverish excitement that filled its every corner. Yavo was
a bit of old Galicia, a community of families related by tongue
and often by marriage, alien and reticent and lonely in a large
land. One Anglo-Saxon in Yavo's midst would have been
conspicuous, two a portent and a cause for suspicion. But on
this April morning there were whole groups of strangers hurry-
ing about, asking unintelligible questions to which the villagers
replied with a shake of the head. A murder was bad enough,
but
these young fellows poking into everything, laughing,
writing things down
in.
notebooks, were worse. But the
breezy newspaper reporters need not be feared so much as the
close-mouthed Mounted Police. Theycould do things to one,
so Yavo huddled about its door-sills and wondered what would
happen.
For there had been a murder, and not only one murder
but
six! Six people of their little community wiped out at a
blow, the whole Manchur family and John Lycheluk, Mrs.
Manchur's brother.
It
was as mysterious as a blow from
heaven.
The
Galicians looked askance at each other.
The
murderer was in their midst, very likely, but who could he be ?
Worse still to have the stern-faced man in the bulky fur coat
ask that question. Where everything was mystery and sus-
picion, it was best to keep quiet. So Constable Day, who had
been sent over from the nearest Mounted Police detachment,
1By courtesy of the Century Co., New York.
406
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