The Eighth Buddha and other stories
Author: Douglas Newton
Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Description: Douglas Newton and W Douglas Newton were working names of Irish author Wilfrid Bernard Michael Newton (1884-1951), who wrote a wide variety of fiction, short stories and novels, including the occult, the supernatural, thrillers and sf. His short fiction appeared in British and other magazines and newspapers from around 1907. His novels were often serialised. He also used the pseudonyms Bernard Birmingham, W N Douglas, John Halstead, John How and Ian Irons. 1: Handsome Is... 2: A Serious Ambition 3: The Sportsman in Pajamas 4: The Sporting Finish 5: The Wedding Group 6: The Eighth Buddha 7: Wha

THE EIGHTH BUDDHA
and other stories

(Wilfrid) Douglas Newton

(1884-1951)

An original collection of

Douglas Newton's short stories,
compiled from newspapers and magazines
by "Pulpmeister"

January 2022

Contents

1: Handsome Is...

2: A Serious Ambition

3: The Sportsman in Pajamas

4: The Sporting Finish

5: The Wedding Group

6: The Eighth Buddha

7: What a Guest Desires

8: Watch Your Step!

9: Just Ordinary Human

10: The Thing of Brass

11: The Novena

12: Sylvia is Freed

13: The Magic Detector

14: Spools of Peril

15: Murderer at Large

16: His Guiding Star

17: State Papers

18: Mr. Sugars Remembers

19: The Parson

20: Headlong

21: The Pen

22: Take Your Choice

23: Crying Baby

24: Too Brave to Love

25: Mr. Cuckoo, Home from Home

26: A Bird Limey

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Douglas Newton and W Douglas Newton were working names of Irish author Wilfrid Bernard Michael Newton (1884-1951), who wrote a wide variety of fiction, short stories and novels, including the occult, the supernatural, thrillers and sf. His short fiction appeared in British and other magazines and newspapers from around 1907. His novels were often serialised. He also used the pseudonyms Bernard Birmingham, W N Douglas, John Halstead, John How and Ian Irons.

______________________

1: Handsome Is...

Truth (Sydney) 19 Nov 1944

WITH brows crowded down on to high, powdered cheek-bones, scarlet lips and feline chin, she had the look of a famished cheetah.

'And I'm in her hands,' the man thought. He was so appalled that he forgot she did not know him. It was only his holding up, for her to see, the newspaper he'd advertised in that could bring about their meeting. Of all the dreads that had beset him since he had lost the packet, she was beyond the worst.

A real little harpy; that was plain in her skinny, greedy body, in the peevish cupidity of her face, in the skimpy elegance of her clothes. A rapacious, conscienceless little she-tough, if ever there was one, with no grain of mercy, let alone generosity, in her. She'd squeeze him to the last farthing.

He made a gesture to hide the newspaper— checked it. It was no good; he had Pamela to safeguard even more than himself. She was looking round for him now, she saw him, saw the paper. Her eyes narrowed with wariness, calculation was in her very pose. Without even a pretence of friendliness, she spoke his name in a Cockney whine. He countered with hers. Her eyes became glinting slits as she heard his cultured accent. He was a fool; he should have let his solicitor deal with her. Solicitors knew how to blunt the greed of this type. And yet, a solicitor would have been impossible. He couldn't have Pamela's name bandied about like that.

He muttered through dry lips: 'Box PDX…'

'One- seven- four- six- nine,' she completed the check they had agreed upon. They had done that through the post. She had refused to send the packet through the post, had insisted on 'personally handing it over.'

Naturally, she had to see him to decide just how far she could go in blackmail. He asked: 'You have the packet?'

'Would I take all this trouble else?' He tried to bluff, tried to say airily: 'It's terribly good of you to do so much. I'm immensely obliged.'

He held out his hand.

'Not so fast, mister,' she said pointedly. 'There's some questions to answer first.'

He felt sick. Unmistakably she was opening up her attack, showing him there was to be no easy way out.

She drove it home: 'We'll go somewhere where we can talk— quiet.'

'Eh — yes. Well, what about the George over there— in the lounge?'

'No need for that line,' she said acridly, and he knew she was telling him that there'd be no placating her. 'There's the gardens in the square round that corner.' She had sized him up. She knew he would do anything rather than figure in a public quarrel with a woman.

They sat down on a bench bank in the middle of the gardens. They were right under the eyes of the score or so people sitting or walking about. Her skill and ruthlessness in choosing such a position numbed him, and he sat for a full minute unable to speak, until, irked by his silence, she said: 'What about it then?'

'About what?' he muttered. 'I mean— you said you'd found the packet.'

'I said I'd found a packet. It might or might not be yours. That's got to be proved.'

'You said you found it the evening I lost it— Wednesday.'

'That's right.' 'I said I'd lost it in Gulf Street. On the way to the tube. A man barged into me and my despatch case flew open.'

'I found it in Gulf Street. Between the toob station and the Shandillo Arms.'

'That little old pub? The chap who ran into me came out of that pub. It's my packet all right.'

'Don't follow. It needn't have been the only packet dropped in Gulf Street Wednesday evening.'

'But there couldn't have been another. Look! it was an oil silk packet. One of those oiled silk tobacco pouches.'

'Yers?' She nodded. 'It had a rubber band round it — a blue rubber band.'

'Yers?'

'Inside were some papers... Well, er— letters. Half a dozen letters.... Not in their envelopes, of course. And they had an old programme of a concert round them. They were tied into it with a bit of ribbon— cherry colored ribbon.' He choked. Cherry was Pamela's favorite color.

'Yers?'

'And though there was no address on them, the letters began... 'Darling 'Lolli'...' His face was crimson.

'Don't know nothing about that,' she said.

'Eh?' he gulped.

'I'm not one to nose into other people's private letters. Ladies don't.... But that's no matter. You've 'dentified the packet all right.' She took an oiled silk packet from her bag and put it into his hands. 'You can look 'em over,' she said. 'You'll see they haven't been touched.'

They were undoubtedly the letters. Amazingly the packet had not been opened.

'I say,' he began, 'it's most awfully good of you...'

'You said,' she told him primly, 'a handsome reward.'

'I did,' he said gratefully. 'I value these letters. And I'm immensely obliged....'

'Er, what would you consider a handsome reward?'

He saw the speculative look come into her face, and could have kicked himself for having given her so easy an opening.

She said: 'You know what it's worth.'

Though he had been prepared to go up to £50— more if forced— for Pamela's sake, he must start low.

'A— er— fiver?' he suggested.

'Five pounds— for just picking up a packet,' she said startingly. 'Rather a lot....'

'Well, a couple of pounds,' he managed to gasp.

'Fair enough,' she said, and held out her claw. He got notes and silver out of his hip pocket, so that she could not see the wad in his note case, and handed it to her.

'That all right?' he asked, seeing a cloud come to her eyes. 'Yers, all right— in its way.'

'But what else?' The greed he had seen in her face when she first came flared into it again.

'Well, there's the tuppenny 'apenny stamp I 'ad to put on the letter I wrote you, you know,' she said fiercely.

__________________

2: A Serious Ambition

Ballarat Star (Vic.) 5 April 1924

JIMMY PROOT was the young man who always got the plain girl when he and a friend were introduced to a pair. You couldn’t call Jimmy an idiot. He wasn’t distinctive enough for that. He was just homely.

He was a small, wistful man, stumpy of figure, and with a top-like expression about his meridian. Grandmothers said he had such a kind face, but girls of any kind of looks never noticed anything. He was fond of children, did all the invoices for a firm of cheese merchants, and was never missed from any social gathering in that suburb of cinemas and last season’s dances, Strooham.

All the same, he hated being the chap who was always overlooked, had earnest and massive thoughts, and was seethingly ambitious. His ambition came to its full, fierce flower the night he met and walked by the side of Ophelia Wry. It was a fateful walk, that one with Ophelia, because Diantha Fountain walked in front. Dick Peel, of course; had got her.

Dick Peel had the Harrison Fisher outline, and a must magnetic way of saying; "Well, well, we are hitting it up!" But Jimmy knew that his intellectual interior was no more than a mass of spiritless sayings. He hadn’t depth. He wasn’t sound. He hadn’t any of those frontal lobes that go to make a great, successful, and worthy man and husband. He had no right to be walking with Diantha.

As he strode behind Dick and Diantha he glowered at their slim and joyous backs. He saw her half-turned face— bright, delicate, crisp, with the transparency of a flower petal shining from an inner glow. He resented every smile that Dick Peel brought to these quick lips. He cursed his figure and his homeliness. He wanted to take Diantha aside and tell her that silent, solid, if quaintly-built figures made so much better husbands than clear-cut profiles and empty noddles. He would like to tell her that in sharp, arresting sentences. But he couldn’t arrest, or even sentence. He was just a thick, woolly stutter. If he could only say witty things like Dick Peel, who made the mere muttering of "Oh, rather!" ring like an epigram, she would be his.

Still, his gloomy thoughts did have cue definite result.  During the hours of a sleepless night, when Diantha’s face shone in his eyes like a sun, he did hammer out a specific line of action. He saw quite plainly that the only chance for a figure like his was brains. He saw and decided that he would have to bring intellect to bear to hide Ins melancholy moon face.

He decided that he must become a rich and noble man to obliterate the damning quality of his physical silhouette. He’d have to become great and powerful and celebrated and affluent, and possessed of a motor car and a house in a swagger district. Only thus would he even up the advantage of Dick Peel’s superb nasal configuration.

He started buying books on self-help and home-training. The bookseller tried to stave him off with something dealing with "Intensive Canary Breeding", and "Fretwork for the Home."

Jimmy turned these bright trifles down with scorn. What he wanted was something large and magnificent. He had no use for the trivial and mean. He had no use for the frivolous. What he was after was the fine and splendid things. What he aimed at was that state in which people would look up to him in awe and say in bated tones. "That's James Proot, the James Proot, the great financier— or the great statesman— or the great newspaper magnate," as the case may be. Jimmy hadn’t decided what it would be.

He spent several evenings pouring out his soul to Ophelia, in such a manner that Diantha, walking in front; was bound to overhear the splendor of his dreams. In a way he was rewarded. He heard Diantha say:— "He sounds like a talking frog, don’t he?"

At one time Jimmy thought of going abroad from cheese-mongering and starting as a pioneer. He would found a new land like Rhodes, or Brook of Sarawak. He would make a tremendous name, and Diantha would drop her exquisite amber eyes before his strong level ones, and murmur, "What can you see in a simple girl like me, Mr. Proot?"

A great idea, but one that would take time and demand absence, things that he felt must be avoided. Dick was striking an attitude of permanency and anxiety in his relation to Diantha. Dick was getting worried about his income and the rent of a terrace villa. Dick was looking speculatively in those shops where diamond rings of definite meaning bloom. Dick was also wondering about his position and income. He said he would have to look out for a new job; junior clerkship in a job without prospects seemed to him to be lacking. He began to wonder whether a tobacco shop with a newspaper sideline might not be a venture of golden promise.

Jimmy sneered at him. He saw through these Dick Peels. They had to grand principles. They were not made of splendid stuff. They had petty and grovelling ideals. Almost coldly he gave Dick his opinions on international finance and how it should be done, and Dick listened with awe. He said:— "That’s all right, Jimmy, old lad, but how do we come in there. What chance have we?"

"Speak for said Jimmy darkly. "The thing is to think big."

"You mean that’s how you think?"

"I think big. I am going to act big. I've got no time for this stupid little stuff."

"All very well... but how’re you going to begin on it. I mean—"

"I’m beginning," snapped Jimmy in a money-king manner, already conscious that he had accumulated £10/10/6 in his bank. "You can worry about your tobacco shops if you like. I've no time for such trash. I’m out for something with a large noise about it. Something that wins respect, see. I’m dead nuts on respect."

Dick, more awed, more anxious about his own prospects, reported the marvels of Jimmy to Diantha.

"He’s a comic little fella," said Diantha.

"He’s got large ideas," said Dick. "Brains!"

"He’s got som’thin’ that makes me go to sleep when he chats," said Diantha. "What’re you fussing about, Dick? You're brighter than him."

"Maybe, but it’s in a different way. He’s got the large, serious stuff in his head. We look cheap to a feller like Jimmy. He’s a superior feller."

ONE DAY someone told Dick that he ought to go one the stage, a chap with hip figure and face would make a hit. Dick thought that there was something in it. After all, he had almost got an encore when he had sung Amy Woodford Findon’s "Less than the Day's Dust" at the chapel concert. And he’d heard of people making as much as ten pounds a week on the stage.

Jimmy said, "The stage," in a large, disgusted manner as he sat with Ophelia on Diantha’s settee, playing with Diantha‘s small brother, and two sisters. One could hear from the contemptuous noise he made just how contemptible he thought the stage, as a profession.

"What you got against the stage?" demanded Diantha, up in arms. "The money's good."

"Just good?" said Jimmy largely. And he just indicated with a few facts and figures from his budget booklet , how meanly the stage figured beside a commercial magnate with political pull.

"Oh! you think that’s you?" said Diantha. "You think the stage is small beer."

"Jimmy’s only got an eye for big things, noble things," said Dick.

"Huh!" said Diantha.

"I wouldn't demean myself with the stage," said Jimmy, aloof.

"Opportunity’s a great thing," said Diantha.

Jimmy loosened himself. He proceeded to demonstrate the need for the magnificent gesture in a career. He showed how one’s aims should be tremendous and noble. He talked of dignity, gravity, responsibility.

Somewhere about the middle of his oration Diantha giggled. Jimmy gripped his features together, and made a commanding gesture. Diantha’s little brother Albert banged out in a laugh. Jimmy, irritated, rose to his feet to dominate them all; he made movements with his hands that wriggled shoulders. He screwed his face into impressive and austere nuances— the whole room screamed.

He stopped and stared at them. A howl went up. Diantha said, almost weeping— "O, Mr. Proot, why didn’t you let us know you were such a comic?"

Her words were cut short by a single, detonative explosion of laughter; Diantha’s little sisters were rolling on the ground, in an abandon of mirth. Timmy was cut to the quick. What had he done to be treated thus? He had merely showed his contempt of their unseemly frivolity.

HE FORGOT all about it when he plunged deep into a course of the accountancy of international finance, with. "Ruthlessness in Commerce" as a side line. His banking account rose to £15/7/6, and he knew he was laying the foundations of a future status in which Prime Ministers would consult him confidentially about the wisdom of Ward. .

When Dick came to him and asked him to-spend Sunday afternoon next at Diantha’s, he shrugged he shoulders in a hopeless manner. Dick wanted his moral support. It appealed that the stage idea had developed and yet diverged. Diantha's uncle, it appeared, knew a young man of Cinematic ambition. This young man had ideas of his own. He had started out in a new venture, was building up an organisation which, he felt, would make history in the "Movie" world. This young man Frudy, Dick said, was out looking for new material and new stars.

It had been thought that Dick’s profile and manner of standing about might suggest vast possibilities to the coming cinema king. Dick said that he had it on authority that even supers got as much as a pound a day, and a small part might bring in quite a tidy sum.

"Small is your regular word," said Jimmy haughtily. "Small things like cinemas, all small parts in ’em is your line. Dick. Why can’t you cut such trashy ideas, an’ think of big things?"

Dick didn’t know; he guessed he was built like that, but he'd  be awfully obliged if Jimmy would come along. Apart from the matter of moral support, they did not need; someone to play with the kids and keep them from making themselves a nuisance while he and Diantha talked to the big man Frudy.

Jimmy snorted. He was angry.  Not only was he asked to help Dick win his divinity Diantha, but also he was to play his usual part of the second rate.  Ophelia, of course, would be his companion in kid silencing. His soul revolted at. this mean point of view. But he went along.

He was really a good-hearted little fellow , and also he had a splendid picture of himself standing superb and aloft while others submerged themselves in trivialities. He thought that Diantha might have a chance of seeing what real greatness was.

He said "As long as you don't ask me to play about in this kid's cinema show."

Dick assured him that that was what they wanted. He and Ophelia were expected to carry the kids right off to the end of the garden, right away, and prevent them butting into important Frudy, who was one of those alert and avid young men who get quickly bored, was bored before his third cup of tea. He looked upon Dick's profile without excitement. He seemed to anticipate attack by giving them a long account of how all the Apollo profiled young men in the world thought they could get a job at his studios at the mere showing of their smile.

Dick and Diantha endeavored to live down their melancholy. They cut tea short, they goaded Jimmy and Ophelia off to play wild Indians with Diantha’s brother and sisters before Jimmy’s second slice of cake, so anxious were they to get to grips before the general gloom killed their chances.

Jimmy went off to the end of the garden. He invented a game in which he was shot horribly and often by all the kids in turn. He felt quite like being shot, also he felt that the grim realism in his nature gave his dying a special and terrible quality. He felt that, if the stage was not so, contemptible to a man of his parts, He could do those things behind the footlights which would send women from the theatre in shuddering hysterics. He felt, even, that his terrific way of dying would unnerve strong men.

At his second death, he heard a shout of laughter from the tea-table that struck to his heart over the gurgles and squeals of delight of the children. He almost groaned. They were getting on well then, were they? Dick and his cinema man were hitting it off, all was plain sailing in the affair Diantha Peel?

Something of his harrowing feelings he put into his third great death. It was, perhaps, too curdling and gruesome for children, this terrible agonised expiration of his, and he hoped he wouldn’t scare them badly, but help it.

There was another shout from up the lawn; again his soul sickened. How quickly they had become intimate— with him away. He went on-with his game, getting a ghastly joy out of his deaths.

Just as he had died the fifth time he became;:aware that -the party from up the garden had approached him. Diantha and Dick looked a trifle sheepish, Frudy looked keen, brisk lively, and eager.

He called out:— "Here, that’s a great game! I'd like to play, too. What I mean is, let’s make a jolly big thing of it. We'll have a real cinema show, oh all of us in it?"

The children thought it was the greatest thing on earth. Jimmy, sullenly, was for backing out, but Frudy begged him not to spoil things; and Dick looked rueful, while Diantha shot him glances from appealing eyes.

So Jimmy shrugged his shoulders.. He saw what it was. The cinema fellow wanted to put Dick through his paces. Well, he'd see it once.

Frudy, naturally, took up the part of the producer. The rest of them, including the kids, made up the company, and Frudy stood on the lawn and shouted at them what they were to do.

He directed them through the wildest series of adventures. There were police chases; falling into, rivers, motor car breaks down, Wild West hold-ups, and everything that flickers on the films.

Idiotic stuff; childish stuff, beneath contempt, Jimmy thought, but for the sake of Dick he went through with it— though he let his opinion show in his bearing. Especially did he let them show when he realised that Frudy was making a sort of butt of him. Frudy was always pushing him, always making him go  through the most foolish antics. Frudy wouldn't spare him.

He stiffened and grew haughty under the treatment, did what he was ordered to do with a sneer.

Frudy yelled in a gust, "That’s it, that's fine!" and Jimmy grew more aloof and contemptuous.  At once Frudy seemed to hustly him on, and he fround himself knocking Dick down, and clasping Ophelia round her waist in a really sickening way. Ophelia blushed and hung her head down like an embarrassed hen. Jimmy goggled.

"Kiss her," yelled Frudy, "Or— or pretend to kiss her... Oh, my hat... oh, my hat!...  That's it!"

He went off in a sort of scream, and Jimmy, glaring at him, saw that he was completely overcome— no doubt with the efforts he had put into the game. What rot! what trivialities! he sneered. This was the sort of stuff that grown men filled their minds with! He was so disgusted that he left very early.

Dick, surprised, said, "Oh well, I’ll stay on for a little. Perhaps Mr. Frudy and me will…"

Mr. Frudy said promptly that he was afraid he must run— right away now, something important had to be done.

He walked along at Jimmy’s side, and Jimmy wished he wouldn’t. He wanted to think big, earth-moving thoughts. He'd have to, now, and quickly, since Dick seemed to have a good thing in this cinema business.

Frudy said after a minute:— "Ever think anything about the cinema business?"

Jimmy said shortly that he hadn't; his tone showed just where he placed the cinema.

"Oh, there’s a lot in it," said Frudy. "I mean it’s going to be a big thing."

Jimmy thought things out with his lately acquired "far-seeing" mind. "Yes, I suppose it is," he conceded. "Yes, there’s big money in it."

"Oh," said Frudy in a descending note.

Jimmy, having grasped the idea, developed it.

"Yes, picture houses opening everywhere. New fields being opened up. Big organizations needed."

"There’s all that," said Frudy gradually. "Ever think about going into it?"

"I haven’t so far," said Jimmy, warming. "But, as you say, the possibilities suggest themselves for a far-seeing man with a gift of organisation and drive, and there is an immense scope for promoting."

"Promoting," said Frudy sharply. "Whose talking about promoting?"

"You were. Didn’t you ask me whether I had any thoughts of going into it?"

"Not on that side. I meant the acting side."

"Acting side?" shouted Jimmy. He stopped dead and stared at Frudy. "Are you saying to me— are you suggesting that I should take up the acting side?"

"Why not?"

"Don’t talk like a fool,", snarled Jimmy.

"I’m not. You can do it."

"The thing's unthinkable."

"No, it’s not. You’ve got the goods."

"Me— me— doing the heavy hero stunts," cried Jimmy. "What do you think people's say?"

"They wouldn't say anything— they’d scream."

"Scream?"

"All the time. Once you started they couldn’t stop."

Jimmy stared at him hard. He was bewildered. The fellow was talking in riddles. ‘‘Look here, are you telling me that I am out to be a film hero?"

"Hero’" shouted Fruity. "Hero be damned. "You’re comic. You’re about the greatest comic that ever happened since Charles Chaplin. And I want you—" Catching Jimmy’s mesmerised air. He cranked down his enthusiasm. "That is, I feel I could fit you into some films of mine."

"Me," snarled Jimmy.

"At a fair price, say, ten pounds a week."  Frudy regarded Jimmy anxiously but cautiously.

"You make that offer to me— me— who—" Jimmy was about to unload himself of his grandiose ambitions.  Frudy cut in quickly.

"Say fifteen, then."

"You scoundrel!" choked Jimmy.

"I can go to twenty— twenty-five," Frudy caught the anger in Jimmy’s eyes. He also caught something else that had come into them at the mere mention of so much money. He went on rapidly:

"See here, we can make it a sliding scale. We can start at twenty-five pounds the week, with a royalty, and work up gradually as you get better known, and I get my ‘releases’ out. I’m treating you squarely. I’ll have to train you, you know, handle you on the publicity side... So... so don’t jump away from the offer. Take time. Consider it. No reason why you shouldn’t be earning your hundreds in time. Hundreds!"

"Hundreds," said Jimmy, forgetting every noble idea under the mesmerism of the figure.

"Easy hundreds," said Frudy. "And Dick Peel, what do you give him?"

"Him," said Frudy in a tone of contempt. "I give him nothing. I can get the pretty men at nineteen to the dozen any time I like. But the born comics— figure and all —well, that’s the difficulty. Will you take time to consider by offer!"

"No," said Jimmy; "I take your offer now. We’ll go along to a lawyer to-morrow and fix it up.

TWO YEARS LATER, just as the world-known funny man, Jacobus Proot, was about to go through his bronze doors, down his marble steps to where the gold-braided chauffeur waited at the open door of his 59/100 h.p. Rolls-Packhard, his wife said something to him.

"Letter from whom?" said Jacobus loftily. "Dick Peel! Dick Peel! Who’s Dick Peel?"

His wife offered a statement.

"Oh, I remember," he went on. "One of those Dolly young men. Went in for high finance, didn’t he? Or politics? Anyhow, something very dull and unintelligent?"

"He wants you to stand godfather to his second," said his wife.

"Oh heck! Like his confounded cheek. Why should I mix myself up with those  confounded trivial city people? Don’t they understand that an artist like me views all that sort of thing as something beneath contempt. A serious, humorous artist like me is a great world force, and—"

"He thought you’d like to do it for old time’s sake, as a friend of him and his wife."

"His wife— let me see, who the devil is, or was his wife?"

"Don’t you, remember? A pretty, dolly little thing, too; called Diantha," said Ophelia Proot (nee Wry).

____________________

The Profiteer Plunderers:

3: The Sportsman in Pajamas

Blue Book Sep 1920

THE catch slipped under the pressure of the knife, and Boyd slipped through the French window into the house. He waited, holding his breath, behind the heavy velvet curtains of the windows, but there was no sound. Then, switching on his electric torch, he passed through the curtains, through the richly decorated room and out into the hall.

The floors of rich men’s houses were beautifully constructed, he realized. Not a board creaked under his weight, and the hall was parquet-floored. Under these conditions his rubber shoes made not the slightest sound. He even felt that it was all too easy. Burglary was, after all, humdrum. The whole thing had been child’s play.

He crossed the hall and put his hand on the door-knob of what he felt must be the rich man’s study. The door was not locked; the handle turned. "This is childish," he said to himself. He went into the study. The young man sitting at the big, flat banking desk in the room looked up and stared at Boyd.

Instinctively Boyd noticed that the smoke from the amber-and-gold cigarette-holder in the other’s mouth ceased to come in puffs. In the stark light of the electric desk-lamp, he could see it ascending in an uneven, waggling spiral. For all his air of coolness, the young man at the desk had stopped smoking, was allowing a certain nervousness to show in this unsteady smoke-thread.

Boyd himself stood paralyzed for a moment, held in the stiff bonds of fear. Then he made a quick step toward the desk.

"If you utter the slightest sound—" he began. The thread of smoke broke into steady puffs again.

"One doesn’t utter sounds," said the young man in a pleasant, low, drawling voice. "Uttering sounds is not done in this century on these occasions." Boyd was taken aback and showed it.

"You see, there’s an electric bell-push three inches from my right foot," explained the unabashed young man. Boyd slipped his hand to his hip.

"Don’t," said the other. "I always carry my means of offense in my hand." His right hand, resting on the desk, opened. In it was a tiny steel and mother-of-pearl automatic pistol. It was pointing at Boyd. That newly made burglar paused; a half- strangled sob of anger and misery rose to his lips. Should he risk the pistol?

"I wouldn’t," said the other. "Your weapon is probably only a life-preserver—yes, I see from your face that it is. And in any case I take it you are really not a thorough-paced man-killer. I’m rather ruthless myself."

"Well," snarled Boyd, "do you want me to put up my hands?"

"Not unless you think it adds to your charm. But would you mind telling me your name? No, you needn’t refuse with an oath. I’ll save you the trouble. I think I know it. I happen to like your songs, rather, Boyd Muir."

"What the deuce! But that isn’t my name," said Boyd desperately.

"Oh, yes, it is. I saw you conduct your own symphony at Queen’s Hall, and then your photograph is on the cover of some of your songs. And, I repeat, I like your songs. Might I ask why a composer with a future should also be a burglar?"

"You may ask, but I shall not answer. Call your infernal policeman."

"Perhaps it was a rather stupid question. Music-writing isn’t a profitable trade in this country, and composers must live."

"It’s true, but what the blazes does it matter?" said Boyd fiercely. "Let’s get this over." He moved forward angrily.

"Please," said the young man, and he showed his pistol. "I may find you attractive, but that wont prevent my shooting you. Sit down." The young man’s voice was low and drawling, but Boyd knew he must obey. He sat down. He said:

"Since I seem to be a failure as well as a burglar, I am at your mercy."

"Oh, I don’t think you failed," said the young man. "You did the burglary rather well. I didn’t hear you until you showed at the door. I assure you I got the shock of my life when you came in. You make a good burglar; you are bold and silent; it was only my being here on the spot that made the venture unlucky for you."

"Anyhow," growled Boyd, "it was unlucky enough to spoil the whole of my future as a burglar, as well as a composer. You’ll call your policeman, and I’ll be locked up, and there’s the end of me."

"But why should I lock you up? Personally I don’t see why I should. I think that music should be encouraged. I think that all musicians should be free from money-worries so that they can do good work unhampered by care."

"What exactly are you driving at," asked Boyd in hoarse amazement, but with a sudden flicker of hope in his voice.

The young man put his pistol on the table, and his hand reached down to a drawer in the desk. He had trouble with the drawer, and changed from one key to another, but presently it opened, and plunging his hand amid some papers, he fished out a thick wad of notes. He examined them, separated a number from the top, and tossed them to Boyd.

"What are you doing?" asked Boyd huskily.

"Take them."

"I can’t," gasped Boyd overcome.

"Please don’t be a fool. In order to go on with your music, you need a great deal of cash. You were ready to commit a robbery in order to get that cash, but when it is given you, you refuse. You can’t logically do that."

"But—"

"Take the notes."

"I can’t say how—" began Boyd in a choked voice as he took the money.

"Don’t try to say it. I know it all. I’ve read it in all the stories. You’d be a prize wretch if you weren’t grateful; of course you are; and we’ll take it as said. Now get out; get out as quickly as you can, and the way you came. I’d like to know you better. I like you as much as I like your music, but— well, go."

With a full heart Boyd made three steps toward the door to go, but the door opened, and a very large revolver came through it, followed by a very large and brutal-looking man in pajamas.

THIS large man looked at them savagely, and particularly he looked at the cool young man at the desk. Then he said harshly:

"Put up your hands, both of you. You," he barked at the cool young man, "you— if you move as much as an eyelash toward that toy pistol on the desk, I’ll smash you to pulp with a bullet from this." He waggled the big revolver. "Understand?"

"Your meaning is unmistakable," said the cool young man without a quiver in his voice, and he raised his hands over his head as Boyd had done. "I should hate to be mauled by your howitzer. You can trust me not to move."

Boyd was amazed. This cool young man with his hands up before the pistol of the obvious householder was, then— heavens, the young man was also a burglar! He and Boyd were both burglars, and they had been caught.

But the young man remained perfectly cool. Although the fierce man in pajamas had cornered them, he behaved serenely; he even whistled a few bars out of "La Bohème." Boyd with a quiver of laughter recognized the air as that which announced the arrival of the hard, rent-seeking landlord at the Bohemians’ quarters. The little melody was beautifully rendered. It was soft, but clear and piercingly penetrating. The big man scowled and swore as he heard it.

"Stop that infernal row," he snarled.

"They have no sense of humor, none of them," said the young man. "No householder who ever caught burglars has made the most of the occasion." The big man scowled again.

"You think it a matter of amusement, do you? I’ll make you laugh on the other side of your face, you blinking jerry-built thief. What have you got to say for yourself?"

"Nothing," said the cool young man. "I never have anything to say to a revolver like that. As an argument they are beyond dispute."

The big man scowled and swore; and Boyd, who had been a bystander all the time, too bewildered by the sudden change of events even to speak, saw that the fellow, if not drunk exactly, had at least taken a nightcap of full-bodied proportions, and was still under the effects of it. He was unstable and truculent, and it seemed to Boyd that he was spoiling for a fight. Indeed, the young musician-burglar had a very definite impression that the man with the revolver was anxious to use his weapon, and was doing his best to goad the cool young man into some action, some movement that would give him an excuse for loosing off.

He wanted to shoot somebody, but at the same time, Boyd also saw that alert and calm young man was not going to give him an excuse to shoot.

"Why did you break in here?" the big man snarled.

"That’s the sort of elementary question that doesn’t need an answer, surely?" said the easy young man.

"You’re thieves, an’ you think you’re mighty clever at it," went on Pajamas. "Thought you were on a soft job, eh? Well, you’re damn well mistaken."

"It’s easy to make mistakes these days," said the young man. "My friend here made several. We all make mistakes. To err is human; to—"

"Shut up," said the big man. "I can tell you one person isn’t making a mistake. I’m not. I’ve got you, the pair of you. And by James, you’re my meat!" He scowled at them sneeringly. "Though you are pretty poor meat, I must say. I could eat the two of you. I could take the two of you on, myself. No fight in you— a pair of worms! Say, do you know who you’ve been fools enough to run against? Do you known what you’ve taken on? I’m something of a handful, I am. When I was in Africa—"

"Look here," said the young man with an unexpected touch of asperity. "We’re burglars, not poor relations of yours, or people who have to put up with being bored by the tedious story of your life. We don’t want to hear your life-story. Cut it out."

THE big, brutal man was also startled by this sudden change from smoothness to defiance on the part of the young man. But he was not altogether displeased. It gave him his chance of letting loose his temper, and when he lost his temper, he could do things. With snap of rage he said:

"You dirty little pup, I’ll teach you! Let me tell you I’m James Briant Callagan, known in Africa as Jim the Man-Breaker."

"And also as Shifty Jim and Big Drunk Jim, and some other names too ugly to mention," said the young man bitingly. "You see, you needn’t tell us. We know all about you. We know that you came to England before the war, swindled a man out of an engineering works, and then during the war by means of shameless profiteering made a pile. That’s why we came to rob you; it’s our business to snatch from the profiteer what he has snatched from a defenseless public. You see, we know all the details. It’s our business to know all about people we’re going to rob. Let it go at that."

During this extraordinary speech, a speech so insulting that it seemed deliberately to provoke the big man to violence. Big Drunk Jim had gaped at the young fellow with an amazed anger. Then he cried with a fierce, low snarl of animal rage:

"Oh, you know all that, do you. But perhaps you don’t know that I’ve killed my man."

"Yes, I do. And I know you ought to have been hanged, only a jury of pals as shifty as yourself worked the oracle for you. But it was a close touch even for Shifty Jim."

The big brute bared his teeth in a horrid grin of passion.

"There won't be any close touch about this, you little swine! When I shoot you,— aye, an’ your dumb pal,— shoot you dead, by God, the jury will be on my side."

"Will it?" snapped the young man. "Don’t forget this will be a British jury, not a jury of skunks like yourself. They won't be so lenient, even in the case of dead burglars."

The sharp lash of the astonishing young man’s tongue had unmistakable effect. The slippered feet of the big man shuffled in rage.

"You dog!" he growled. "I’m only defending myself against a dog."

"With no sign of a struggle in the room," whipped out the young man.

The revolver that had been lifted, wavered. And then:

"I don’t care, you scum, I’ll risk it!"

AS he said that, there was a low, penetrating scream from the door. And through the door there ran a young girl, a dainty girl, an exquisitely lovely girl. She ran into the room, and between the men. She stood deliberately in front of the leveled revolver.

"Don’t," she whispered. "Don’t shoot!"

The men gazed at this tall, slim and delicious girl in amazement. There was anguish in her face. Her beautiful eyes pleaded tearfully with the angry yet now astonished eyes of the big man. Her hands moved in fearful and desperate appeal.

"Don’t shoot him," she whispered, "don’t!" The big man lowered his revolver and gaped at her.

"Who in the name of Hades are you?" he gasped. His anger seemed to have vanished ; there was that in his tone which the male cannot keep out of his voice when he talks to a beautiful girl.

"My brother—" began the girl, her vivid soft lips quivering. And then the young man butted in.

"Nora, my dear," he said evenly, "this isn’t quite the right moment for a woman. Perhaps you’d be better outside."

The big man looked at the speaker and then at the lovely girl as she stood tall, deep-bosomed and beautiful in the lamplight. His eyes took on a look of crafty cunning.

"Another of ’em, are you?" he said hoarsely. "What is it, a family combine? You’re his sister?"

"Yes," whispered the girl. "I know he’s done wrong. But please—"

"A deuced pretty sister, too," said the big man. "Oh— deuced pretty! And one of the gang, hey? One of the gang— no better than they are, hey? Where were you all the time?"

"Outside," she said faintly, "waiting."

Boyd knew now why the young man had whistled.

"Any more of you? Any more in the family?" growled the big man.

"No—no, really I was quite alone."

"Good!" said the man, and his eyes leered on her. "You’re pretty enough for a crowd, anyhow, me girl."

"As I said, Nora," the young man cried impatiently, "the best place for you is outside. This type of brute is peculiarly offensive."

"But— he’ll shoot you," said the girl.

"He may not, after all, be a particularly good marksman," said the young man flippantly. "Anyhow, it’s our gamble.  Meanwhile, Nora, please go."

"Go," breathed the brute, who had not taken his eyes off the girl. "Oh, no, you don’t go." The girl started slightly. "You stay here, see? I mean you to stay here." He lifted his revolver menacingly.

"He’ll shoot you, too," said the young man ironically. "He’ll shoot anything, no matter the sex— a very resolute sportsman."

"You shut up," said the big man. He waved the girl away from the door with his weapon. "Stand over there, girl," he said to her, following her with satisfied eyes as she moved proudly yet timidly in obedience. Then he turned to the young man.

"You don’t think I can be a sportsman? Well, I am a sportsman. I’m going to be one."

"I was afraid of that," said the young man.

"You don’t make me angry with your talk," said the brute. "I am going to be a sportsman. I was going to shoot you like a dog, and him too." Boyd was indicated with the pistol. "But I’ll make a sporting offer instead. I wont do any killing. I wont even ring up the police, if you’re willing, my dear. Just a kiss from you—"

"I told you so, Nora," cried the young man. "The beast is true to his type. But you would, stay; you asked for it."

"You can’t possibly mean that," cried the girl in a startled voice. "It’s not— it’s not the act of a gentleman."

"This isn’t exactly a gentlemanly moment, is it?" sneered the big man. "Besides, it’s a sporting offer. You can make your choice, shooting or jail for these scoundrels, or a kiss. I’m willing to let ’em go; you ought to be willing to give me that kiss. I’m the generous one; but then, good-lookin’ women can always get the better of me— an’ you’re deuced pretty, my dear."

"I couldn’t," whispered the girl. "You can’t really expect it."

To Boyd’s astonishment, the cool young man said nervously, and, yes, cravenly:

"Well, you know, Nora, you asked for it. If you hadn’t waited, we’d have taken our chance. But you see, you did wait—"

"Still," whispered the girl, "you must see that a girl couldn’t— there are things she can’t do."

"Bosh!" said the brute. "Rather squeamish for a thief, isn’t it? Well, you’ve got your choice. A kiss and freedom, or by James, I’ll shoot ’em dead with this. Come, now, no hanging about!"

BOYD MUIR reached explosive point. This was beyond endurance. He could not stand by and see this exquisite girl insulted and shamed. To remain indifferent was a crime against his manhood.

"Shoot and be damned!" he rapped. "I’ll see you to blazes before I allow such a thing. Shoot— And Miss Nora, run." He made a step forward. The big man covered him with his revolver.

"Get back, you dog! Get back— all right, then, take—"

The girl flashed between the two men.

"Stop! Take your kiss," she cried.

"Take it, take it and let us go." The big man lowered his pistol.

"No," cried Boyd, trying to catch at her arm. "Not for my sake. I wont submit."

The girl turned and looked at Boyd, and there was a gentle light in her eyes; her soft lips trembled in gratitude, and—

"Please!" she whispered. "I’ve agreed. I’m quite willing— quite. Please! It’s fine of you, but let me do it."

Boyd, looking into that beautiful face, wanted to protest with all the fervor of his being. But the light in her eyes quieted him. He fell back. He looked at the young man, and the young man’s smile was rather mocking. Boyd, at once, abominated that young fop. The big man had looked on all the while with a cynical leer.

"I don’t mind a little drama," he said, "the honorable-young-knight stunt gives a charm to the occasion. But it doesn’t seem to fit in, does it?"

The girl faced him. "I submit," she said coldly. "Please!"

"I thought you would," said the brute. "That’s where the little touch of drama suited niy book, see! Brought things to a head."

"And you promise to let them go," said the girl, brushing aside his remarks.

"I’m a sportsman. A promise is a promise to a sportsman."

"I’ve given in. Take your kiss."

The man leered at her. "Come here," he said coarsely. "Closer! Put up your face. Aint your skin white and soft, like peach skin. And— eh— ugh!"

AN astonishing thing had happened.

The brute had put out his hand to paw the girl. The girl’s hand had moved— then an earthquake seemed to strike and destroy the big brute.

He twisted violently, crumpled in the air and struck the floor with a heavy thump. He had collapsed with indescribable violence and suddenness. The earthquake had been a whirling affair, but it was an earthquake with fluttering feminine garments in it, and a flash of a lithe, strong girlish body, as a Japanese wrestling-hold took effect. The big brute was down on his face, and the girl was kneeling on the small of his back and holding his arm twisted back in a painful but effective way. It was the neatest and most astonishing throw Boyd had ever seen.

But he had no time to wonder and admire. The cool young man was at the girl’s side at once; with lightning swiftness he had taken the brute’s arm, transferring the hold to himself.

"Quick, sis!" he snapped. "Vamoose, and get her on the move. Take his gun and my automatic, and that wad of notes on the desk. Right! You!" This was snapped over the shoulder at Boyd, as the girl with swift movements gathered up weapons and money and vanished from the room. "You, get something to tie him up— quick. Those curtain-rope things. Oh, Lord, no! Go! The old boy’s giving tongue."

He was. Recovering from the partial stunning his fall had caused, the big brute immediately began to yell. He was a powerful yeller. His voice had an enormous volume.

"Hades!" cried the young man. "I don’t want to stun him, but we must get away. I suppose I must."

But Boyd had already acted. He had swung a massive saddle-back armchair forward. With a quick movement he had toppled it over and across the sprawled householder, pinning him flat. Without exchanging opinion, both young men nipped out of the room. The door was slammed, and the cool youth turned the key in the lock, wrenched it out and pocketed it. They rushed across the hall, through the room, and out of the windows by which Boyd had made his entrance. In the garden Boyd cried breathlessly:

"Better divide. More chance of escape if we divide." The young man caught his arm and dragged him forward.

"Come along," he said. "You don’t know the game. You’d get caught in about thirty minutes. Come on."

THEY crossed the lawn, burst through a hedge, ran across a field and dashed into a small thicket. On the farther side of this thicket a small yellow automobile, of a queer shape, was moving from among the trees to a side road. The young man dragged Boyd to the car, bundled him into the back seat and fell in after him.

"Let her rip, Thecla!" he panted; and Boyd understood that what he had meant by "her" back in the room was the car. And he also understood that Nora was a name only used for business purposes, for the Thecla who was to let her rip was none other than the girl. "Let her rip, old girl!" said the young man. "Big Drunk Jim is alive and raising Cain on the top note. It’s got to be a lively getaway."

The girl spun the car deftly down the rough road. They swept down this side road and came to the main highway stretching to the left and right. To the right was the house they had burgled. It was blazing with light at every window. Doors were open; people were running through them and shouting. The girl looked at the house, glanced back at the young man.

"We’d better not pass it, Cyprian," she said.

"No, turn left." The car bumped onto the highroad and whirled to the left. As it did this, there burst out a new outbreak of shouting from the big house. "They don’t seem to have missed us," said Cyprian with a grin. "A nuisance! A house like that is packed with cars of the most powerful kind, and we’ll have to run like billyhooly. And my aunt, they’ve already roused the majesty of the law."

The majesty of the law was standing well in the middle of the road in their very path. They could see this fool policeman in the light of their headlamps, with arms stretched out, "to shoo us like chickens," chuckled Cyprian; and he cried: "Drive at him, Thecla. The shooing sort always jump at the last moment."

Cyprian was right: the policeman jumped. They caught a glimpse of his pale, terror-stricken face staring at them from a hedge as they flashed by.

"He’s got our color and build, and perhaps our number, all right," said Cyprian as they ran on, and to Boyd’s amazement he seemed pleased.

TEN minutes later Boyd understood the reason for this. The car was slowed and then turned right round. The girl and Cyprian did nimble things to the shape of the car, and in a way almost magical it was no longer yellow but royal blue (afterward Boyd learned that the yellow was merely camouflage panels of cloth). The odd shape vanished, as the pair unfolded a neat, beautifully made canvas-and-wood structure that turned the vehicle from an open car to a limousine. The number-plates were whipped off, and other number-plates stood revealed.

The girl then pulled Boyd into the light of the lamps, scrutinized his face with the eyes of an artist, and then demanded a beard. Marvelously a false beard was plucked by her brother from some locker of the car, and a heavy ulster. These were put on Boyd. "If you have to speak," said the girl, "be husky and grumpish."

Meanwhile Cyprian himself had undergone a change. His dandified aspect had vanished; he had become a chauffeur with a ragged mustache and a slightly larger nose (false, of course). All this took but a minute or two. In another minute Boyd was lolling back in the tonneau, with the girl Thecla huddled into an amazing small space beneath the seat and the rug he had over his knees, while Cyprian was driving the car at a positively reckless speed back toward the very house they had burgled.

Half a mile along the road a brilliant piece of driving saving them from a bad smash-up at the hands of Big Drunk Jim’s chauffeur and his powerful car, and Cyprian in cockney accents of a virulent kind was speaking his mind about reckless driving, and the moral vileness of the other car’s chauffeur, and the other car’s passenger. The passenger, none other than Big Drunk himself, was trying to be mild because he wanted to know if the cockney chauffeur, whom he did not recognize as Cyprian, had seen a small yellow car, holding three people, one a woman; and if he had seen it, how far away it was.

With exasperating slowness Cyprian admitted that he had passed such a car five miles back along the road, and he added the fervent hope that in it might be the questioner’s wife eloping, and that the questioner would be badly ditched just as he caught sight of the flying tail-light. With this pleasant parting shot the cars parted, Big Drunk rushing recklessly off to catch nothing, Cyprian driving them, at an astonishing speed, toward London.

A FEW hours later they were in a beautiful Kensington house; the car had been garaged by Cyprian and Thecla Xystus, for so were the strange pair named; and they were eating what Cyprian called "a burglar supper-breakfast," served by a silent Chinese servant.

"To-night’s little episode," said Cyprian, counting his share of the wad of notes, "will pay some rent, buy some attractive food, and perhaps a picture by a good artist— and, I think, a grand piano, too. We have always wanted a grand piano, and now it’s a necessity."

"A grand piano!" echoed Boyd, amazed at this amazing pair.

"Naturally," said Thecla with a radiant smile. "It’s for you. You don’t think we’re going to let you go, now we have met you?"

"Moreover," said Cyprian with a grin, "it’ll be safer for you. You’re a much better composer than a burglar, and should you need to replenish your banking-account, as no doubt you will, you had better do your burgling under our management. We’re masters at it."

Boyd laughed; he lifted up his glass.

"Here’s to the study of music, and the means of supporting it at the expense of the profiteer."

They all laughed and drank, and the alliance of the arts against the profiteer was cemented.

__________________

The Profiteer Plunderers:

4: The Sporting Finish

Blue Book Oct 1920

THE three plunderers of profiteers had many quiet months before Cyprian Xystus was devoured with desire for the Gillard rubies. For several reasons they had neither robbed nor talked of robbing the men made rich at other people’s cost. The first was that their successful business of plundering had given each enough money to assure them a good income in the future. At the same time Boyd Muir the musician was now at the top of the tree in his profession and well beyond the need of stealing to maintain himself, as well as far too busy in his honest trade to afford much time for his criminal profession. But lastly and perhaps, really, it was firstly with Boyd he had a growing fear and distaste for the danger Thecla Xystus was running in their dark calling. She had ceased to be one who could take part in a rather exciting and profitable adventure, and had become, for Boyd, some one who needed protecting from the horrors of imprisonment. The fact that the dapper detective Max Conrad had shown that the authorities had suspicion of the doings of the trio filled the musician with a thrill of alarm. Certainly they seemed to have thrown Max off the scent, but the mere fact that he had been on it was enough to make Boyd tremble.

He had been hoping that Cyprian and Thecla were sharing his attitude, since they made no attempt to plan a robbery, when Cyprian mentioned the Gillard rubies.

"They are the finest in the world, my child," said the gay young dandy of a burglar. "They are gems of the purest water, and that confirmed dyspeptic Gillard is master of them. It is a crime. He hasn’t a wife or a child, nor kith nor kin— nobody to wear those lovely things; yet he has them. They are locked away in his stuffy old country house in an iron-grated showcase, and nobody sees them: they bring pleasure to none."

"Well, what about them?" asked Boyd, turning uneasily from his piano.

"I think it is our duty to release them from that old skinflint and place them in the care of people more worthy. I don’t know of anybody more worthy than ourselves. Do you?"

"I thought we’d let looting people slide?" said Boyd ruefully.

"Yes, haven’t we, my infant!" said Cyprian with exasperating coolness. "We’ll be getting sadly out of practice, if we go on like this."

"Is it worth it?" asked Boyd, looking at Thecla.

"In money? Those rubies are worth every penny of nineteen thousand pounds," answered Cyprian.

"Haven’t we enough money to carry on?" asked Boyd.

"Money— oh yes. But I was only giving you their estimated value; I wasn’t thinking of them in money terms. I want them for themselves alone. I want to make a present of them. Thecla would look ripping in rubies."

"Why Thecla?" said the astonished Boyd.

"Oh, I thought perhaps you’d know why," chuckled Thecla’s irresponsible brother. "I had an idea that probably there could arise an occasion for giving Thecla a present soon."

Boyd colored at the palpable hit, for certainly he and Thecla were beginning to understand each other very well. Thecla herself showed a lovely confusion, and said to Cyprian: "Don’t be silly. And wouldn’t your present be a useful one! The first policeman who saw me in those rubies would recognize them; I should be in custody in half an hour."

"Not so fast, my child," cried Cyprian. "You forget that rubies are very like each  other. The setting of the Gillard rubies is unique, but I fear we would have to dispense with that setting. Recut, even only a little, by our Chinese servant, and put into a new setting, I defy anybody to name them as the Gillard gems. They will be the Xystus rubies— unless, of course, Thecla changes her name from Xystus to— well, some other."

They looked at the chuckling young man for a moment. Boyd, gaining heart from Theda’s suggestion that any policeman might recognize the rubies, felt that she too was no longer inclined toward the daring and dangerous life they had been leading.

"My dear Cyprian," he cried, "is this worth the risk?" He expected a laughing snub from the young daredevil, and was surprised to hear him say: "Well, perhaps it isn’t. But hang it, my child, I hate to finish off our career as plunderers in tame comfort. It demands one last and dramatic fling, and I think the rubies will give us that. To take just one last thing as a present to Thecla— that will be fitting."

"And that will end our escapades?"

"I suppose so," said Cyprian with a note of regret in his voice. "When comfort and a good income fly in at the window, the love of risk and adventure goes out by the door, my children."

"How are we going to set about getting these jewels?" asked Thecla.

"Very simply and easily," answered Cyprian. "Gillard lives in an old worm-eaten, half-tumbled-down house called ‘Lessdaunt.’ It stands in a lonely place in the country, and most of its windows wouldn’t defy an amateur. Moreover, Gillard lives more or less alone. His rooms are in the main buildings; those of his servants are in a remote wing built apart from the main structure in such a way as to cut him off completely from their aid. Next Wednesday, too, most of his servants will be away for the night at a fair ten miles distant. The rubies are kept in a case, a glass case covered with strong wire netting, in a big old hall that Henry vm was supposed to have dined in, on the ground floor. There are windows with steel shutters to this hall, but we can get in quite comfortably through a smoking-room window. Rich people are like that; they turn one room into a sort of vault or dungeon, and yet fail to stop up other avenues to the place. The job should not be difficult to us."

"You’ve got all your facts down pat; how did you find them out?"

"I went down for three days a week ago, to spy out the land. I tipped the butler and was shown the famous collection of rubies, and the rest— the public is allowed to see ’em. For the other facts I have to thank a sporting fisherman, who had a grudge against old Gillard because he was a bear about a stream that ran through his grounds."

"Where did you meet the talkative sportsman?" asked Thecla, with, Boyd thought, a touch of suspicion.

"Oh, in the local inn. We were both staying there and exchanged views on troutflies and such things in the coffee room after dinner. It was a bit of luck meeting this fellow. He came down by the same train; I saw him on the platform just before we left town. He saw me too, and that gave us a sort of bond of sympathy. He was an asset. He always fishes in the district, and knows all the local news."

"What sort of man was he?" demanded Thecla.

"Not like anyone we know, my child," laughed her brother, "so you need not get nervous. A big burly chap, red-faced and whiskered, and with about ten thoughts only outside the topic of the rod and line."

That seemed to satisfy Thecla, and there was a pause, broken at length, by Boyd.

"How do we set about this job?"

"Again, quite simply. We motor down suitably disguised, leave our car in a wood, get in through the smoking-room window, go along the passage until we get to the oak-and-iron door of the room where the jewels are. We can break through that door— easily. After that—"

EVERYTHING went as Cyprian had promised. They went straight ahead until they came to the iron door sheathed in oak. With a special tool inserted in the keyhole, which automatically found the register of the lock and enabled them to click the bolt back, they let themselves into the room, and closed the door softly.

Directly the door was closed, there was a snap in the room, and an oil lamp lit the place with a brilliant radiance. They sprang round. There stood a big burly man, red of face, and whiskered. It was evident he had been standing behind the door when they opened it. He held two pistols in his hands, with which he made a sign that there was no mistaking.

"Put your hands up," he commanded "and remember you are covered. Understand, I know exactly how clever you three are, and I’m not going to risk any tricks."

At the sound of his voice the three started, but Cyprian more than the others. For the voice he heard was not the voice that should have come from the whiskered fisherman he knew and rather despised, but the voice of one he knew and feared. But he managed to control himself and say as coolly as ever.

"Would you mind taking off some of that hair on your face? It is ugly anyhow, and then I should like to know who you are."

"You don’t need an introduction to me, Cyprian Xystus," said the hairy sportsman.

"Max Conrad!" Thecla gasped. Cyprian followed with:

"The dapper and jolly, little detective man! You used to be more pleasant to look at, but I admit you’ve fooled me pretty thoroughly."

"I meant to, Xystus," said the detective. He plucked off his whiskers, and under the red paint of his disguise showed that he was indeed the jolly and rather boyish detective Max Conrad. "I meant to fool you, and I took no chances. I had to be perfect in my disguise. I’ve been waiting to get you for some time. I didn’t mean to slip up this time."

"You couldn’t have made so good a change in the train," said Cyprian coolly. "Would you mind telling me how you managed it? As an expert in these things myself I’d like to know."

"Certainly I didn’t change in the train," said the detective. "And I’m only too glad to tell a sportsman like yourself how it was done. I fixed my suspicions on you three as the bright people who were looting the profiteers and since then I haven’t let you out of my sight. You haven’t given me much to catch hold of but you made a slip when you came down to reconnoiter Gillard’s place. You bought your ticket the evening before. My Confidential man was on the spot and saw you do it, and heard you inquire for trains the next day. All I had to do was.to effect my disguise and wait about in the station. I saw you get out, and I took a room at the same inn."

"But you seemed to know old Gillard’s movements pretty well."

"While you were spying out old Gillard’s house, I was gathering information from the innkeeper, villagers and such. From them I learnt of Gillard’s greediness about his fishing rights, the situation of his own and the servants’ bedrooms, and more to the purpose, that his servants would be away tonight because of the big fair at Hendyke, ten miles away—everybody in the village goes there. That suited me, because I knew it would suit you. It fixed the date you would make an attempt on the jewels. Both of us could make adequate preparations for the event."

"Yours seems to have been the more adequate; I must say," said Cyprian.

"Seem is not the word; they have been. I have you." The detective’s pride ran a little away with him here, as Cyprian had meant it to do, for that was his purpose underlying this strange dialogue. "I’ve got you. I’ve got the smartest gang of thieves of the age. And I’ve done it all off my own bat."

"Single-handed jobs are rather dangerous," smiled Cyprian.

"Not this one; I have the drop on you," chuckled Max Conrad, and then, too late, he corrected himself: "You are jumping at conclusions if you think this is single-handed. I warn you not to bank on that fact because—"

He stopped speaking, gave a low groan and fell to the floor.

The tiny pistol in Cyprian’s hand had spoken.

Boyd Muir knew that pistol well. It was a tiny automatic that could be concealed quite easily in the palm of the hand. Cyprian always carried it on his adventures. He had a theory that it was the one chance a man had when he was in the otherwise hopeless position of having to put up his hands. A neat attachment to his finger ring enabled him to hold the pistol in his palm when his hands were aloft, and he always turned the back of his hands to his opponent when he raised them. He had practiced shooting from this position until he had attained a deadly accuracy; and this, and the fact that the detective was perfectly certain that he was helpless, brought about Conrad’s downfall.

The little bullet from this pistol does not kill unless it strikes straight into the eye or some other vulnerable part. But the crash of the projectile against the hard bone of Conrad’s temple knocked him out completely, and he fell unconscious like a limp sack. He dropped with a thud on his own lamp and for a moment the room was plunged in blackness.

But only for a moment! The three flash-lamps in the hands of the plunderers were switched on at once, and there was light in the room. Cyprian was all activity.

"We must get out of this," he snapped out. "The sound of the pistol will awaken the house. Besides, he’ll recover consciousness soon. Quick, sling Conrad’s body out of the way and get the door open— and then for the car."

They dragged the detective’s body out of the puddle of oil in which the wick of his lamp faintly fluttered in a feeble flame, and pulled it to a far comer, so that any people coming down into the room would not discover the man quickly; then they wrenched open the door, flung through it and slammed it behind them. Its automatic lock crashed home. They fled through the smoking-room window, and out of the house.

THERE was a flurried movement of people stirring in the house as they ran, but they got clear. It was only when they reached the car in the thin wood and began to crank it that they looked back at the house standing stark in the clear moonlight.

As they looked they saw breaking away from it several black and thick puffs of smoke. They stood and stared aghast. Cyprian voiced their thoughts.

"My God! " he said. "The house is on fire! Conrad’s lamp has set it on fire. That tomb with the iron door and shutters is burning and Conrad is in that tomb!"

For a moment they stood gazing at the burning building with mixed emotions. All of them felt the personal significance of this happening. They recognized that with Conrad dead they were safe. He had, as he said, played off his own bat entirely. With him out of the way, there would be no one who knew of their crimes. But with this thought was also a feeling of horror and decency. To let a good man die pent up in that tomb was a ghastly thing!

Thecla burst out:

"We can’t! We can’t allow it!"

Boyd caught her hand and pressed it. Cyprian said in his own manner. "Of course not, Thecla. We’re burglars, but we’re not beasts." Then he added: "Stay by the car, Thecla. Boyd, get that tool-case from under the seat. Good! Now come along sharp."

They dashed into the open again and made straight for the house. There was  nobody to see them. Gillard and the two women servants who remained with him that night had made their escape by the front (they afterwards learned), but they knew already that they had been awakened and would escape. The villagers had not yet realized the house was on fire.

The plunderers had the rear of the house to themselves as they raced toward it. They went straight to the steel windows of the hall, and in his careful yet rapid manner Cyprian examined them. Boyd opened the tool-case. He picked out a crowbar which seemed to him to be the best tool to vanquish the strong shutters swiftly. Cyprian waved those aside.

"The nitro-gelatine," he ordered, and reached for the phial.

"Noisy and dangerous," Boyd cautioned.

"It can’t be helped; there’s no time for caution; this house is nothing more than a tinder box— it will blaze like one!"

With a strong chisel he was hacking a slot in the window frame, and in a few seconds, he had fixed the charge and tamped it with a special rubber and iron tamp; then he and Boyd ran backward into a ditch unrolling the electric firingwire as they went. In less than ten seconds there was a sharp, tearing explosion; part of the side of the house was torn out, and the steel shutters crumpled. A great gush of black smoke poured out of the hole, and behind the smoke they could see the lurid, blood-red flames.

Both young men ran to the opening. Boyd got there first, pushed his head and shoulders in and fell back choking. For once Cyprian was second. Boyd with smarting eyes was able to see why. He had unwrapped his big motoring scarf from his throat and was binding it round his mouth. He touched the musician on the shoulder, and then keeping as low as he could, crept through the opening.

Boyd waited in agony for what seemed an eternity. He watched the smoke, and it grew terribly dense. At one moment it gushed out in an awful billow, and he saw the reflection of a fresh upshooting of flames behind it. Something had fallen in somewhere! It had engulfed— what? Cyprian as well as Conrad? Boyd knew a terrible fear.

The fear was growing on Boyd at the wait, and he was just about to unroll his own neck-wrap when he saw a movement in the smoke. A pair of boots appeared in the gap in the wall, and with a throb of joy he caught hold of them and began to tug. He tugged with a will, and in a short moment the unconscious body of the detective was on the ground beside him. As he bent over the body, he heard Cyprian shout:

"Take him back to the car; get him aboard. You and Thecla look after him."

Boyd lifted the body and staggered across the garden to the wood in which the car was hidden. Conrad was not a light man, and the journey was made with many halts and rests. Cyprian, Boyd recognized, was probably not in a condition to lend a hand, but all the same he could trust that alert and capable young man to take care of himself.

It was when he reached the car that he experienced a shock. Thecla and he had no sooner hoisted the detective into the rear seat than they turned and found Cyprian was not with them. It was an ugly moment. They had a vision of Cyprian, having completed his rescue, falling down overcome by the smoke and fumes. He was lying unconscious in that furnace; even now the flames might have reached him. Boyd turned and ran back toward the house.

As he ran, he tore his scarf from his neck and wound it about his face. He was ready to plunge into the smoke when he reached the house, and he lost no time.

It was not easy to find Cyprian. Boyd had heard his voice close to the wall, and was certain that he must have fallen near it. But he had to crawl through the smoke many yards before his hand touched the prone body. For some reason Cyprian had gone back into the heart of the room. Here, with dense volumes of smoke above him and the fierce and snapping flames terribly near, he had fallen. Boyd, scorched and suffocated, his mouth bitter with the smoke, his eyes streaming and inflamed, his body weak with the awful heat, had a terrible struggle to get the unconscious man clear. It was an agony to get him along to the car, and only by the dint of homeric exertions that he succeeded. Even then he had to drive off, leaving Thecla to deal with the two unconscious men in the back of the car.

THE three plunderers sat in the bright room of their Kensington house, looking at Max Conrad the detective, tired but now fully recovered. He was smiling at them a little ruefully.

"It’s an odd situation," he said. "Here we are, the captor and the captives, sitting comfortably in the latter’s house, talking things over and deciding what we shall do."

"I suggest," said Cyprian quietly, "that you just change your remark about a little. Call it, my infant, the captors and their captive. Don’t forget it is our house, and that we are in the majority."

"That means nothing," said Conrad. "I am your prisoner for the moment, but only for the moment. Oh, I know you can keep me tied up until you make good your escape, and all that, but in the end I am the man with the pistol in my hand. I know you. I know all about you. I know for whom I have to hunt. I’ve got you marked down wherever you are."

"You’re delightedly candid," said Cyprian. "We’ll be candid, too. Doesn’t it occur to you that we might quietly and without fuss do away with you."

"It doesn’t," said Conrad cheerfully. "I have already received confirmation of what I already knew, and that is that you are not the dirty and murdering sort. I knew all along you were sportsmen, and that’s the difficulty."

"Why is it a difficulty?" asked Boyd.

"This: to all intents and purposes it was that sporting and decent spirit in you that put the handcuffs so to speak, on your wrists. Oh, I know what I’m talking about. You see, I played this case as a lone hand, and I know you knew I did. Xystus got that out of me in that room. I was so certain I had you that I let you know. Well, then, though I was the fellow who had all the facts, the only one who could bring a case against you, you were too clean not to remove me, though twice you had an absolutely certain chance."

"Twice?" said Boyd.

"Xystus could have pinked me through the eye or heart with that cunning little pistol," said the detective, "but he simply stunned me with it instead. And then I recovered consciousness just after the room had got well alight from that oil lamp, and I tried to get out through those infernal steel shutters and the door before the smoke and fumes sent me under again. I knew I was done unless— unless some sportsman got me out. And sportsmen got me out."

"Almost anybody would have done the same," said Cyprian.

"Not on your life!" said the detective heartily. "Nine out of ten would have seen in that accident a heaven-sent chance. With me out, they would have had a clean bill; they could go secure."

He paused thoughtfully for a moment, and then stood up.

"I guess," he said cheerfully, "that’s the answer to the difficulty. That fire squares us. We must take it as the others would take it. It has wiped out all evidence of your crime; we are as we were before it. We’ll cry quits, and begin again." He turned to the three with a grim twinge under his smile. "But understand, we begin again. Next time I’ll get you sure, and there’ll be no mercy about it."

"There isn’t going to be a next time," said Boyd. "We’ve finished."

"All the better," said Conrad, smiling genially. "You were sports all through, and I should have hated to lag you, and after all, there was a certain justice in your getting even with profiteers."

With a smile, he left them; and when he had gone, Cyprian said dreamily.

"Yes, I felt that that fire would wipe out everything, so I thought that if I went back for a souvenir, nobody would miss it. So I went back. Here’s your present Thecla— a wedding present, I suppose."

He threw into his sister’s lap the Gillard rubies.

__________________________

5: The Wedding Group

Sunday Times (Perth, WA) 2 Aug 1942

HARTING, the burglar, found no more money in the second drawer at the back of the safe, only some dusty papers and a photo. He was studying this in the beam of his torch when the lights clicked on.

A queer drawer and a queer photograph. From the dust neither had been touched for years. The photo was no doubt the reason for it— a sort of skeleton in tba cupboard.

It was the photo of a woman, a child, and a very young private in the khaki of the 1914-18 war. It was a war photo, bearing a trade address in a well-known camping area.

The woman in the photo looked pretty but flashy, a real common bit o' goods. She was making sure that the world and the camera lens saw her wedding ring. A new one, of course; one of these snatch-as-snatch can 1915 weddings, from the look of it. Yet the boy was a two or three year old. Her boy, from the cut of his lowering jib; certainly not the khaki chap's, for he, in spite of his private duds, was a toff.

A gentleman enlistment— no mistaking that, and years younger than the woman. In fact, she must have been a regular babysnatcher. The sharp, sly brain of Harting guessed the story quickly enough. The man would be a young college boy joining up in the first rush of 1914, lying about his age and name as many of his kind did. Freed of the apron-strings, he'd been caught by this woman, probably a widow he had been billeted on.

What made it odd was that she did not seem to have kept him. The woman in the wedding photo on the big banker's desk of the room Harting was now in wasn't ibis woman. She was a quiet, younger beauty, and a regular lady. The man. however, was the same.

The same, save that In the later photo he showed himself the gentleman he really was. No shoddy khaki there, but the morning coat, striped bags, and the lofty, well-groomed manner as became the rich and rising member of Parliament. Peter Graiter.

And not only had he married again, but he'd had a family. They were there all together in the second photo on the handsome desk— Graiter, his new wife and three children, all girls, the eldest about nine. No sign of the lowering boy of the first photo, or the old wife!

That was the sort of thing that tickled a mind like Hartilng's. The whole business was so plainly fishy. The mere act of locking that photo away in a drawer so that no one, not even the new wife, could see it, meant a guilty conscience, or Harting was not an expert in that article. The question was— was there anything in it for him?

He'd been thinking that over for half a minute when the lights clicked on. He swung round. The man ot the photo, Peter Graiter, M.P, was standing in the door-way with an army revolver in his hand.

Harting obeyed his first impulse, and swore foully. It was a dead cop. Just when he'd collected £75 in notes and a pocket full of highly, "fenceable" jewellery. He snarled at Graiter, but "put 'em up," as ordered.

As his hands rose aloft he saw Graiter's face change from anger to pallor. The chap's eyes were on Harting's right hand, and what he saw there made him sick with fear.

Only then did Harting realise that he still held the first photo. It was the sight of that khaki wedding that had bowled Graiter over— for his eyes were really afraid.

And that was Harting's chance. He said thickly:

"I see the photo brings back memories, eh? I thought it would. That's why I come for it."

"You came specially for that photo?" Grafter's voice was shaking. Yes. without doubt, it was the skeleton in.his cupboard.

'"Why not— step-dad?" Harting sneered at a ventura

"What do you mean? I— I don't know you," Graiter said huskily, yet. he was so plainly afraid that he might know Harting that the burglar said with growing confidence:

"I've changed o' course-growed up. But there I am in this photo with you."

"Good God!" the other gasped. "Molly Fletcher's boy!"

Harting wondered Who Molly Fletcher might be, and chanced his aim once more: "Never expected to see me— or her again, hey?"

He saw he was on the right tack. The little wedding had gone wrong, but then he guessed it would have.

"But— but that was her fault," Graiter said in a strangled volca

"lt always is. to the feller who deserts 'em," Harting jeered, and again his shot in the dark got home.

"That's not true," Graiter's nerve was coming back. "The way she behaved..going off with that crook after I'd left for Mespot, disappearing.... But then she was crooked, too: crooked all the time, like her first husband, your father."

"You leave my father alone!" Harting growled, wondering who and what he was.

"But she told me about him herself," Graiter went on steadily. "He bolted back to the army at the outbreak of war solely to escape a term in gaol. If he hadn't been killed in Ypres he'd probably have ended on the gallows. That was part of her way for getting round me. She wanted me to marry her so that yon could be taken out of your criminal environment. You show how much she really meant it— but I was yoong enough then to be easily fooled."

"That's no way to talk of the wife you neglected and threw over for another." Harting jeered, with pointed glance at the photos on the desk.

"Mollie was dead," said Graiter in a tone that told plainly that he wasn't sore about that even now.

Harting seized upon it.

"Oh, was she? How sure did you make of it? Not much, I'll bet! Digging back into the past might have upset this new marriage of yours, hey"

The way Graiter winced and went green showed him how he had touched home.

"I— heard that she was dead," Graiter said with a terrible feebleness. "And I never heard again from her."

"You heard," Harting said with scorn. "But yon didn't trouble to find out-"

"That's not true. I went down to Braehead and made inquiries. Nobody knew. And there were no relatives— at least, she told me she had none."

That was good news to Harting. He could make the most of this with few risks from the real people. He shrugged.

"That's true. Nobody but us two. An' yet, that don't let you out. Did you make certain as the law demands?" From the way Graiter winced he saw he hadn't. He pressed his advantage. "I know you didn't, because you couldn't have. Ma was alive five years ago."

He knew that was safe. The eldest giri in that photo on the desk showed it. Besides, Graiter gave himself away. He fell back against the door, cried huskily:

"Alive five years ago! My God!" Then wildly: "But she's dead now?"

"Yeh, she's dead now," Harting leered, safer to have her dead now. since he did not know how to produce her. "But not five years ago, 'tep-dad. An' that makes you a bigamist!"

Graiter stared at him for a long minute, eyes big and dark and blazing with agony in a sheet white face. After a couple of attempts he croaked:

"Well, what— what about it?"

"It's gotter be thought over, now I'm certain o' you," Harting said. What he meant was that he wanted to get away at once from this dangerous position, and then take time to work but a safe plan for squeezing this man to the last penny.

He had already dropped his arms. He went to the desk to gather his Jemmy and tools and the £75 in notes.

Harting swung round to find the man of the photograph standing in the doorway with an Army revolver in his hand.

"I'll take this as a little bit on account," be jeered, to show the strength of his position. "An' I'll drop you a line later."

"You mean to blackmail me?" Graiter asked hoarsely.

"Call it what you like," Harting grinned. "But you'll certainly see me back in due course."

"Yes— you'll twist the heart out of me!" Graiter said. "You would— as your father's son."

"What odds, when I got such a good step-father?" Harting grinned, and made for the door. Graiter made a gesture to bar his way, but, meeting Harting's grin, stepped aside. He knew he was beaten.

"Brains always win!" Harting told himself. He chuckled at his smartness at turning that photo to suck quick account. He wondered who Mollie what-was-her-name and her son really were, and it they were still alive. Not that it mattered. He was too clever to be beaten now ....

He was in the doorway. He heard Graiter behind him shoot. He turned startled and fearful. Something whizzed by his head: a vase. Now Graiter was flinging a chair down with his left hand, turning the room upside down as though he had been attacked, and shouting for the police at the top of his voice.

The abruptness of the thing whipped Harting's nerves to panic. The fool would raise hell if not stopped. Instinctively he snatched his jemmy from his pocket, bawled: "Shut your row! Stop it, d'ye hear, or I'll cosh you!"

He ran at Graiter, only meaning to frighten. But Graiter was staging a "shooting in self-defence" scene. He waited until the hand with the jemmy was in the air, then he sighted his revolver deliberately and fired.

Just as he died, Harting saw the look in Graiter's eyes— and realised he'd been far too clever. He'd told Graiter Mollie was dead and that there wasn't anyone left but himself. With him dead and Graiter getting back that photo before the police came, the secret would be safe.

Graiter wasn't a killer, but, for the sake of his living wife and children he shot to kill.

________________

6: The Eighth Buddha

The Danger Trail June 1927

Australian Women's Weekly 9 March 1935

PHILIP TENCH found old Erasmus Tenche's "Relation" as he looked through the attic for such personal belongings as he might wish to keep back from the sale— as the auctioneer for the receiver in bankruptcy put it.

He knew the old book, of course. It had been a treasure of his boyhood. What boy would not thrill over its fat parchment pages, its fine metal hinges and clasp. Erasmus' work. But apart from the binding and just one passage there was no glamour in the book.

As he was now penniless Philip thought of that one passage as he came across the book amid the litter of his old play-box. He had always been excited by the vague possibilities underlying that account of his ancestor's flight from death in the land of Jawa, since the day he had heard his father discuss it with his uncle. Uncle Pym, naturally, had scoffed at it.

"I don't believe a word of his traveller's tales." he jeered. "We know the kind of rascal he was. A vagrant and a disgrace to the name of Tench." The final 'e' had been dropped in Georgian days. "If he really hid something in that Indian temple the Borro-burru—"

"Boro-Budur," Philip's father corrected. "And it's in Java— quite well known. Jawa is the old spelling."

"What does it matter after hundreds of years," snapped Uncle Pym. "If he did put something there it's not there now."

Uncle Pym had been, in his own opinion, the most progressive of all the Tenchs who had traded as goldsmiths and jewellers in Loose since Gabriel Tench had put up his sign in the days of Henry VI.

Uncle Pym had become famous as the man who had ruined a solid and old-established business with one of the worst smashes in the county records.

Uncle Pym's heart had not stood the shock of his last profit and loss account, and he now rested close to the despised Erasmus in a corner of Loose churchyard. Philip, heir to all his debts, with a fine arts career cut short at 24, and with only a bank balance of £20 between him and starvation, felt in no mood to accept Uncle Pym's rulings on anything.

His father had told him all about Erasmus. He had gone to the Orient, drifting through the Indies, Assam, and out by the Sunderbunds to Burma.

He must have had adventures. He spoke of starving, of perils at the hands of the Portugales. He gave hints at phases of wealth of sudden and Arabian Nights-like magnificence. This was especially the case when he reached Java and became a sort of court gold-smith to "ye Emperour yf Jawa." His position must have been important and gorgeous. He told of chiefs bribing him to get the ear of the Emperor. Perhaps this was the reason of his fall, for, quite suddenly, he was flying for his very life, stripped of all his wealth save for certain easily portable things he carried with him.

Having reached the Boro-Budur he feared that the things he carried might cost him his life, and he hid them in the ancient ruins.

Philip had read descriptions of the Boro-Budur, those amazing ruins in the heart of Java.

Erasmus described the square lower terraces with their marvellous carvings, and the three higher, circular ones where the wall carvings gave place to rings of dome-like structures "like great handbells, having a spire that is as the hand part but the stone of the bell cut away to form a niche, and inside this is an image of Buddha, one in each of the many on each round terrace."

One of these bell-shaped shrines was Erasmus' cache. He had taken out a stone under and at the back of the Buddha, and there he had fashioned a chamber and hid what he carried. Then with great care he had repaired all "so that no man could say it had been touched."

His directions for finding the hiding place were precise. It was on the lowest of the three circular platforms. One mounted the steps on the east face of the ruin; "this being easy to know for all the images of the Budd on that side have the attitude in which their right hands touch the earth to the front of the right knee. The other sides have each their different posture of hands." Turning right from the stair one counted eight of the shrines and under the eighth the things were buried. Erasmus Tench had meant to go back for what he had buried, but he never did.

Philip let his imagination dwell on the idea of this hidden treasure. Why should he not go to Java himself and see if jewels were hidden under Buddha No. 8?

It was a gamble in which he had little to lose. He had neither work nor relatives to hold him. If there was nothing else in it, he would have an opportunity of studying Eastern metal work on the trip. It would help his ambition to be a modern Cellini in the art of metal carving.

He went. He had been to school with a boy whose father was a director of the Spice Island Line. The Spice Line was running a deluxe tour round the world on the Samarkand, and Philip went with it as a clerk and general utility man.

His friend told him it was a yachting trip in which he and a shipload of rich people enjoyed every luxury and saw all the chief ports of the universe. That was a lie. The Samarkand carried three hundred assorted egoists whose real work in life was grumbling. Philip found that part of his job was listening tactfully to those grumbles, issuing tickets to the tourists for shore trips, herding them into hired cars at ports.

By the time he had worried through the chaos of shore parties at Oporto and Lisbon, he was wondering whether it would not save temper and tissue to desert at Gibraltar and finish his journey working as a deck hand on a tramp. He was making his fateful decision when he came upon the name of Laggan in the passenger list: "Mr. Norman Laggan and daughter; New York."

The name hit him right between the eyes. Could it be the Laggan? It was. The card index called him "Jeweller, 5th Ave., New York." just that, but it covered the name that was spoken with awe by all goldsmiths and jewellers the world over. Laggan, the millionaire Laggan, the sultan of craftsmen. Laggan, who could make a designer world-famous― and Philip's ambition was to be just such a designer.

"Luck!" he grinned in his large cheerful way. "I will cultivate brother Laggan." He was an affable and at-tractive young man. clean to the eye and well equipped in wits—in the main. He asked one of his superiors in the ship's tourist office how to unearth Norman Laggan.

"Wander along the promenade deck until you run into a sound of perpetual grousing— that's Norman Laggan," said the man. "He's one long sour song."

"I was thinking," said Philip airily. "I might have him in my party at Gibraltar. I know something about his trade, it'll make him sweet to talk shop. Can you put him down to me?"

"Gladly," said the man, "and Heaven help you!"

Philip saw the great Laggan the next morning as they nosed through the straits. A waiter pointed him out in the saloon. He was tall and shrivelled.

On the seat to the left of him, the other was vacant, was one of those pink, mum women, all bulge and no conversation. His daughter, of course. Millionaires seem prone to such. Philip marked her and his man and made plans to conquer both.

When the tender landed them at the town quay of Gib, Philip did miracles. Laggan showed an inclination to stray. Talking to a flapper who seemed rather pretty had led him away from the cars.

Philip rectified that. He took him brightly by the arm and bore him to the smartest car in the line.

"You'll find that car the best ever, sir," he said.

"Young man," snarled the peppery old specimen, "I thank you for—"

"Don't have to, sir," said Philip cheerfully. "It's what we're here to do. I'll find your daughter."

He bundled the old man in, and after a furious minute trailed and seized the dumpy female. In less than no time he had her at her father's side. Or rather, at his back. Rather slow on his pins the old man, he was still poised in the door. Philip gave him an affectionate heave seatwards, and boosted up the daughter.

"Confound you!" shouted the great man, for perhaps Philip had been a trifle too vigorous— and then he saw the girl. He sat back on his seat goggling and breathing hard. "Had a tiff this morning, no doubt," thought Philip. Well, they'd be reconciled before they reached Europa Point.

Arrived at the wide space by the old barracks at the Point he was astonished to find that Norman Laggan took no interest in the view of the blue Straits with the towering headlands of Africa beyond. He just sat huddled in his car, a lonely and rather vulturine figure. Philip approached him a little more nervously than before, and asked:

"Don't you find Europa Point stimulating, sir?"

"Darn Europa Point!" snarled the millionaire. "Darn you, you young fool, for an incompetent and interfering mutt! Kidnapping me to see your dashed Europa Point!"

"One of the show places, sir," said Philip feebly.

"Don't I know it," raged the great Laggan. "Eleven times I've seen the adjectival thing. Eleven times! I loathe the sight of it."

"Then— er— why come?" asked Philip.

"I wasn't," bellowed the millionaire. "I was heading for the ferry to take me to Algeciras when you clawed me away from my daughter, sir. My very daughter—"

"Your daughter!" gulped Philip. "I put your daughter in with you."

"You put— You think that giant clam was my daughter! My— Go away, sir! Go away before I do murder—!"

Philip went away. The great Laggan looked exactly like murder.

Philip's day ashore was not a success. But it was almost happiness to the reception he had from his superiors when he reached the Samarkand. It appeared that he had shoved into the great Laggan's lap the very girl he hated most on earth and particularly water. The millionaire had already complained his bitterest of her crushing presence next him at meals, and demanded her removal under threat of leaving the ship.

"And you imprisoned him in a car with her when he was feeling his wickedest," wailed his superior. "I've had the worst hour in my life persuading the old man that it was not a deliberate insult aimed to get rid of him. Are you the world's worst damfool or what?"

Philip himself was not certain. But before the night was out he was.

Warned to keep his silly face out of the sight of millionaires and other explosive cargo, he quit the dancing and went and did private work over the bows. At his angriest moment a girl drifted forward; a girl needing a little cheerful conversation after stress, it seemed. He seemed to know her, but he was in no condition to be warned by that. And when she herself led him to the edge of the pit by saying that this sort of tour was very trying, Philip felt such a glow of sympathy that he set out with full fervour to show how very much more trying it had been for him. His opinions were lurid, and mainly about Mr. Norman Laggan.

HE was in full flight when he noted a certain drawing away on her part. As he paused, suddenly rather fearful, she inserted an icy voice into the conversational gap, saying: "I think you said Mr. Laggan— He is my father!"

She then sailed off, the prettiest and iciest moonbeam of a girl who had ever moved under a glorious Mediterranean moon. Philip kicked the anchor engine very hard, that hurt more than kicking himself. He realised that he had begun his splendid career by making a mortal enemy of the man he had arranged would count most in his career. Also, he had insulted a girl whose prettiness surpassed all prettiness he had ever seen.

She was a sport. He admitted that, among her other virtues of daintiness, slimness and glorious colouring. She said not a word of his latest infamy, and he was not kicked off the ship at the next port.

All the same, they had no contact. For his bone-headedness he was relegated to the staff cabin in the bowels of the ship and kept on office work all day, leaving to others the joys of smoothing out the grumbles of opulent or pretty tourists. And there were no shore parties for him.

That had advantages from one point of view, though it would not kick the scale against one friendly smile from Lois Laggan. He was able to wander at will about ports undistracted by trippers de luxe. He saw much of Marseilles, Ajaccio, and Naples, including lovely metal-craft work in churches, museums, and elsewhere, and in Port Said he found something even better.

It was in the darkest portion of a shop kept by a sleepy old Arab that he found something so worth while that he was ready to blow all of £5 of his little capital on it. He was examining his find when Mr Norman Laggan, his daughter, and some others came into the shop. Philip could not bolt, and did not mean to until he had bought his find. The millionaire saw it in his hand, and the collector in him nosed forward like a pointing dog.

"Say, what's that?" he asked. Only then he saw it was Philip, and a look of bitter contempt came over him.

"It's what is called a candle pricket," said Philip, more confused than priggish. "Thing for holding candles on the walls of old churches, palaces..."

"I know what a pricket is," sneered the great Laggan, looking from the dragon-shaped thing to the face of a born fool, as he considered Philip. "What else do you reckon it is?"

"I know what it is," said Philip, stung by the tone. "It's the work of William Torel, of Henry III's time."

"William Torel!" said the great Laggan, and his eyes widened in surprise at anyone but himself knowing about that craftsman in brass. He glanced at Philip and saw only the fool who had messed things up at "Gib."

"What do you think you know about Torel?" he sneered. "And what's a Torel doing in Port Said?"

"I don't know, but I know it's genuine," said Philip.

That was a challenge to an expert, and he resolved to teach this jackanapes a lesson. He looked the brazen dragon over contemptuously, and handed it back to Philip with a superior smile.

"Fake," he said, and his tone said "I, Norman Laggan, have said the last word."

"Just as you like," said Philip, "but William Torel's mark is good enough for me."

"Eh?" snapped the great Laggan. "Torel's mark? Lemme see!" Philip showed the craftsman's mark. He knew it well, the Tenchs had two small Torel pieces in their collection— or had until the smash. Norman Laggan saw the mark, which he had not troubled to look for, but he did not apologise. He just became the acquisitive collector in a greedy flash.

"You closed with this gink yet?" he snapped. "No— what's your highest offer? Five pounds, English. All right, I go seven-ten." His thrusting and determined face browbeat Philip.

Philip handed him the pricket and said coldly:

"I can't compete with millionaires," and walked out of the shop. He heard Lois Laggan cry: "Father, that's wrong," in a soft, protesting voice. But that wasn't balm to him, he was furious and the sworn enemy of anything bearing the name Laggan.

He was so furious that instead of snapping at his chance to heal the wound with Lois, he simply made the gulf wider. He knew she made distinct movements towards him as they passed on their before-breakfast tramp, but he was the icy one now.  He swung by her with his pleasant face set in the sternest lines.... and by the time his anger had cooled and he was in a condition to know himself for a chump it was too late to patch up a peace.

He saw that he might have used that Torel pricket to win the old goldsmith; instead, it had merely increased their mutual hostility and made him act the boor to the girl he knew he liked best on earth.

ADEN, Bombay,  Colombo went by without another encounter. When they reached Burma, and he saw Lois and her father and the rest of the tourists off the ship at Rangoon, he almost returned to the ship after his visit to the agent, so dispirited and flat was he.

But he saw the golden umbrella of the Shwe Dagon sticking up over the landscape, and he knew enough about that gorgeous pagoda-shrine set up over the hairs of Buddha to know that an artist of his type must visit it. He did.

The mere sight of all the superb carving fired the craftsman in him. On the great platform from which soars the huge bell-shaped monument, rising in gold to the golden umbrella, at the top, on that crown of the superb structure he found so much to delight him that his ready sketch-book came out and he lost himself in drawing. He was oblivious of all things until a drawled voice said:

"Young man, that's real good work." He started and found the great Norman Laggan at his shoulder, staring not at him, but at his sketch. Peevish the millionaire might be, and a ruthless collector, but there was a light in his eye that told of a craftsman with an artist's joy in good work.

"Yeh, good work," he said again. "But say, do you know you're drawing that as a metal worker would?"

"I am a metal worker, sir," said Philip, his heart in his mouth. "Or I mean to be when I'm through with my studies."

The great Laggan looked at the drawing again, looked at Philip.

"Studies," he said. "You've got something above studies already. You've got an instinct. Wonder how you got that?"

"It's in the blood," smiled Philip.

A soft voice said startlingly: "His name is Tench, Father."

Philip hadn't known Lois was there, and turned on her in surprise. But there was an elation in his surprise. She had taken the trouble to find out his name, the name of a nobody of a ship's clerk. More, she had found out what his name meant to a man like her father. Her father's bushy eye-brows lifted at the name.

"I know of some Tenchs," he said.

"Of Loose?"

"I come from Loose," Philip smiled. "They're my Tenchs."

"Gee!" said the millionaire. "Queer world, this. I've a Tudor 'salt' and a Charles One wine-cooler made by your folk at home. Beautiful work, specially the 'salt'."

"It's probably an Amadas Tench piece," said Philip. "He was about the best designer we had."

"Sound workman," nodded the great Laggan. "And so that's how you knew all about Torel, eh?"

That was meant to be a sign of comradeship in the arts, the glad hand.... But no sooner were the words out than it was seen to be a mistake. Laggan knew he had been anything but fair over the Torel business. And like all men, and especially rich men this feeling made him uncomfortable and angry.

"Hmm! There's something else I call to mind about the Tenchs of Loose. A bankruptcy..." He smiled grimly "Bad business, that.... Good day, Mr. Tench."

He stalked off at that— with Lois who had been smiling until then, and now looked taken aback and angry! And Philip, who had been, in imagination climbing a golden stair, came to earth with a bump.

A very savage bump. It kept him sore as the liner pushed down to Penang and Singapore and then along the exotic coast of Sumatra towards Java. And his misery was added to by Lois' absence. After Rangoon she had had an attack of prickly heat that kept her in her cabin. And Java drew nearer and nearer.

Philip debated with himself whether he'd cut the Boro-Budur business and the gamble of old Erasmus' treasure and stick to the Samarkand on the chance of getting to know Lois Laggan really well. He decided against that. He must go through with the hunt for old Erasmus' treasure and forget  Lois.

He had thought his plan well out by now, and felt it had to mean deserting the ship. At the capital, Batavia, the authorities talked of disturbances on the Kedu plateau, on which the ruins stand, and it seemed questionable whether the officers on the Samarkand would risk a party.

Just as Philip felt he must slip ashore alone at Samarang, a certain group of the passengers demanded that they must be taken to the Boro-Budur, risk or no risk. The leader of these was none other than Norman Laggan. His protests won the day, a small party dared the local malcontents and went to the Boro-Budur. And Philip accompanied them.

Philip noted that Lois Laggan accompanied her father as they entered the train, but for once he was not fully thrilled. He was thinking of Erasmus and what Erasmus had hidden under Buddha No. 8. All that climbing journey up to the plateau was throbbing with the thought.

They arrived at the Rest House near the ruins at night, an exquisite moon-light night. But most of the tourists were tired out by the journey, and the sight of armed Dutch soldiers on duty further suggested to them that, in spite of the moon, bed was the best place for them and that the Boro-Budur would look better, if not safer, by daylight.

Philip had no thought of bed. He was in a fever of excitement. He saw the strange and mystical loom of the great carven pile in the moonlight and he could hardly repress his jumping nerves. Also the moonlight and the fact that most of the tourists had gone to bed had given him an idea. Any difficulty about getting the jewels out of the country might be overcome easily. If he worked all night on Buddha No 8, he might secure Erasmus' hidden treasure before morning. He could go back to the Samarkand with the party, and with the jewels. The party, as mere tourists, were never regarded with suspicion.

The logic of the thing seemed overwhelming. He crept out into the moon-light with his tools and climbed the Boro Budur.

Old Erasmus had been perfectly right in all his directions. Philip found the eastern face of the ruin by the earth-touching Buddhas, easily visible in the strong moonlight. He climbed the worn steps stealthily and with a beating heart. He found the first circular plat-form above the square platforms. He found the strange domes, so like big handbells. He counted them to the right hand. One, two, th—... his heart went into his mouth. Three had been smashed. Only a ring of broken stone showed where the circular shrine had been... four, five... six, seven... eight.... His heart leapt almost into a shout. Eight was intact, un-touched, apart from weathering was exactly as old Erasmus must have left it. Philip got out his tools.

It was very eerie in the moonlight. In spite of his modern common sense Philip felt the pressure of the mysterious East about him. He felt all the inscrutable stone Buddhas crowding the ruin watching him. Twice, three times he stopped because he was certain he heard something definite.

Thank goodness! He'd got one lump of stone out. Gosh! he'd found the place. One stone sticking out of true beyond its fellows. He reached for a tool, and as he reached his body froze stiff.

He heard definite sounds. He heard footsteps coming up towards his terrace. And as he realised this, he heard a voice say:

"Well, Lois, I guess this is a lot better than just sleep. Gee! I wouldn't have missed it. And you see, from the top of this pile we'll get a view that'll take the hearts out of our bodies."

Philip crouched petrified. Norman Laggan and Lois were coming up here. They would be bound to see him. What should he do?

He never had to work it out. As the Laggans reached the level of the square terrace beneath him there was a sudden rush of bare feet, a burst of snarling cries, and Laggan's shout:

"Look out, Lois— niggers!"

There was at once a scuffle, the yell of a man struck, another shout from Laggan, a cry from Lois. Then the bark of a pistol. Laggan had drawn and fired.

Philip had jumped to his feet and run towards the sound at the first cry. Scrambling and slithering he arrived at the top of the wall overlooking the terrace beneath, just as Laggan fired. In the bright moonlight he saw a group of a dozen natives attacking the Laggans. They were led by a large, fanatic-looking brute who looked more murderous than his fellows.

Norman Laggan had swung Lois into a recess and had placed himself in front of her in the mouth of it at the first rush. He seemed to have knocked out one man with his stick, and so checked the rush long enough to pull his pistol. The crash of that shot had made the Javanese draw back, but the big fanatic meant murder, and, waving a very ugly-looking kris, urged his men on. Laggan fired as the man leapt. Perhaps he wounded the ruffian, per-haps the fanatic merely blenched in the face of the shot; anyhow, it saved the millionaire's life. The point of the kris missed the throat.

The haft of the weapon and the native's fist, however, caught the old man on the side of the head and he went down, striking his head against the stone, for he lay still. Lois, with brilliant courage, opened the parasol she was carrying and thrust the thing with the same movement into the murderer's face. He leapt back astonished, and the girl dropped to her knees searching for her father's pistol. Even as she went down the fanatic shouted and jumped again.

This time, however, he was not the only jumper. Philip came off the cornice immediately above him and landed with a heavy crash feet foremost on his spine. The man went down hard and from then onwards took no interest in the proceedings.

Instinct had caused Philip to bring along his stout stick, and he used this with such fury on the dark, evil faces before him that he actually drove them back. Unluckily, one hefty stroke, glancing off a yellow skull, smashed the stick to pieces against the wall.

Seeing him disarmed, the natives came on again, and Philip felt himself turning a little sick as he saw the gleam of many knives, all meant for his chest. At that moment, however, Lois found her father's pistol and began to use it. The banging of the weapon in that confined space and the fact that they lacked a leader took the heart out of the ruffians. They turned and ran. A minute later soldiers and tourists from the Rest House swarmed up, and they were safe.

The Dutch soldiers spread out to hunt the Javanese malcontents, while they were carried down to the Rest House. They found a complicated situation waiting for them there.

The Dutch commandant was all for arresting the three of them for risking themselves in a disturbed country for the sake of a little moonlight; while the rest of the crowd made them heroes. Particularly did they try to make Philip a hero; for, either in self-defence or for some other reason, Lois had put all the gallantry on to him, and, when he came to, old Norman Laggan aided and abetted her. He came to Philip at the latter end of a sleepless night.

"Son," he said with a conspiratorial grin, "I can see an International fuss ahead. That darkie you jumped on was that leader of the rebels the Dutch have been hunting for months. He's been hiding in the Boro-Budur. There's going to be a big talk and bother and courts of inquiry and what not else. Well, don't you think it better to get out while the going's good?"

Philip looked at Lois who had been near him most of that exciting night. He realised that he had quite a number of private matters to talk over with Lois— things that would sound better on a ship's deck with the sea moon over them. He grinned back at Norman Laggan.

"I've had all I want of the Boro-Budur," he said, and with his mind occupied by Lois he meant it. "I think it wisest to bolt back to the ship and out of trouble."

"Good boy," said the millionaire. "Knew you and me were of a kind way back, in well, Port Said. And see here, son, I guess I've rather played the Elder Statesman to you. It's a sorter habit men like me drop into. It don't mean anything real, and will you forget it?"

They shook hands on that.

THE captain of the Samarkand saw the force of getting a shipload of expensive tourists out of delay's way, and before night came Java was out of sight astern. And, as Philip had thought, a boat deck and a sea moon were quite the best accessories for the things he had to say to Lois.

And after he had said those things and found her deliciously agreeable to them, and after they had sat back and talked sensibly, with interludes, as lovers will, Philip said quite gravely: "I'm a poor man, Lois, and—"

"I don't want to make you conceited," laughed Lois, "but you're a genius, too. Daddy said it several times over those designs you showed him before dinner. And Daddy can give a genius a chance."

"Oh, yes, my dear," laughed Philip, "he's a sport, he's starting me directly we get to New York. All the same, I come to you with nothing."

It was there he began to laugh. He suddenly remembered what had brought him to Java. He had come half round the world on a treasure hunt, and then allowed the whole matter to slip his memory when the time arrived to find it. It was really droll.

Or perhaps it wasn't so droll.

After all, old Erasmus's treasure had always been a gamble. And Lois was not a gamble.

________________

7: What a Guest Desires

Mercury (Hobart) 10 August 1935

WHEN Maunder ignored the row of guest slippers outside the audience hall of Ras Yermer's mud and wattle palace, his guide said nervously:

"We are about to cross a carpet once hallowed by the feet of the Prophet himself. It is a sacred thing."

He looked downward to call attention to the fact that he himself had shuffled off his shoes and donned a pair of slippers.

"Yeh, it looks moth eaten," was all Maunder said, and tramped ahead over the lovely silken pile in his muddy riding boots.

"But it is not considered courteous," wailed the guide.

"Oh, shucks," grunted Maunder. "I haven't any use for this pretty stuff!  An', after all, this Ras chap's only a nigger."

That was Maunder all over. Maunder had made millions from exploiting the by-products of sludge, and considered himself one of the really large items of mankind. Also he was one of those big and abounding creatures who take it for granted that a white skin naturally makes a man more than master of any darn native, mentally, physically, and socially.

Ras Yermer, as became a prince whose line dated from before Moses, showed no sign. In his simple native code a gentleman must not show dis-courtesy to a guest, even in thc face of discourtesy. Still he found Maunder increasingly trying. Maunder would take no sort of hint from his anxious guide. He was a millionaire by natural right and the white raj in being anyhow. Niggers were created to fit in with his ideas of things, not he to conform to theirs.

He gulped the cup of tea at one draught, instead of taking ceremonial sip by sip with the Ras. He brushed aside the mouthpiece of the water-pipe, although it' carried the honour of coming straight from the Ras's lips. He wasn't any open house for germs, he said, and he preferred a white man's smoke, anyhow.

BUT worst of all he rose to his feet although it was taboo while the Ras sat, and pawed over the sacred canopic urn in The Niche of Remembrance, saying with contemptuous affability over his shoulder:

"Say, Ras, this is about the best bit of chinaware I've seen this trip. I'll give you good money for it."

It was an exquisite piece of ceramic, naturally. It enshrined tho ashes bf the holy founder of Ras Yermer's line. For this reason alone Maunder came nearer to sudden death than in any of the "hairsbreadth" adventures he meant to describe in his travel book de luxe. Men did not approach that canopic vase except on their knees. No man might ever touch it except the Ras himself or his high priest-and Maunder had pawed it with hands that had not even been purified.

For a moment every man in the audience chamber, court officials as well as guards, stiffened, hands on swords, eyes watching the Ras. Ras Yermer himself sat like a figure of stone, though his eyes smouldered red. It would have given him the most holy pleasure to make the gesture that meant death. But a gentleman must always be a gentleman no matter the provocation. As a good host he must ignore even brutish ignorance. So he made the gesture which meant: "Bide on wisdom," and said aloud with his politest diction:

"That vase is not for sale.... The audience is ended."

Maunder merely strolled across to him as he rose, an unforgivable affront, and beamed:

"Well, glad to have met you, Ras. An' you just think over my offer. It's business I've taken a fancy to that vase, and when I take a fancy to things I always get them. That's my way. Name any price.in reason—"

Ras Yermer merely lifted the, fold of his chamma to cover that side of his face nearest to Maunder, which interpreted locally means: "You and your breath are offensive to me."

THEN, since Maunder showed no sign of leaving the Presence as etiquette demanded, he went out himself. Maunder's guide, shaking in his shoes, for he might be held responsible for this ferenghi's rudeness, plucked Maunder away,.whispering hoarsely:

"You have offended the Great One

"Offended nothing." Maunder grinned. "He's only a funny little native... An' how, anyhow?"

"To offer money for that vase."

"Stuff," shrugged Maunder. "Good money offends nobody. An' I want that vase."

"But that vase is a most sanctified'! thing," the guide mouthed.' "Moneyj eannot buy it. No man—"

"Don't talk silly," Maunder chuckled. "Money, can buy anything. I'm telling you, and I know. There ain't one thing in this world it cannot buy. It's just a question of price"

"But don't you understand ? He'll never sell it because—"

"He'll sell," Maunder said comfortr ably. "I'm going to make him sell. There ain't any man living who can stand out against spot cash when another means to buy."

"You just hop along to this Ras feller and tell him I mean to have it and I'm going to stay right here till I get it, so he'd better name his price right now to save trouble. That's the way to treat niggers."

When they listened to what the guide had to say the whole Council tore its hair, declaring it was plain that there was no other way of dealing with this gross ferenghi who heaped insult upon insult, than by putting broken glass in his next meal.

"Nay," sighed the Ras, "that would be ill-bred. We must preserve politeness whatever the cost. Besides, to kill a white man provides too good an excuse for European Powers to subject us to mandatory rule and the other horrors of civilisation."

"But-if you do not,kill him, how do you got rid of him?" one of the Elder Statesmen wailed. "He says he will stay here until he obtains the sacred vase."

"Aie, and he himself says he had the power to force the affront on us, since he, knows how to handle— niggers," snarled another, and at his words a howl of rage went up; for these people were of a proud Semitic race, with no trace of the Negro in them, were indeed ever ready to kill anybody who said there was.

"He must die, this insulter of our blood," they shouted.

"No," the Ras murmured again; "We must remain to the end the simple natives we seem to him. Honour forbids us to take umbrage at his ignorance… What are his plans, O Maggot that guides this Mongrel, when he departs from our land?"

"He leaves by ,the jungle, road, because ho means; to explore the, Gogondo-country," the guide mumbled.

"A land of Negroes with true Negro ways," the Ras's thin smile deepened. "Let us as true gentlemen forward his education then... that is, teach him the. difference between Negroes and us.

"Yes. It can be done, especially as the Gogondo are the darlings of the African Mandatory Council and can do no wrong. We will speed his parting. Yea. And we will do it with the simple courtesy that be comes our backward race.

"He means to have the canopic vase— he shall have it.  Tell him that I sell it to him for one thousand pounds English.  Not a penny less.

So Maunder got his vase. A thousand was nothing to him, whereas the triumph of his great white brain meant everything. He set, oft. for Gogondo with the caponic vase carefully packed, and a sense of victory inflating his heart. And. Ras Yermer let him go without a scowl, without event-hint of trouble. Gentlemen did not make trouble; also there was no need. The Gogondo would provide that.

AT THE Gogondo border at least Maunder learnt what niggers really were. The Gogondo were Negroes at their uppish worst, in fact, for they were conscious of the backing the Mandatory Council always gave them. Yet even their handling of Maunder and his caravan was a trifle worse than usual. A whole mob of Customs men and native police were waiting for him, and they treated him as a criminal under suspicion from the first. They went through his baggage like blood-hounds. Maunder tried to be a Big White Mind, aloof and amused, but the way they tore his carefully packed treasures apart rapidly got his goat.

He was quarrelling furiously arid making enemies right and left by the time they reached his precious canopic vase. For this reason his endeavours to protect that treasure seemed to excite their worst suspicions. They thrust him back. They tore the vase out of its case and, breaking the cemented lid off its top in spite of his curses, dipped hands inside.

Then they let out a howl of fury that seemed to promise death. But they weren't as lenient as that. They thrust him into a prison instead— such a prison as only Negro minds could condone; a filthy, stinking, deadly place, full of verminous and degraded natives, and there they kept him. Not even his consul or his millions applied to same, could get him out of it.

"No," the Consul told him stiffly. "For any other crime I might manage your freedom. But the Mandatory Council itself has set its face against this."

"Against what?" Maunder snarled.

"Against drug smuggling," the Consul said, "Drug smuggling to natives. It's the unforgivable crime."

"But you're crazy," Maunder shouted. "I never smuggled a gram of dope in my life."

"That line won't do, Maunder," the Consul snapped. "We've too much evidence to the contrary. You rich men may think you have the right to snatch big profits anywhere you can, but dope smuggling is—"

"Shut up," shouted Maunder. "What do you mean by your evidence? Where did you get it?"

"From Ras Yermer, naturally. Didn't he turn you out of his territory because you were peddling drugs? He's sworn an affidavit to that effect, anyhow. So have two dozen-of his subjects to whom you sold dope...."

"It's a lie. It's all lies," Maunder yelped. "I tell you, man, it's a trick."

"Why should they play a trick on you," the Consul rapped, and Maunder could only blink.

He did not know why. As far as he knew he had parted, with Ras Yermer on good terms. Courtesy, after all, has that effect.

"You see, you can't get away with it, Maunder," the Consul went on. "Besides, you were caught with the dope on you, cunningly hidden for smuggling."

"Hidden! For smuggling!" Maunder gulped. "How? Where?"

"In that canopic vase. A clever place, Maunder. The Gogondo might have missed it, and taken, the vase to be merely a collector's piece, if Ras Yermer had not warned them where to look."

"But— but I paid a thousand pounds for that vase as a collector's piece," Maunder began.

"I don't doubt it, since it was filled to the brim with drugs," the consul said. "It's no good, Maunder. You may only have been a money-making fool, but you were caught red-handed and you'll have to pay for it...."

And Maunder is still paying for it in a Negro prison. And possibly he has learnt by this time that the simple native is not so simple as his appearance suggests, and that a tradition of courtesy can be as deadly as any other weapon.... properly handled.

_________________________

8: Watch Your Step!

Australian Worker (Sydney) 20 April 1932

HALLING accomplished quite the neatest of murders.

When Pritchard, his partner, took to staying late at the office to study the books, Halling knew that his thefts were in process of being found out. Also Pritchard's manner made it plain, for Pritchard was one of those rigid old fogies who cannot bring themselves to be even diplomatically civil to those they suspect of underhand work. And by the same token Halling knew that the grim old man would show no mercy. Once he had proved his case he would jail his partner— and it would be for a long term, too, for the sum Halling had stolen was big and his methods had been— well, mean.

Halling knew he was doomed if the matter was taken into the courts. On the other hand he knew that he could remain unsuspected, even by the shareholders, if something happened to Pritchard before he could make his disclosures public. That had been Halling's meanness — only he called it cleverness. He had cooked the books so neatly that .it would look as if Pritchard himself had robbed the firm— if Pritchard was no longer alive to prove otherwise. Halling, in fact, had always had that way out in his thoughts. It was because he had turned it over so long in his mind that his plan to kill Pritchard had become a perfect one.

THAT night he left the office early, taking care that the clerks should note it and be forced to swear, if it was ever necessary, that he had left the office long, before Pritchard died. And neither they nor anybody else saw him slip into the cupboard on the half-landing below the office. It was a small, black, smelly cupboard in which the women who cleaned the offices kept their brooms and pails and things. Nobody ever opened that cupboard save these scrub women, and they would not come until seven next morning.

It was a nasty, dirty place, and he had to keep very still to prevent clattering the pails and things that littered the floor. But there was a crack in the upper panel of the door through which he could watch the stairs. Thus he was able to see his four clerks and two typists go home for the night.... But not Pritchard. Pritchard was staying alone in the office over the books. That was what he counted on— having Pritchard entirely cut off from help, as he was since their office occupied the whole of the top floor of the building.

Nobody overlooked it. Nobody would come up to it until to-morrow. It was also practically soundproof. He crept silently up the stone stairs, along the passage, and opened the door of his own room; from that he walked across the clerks' room to Pritchard's. The old man looked tip surprised at his entrance and then grew stern. Halling said meekly, but shakily:

'I— I see you've discovered something in those books, Albert.... I've decided it's best to confess. How much have you found out?'

That disarmed Pritchard, enabling Halling to walk up to his side and then bend over as though looking at the ledgers on the desk. As he did that he thrust a pistol against Pritchard's chest and fired.

As he had expected, Pritchard's clothing muffled the explosion.

Also the burnt coat and the very nature of the wound would make it look self-inflicted. Hailing stepped back quickly as he fired, and Pritchard's body dropped naturally forward on the desk, his right hand extended towards the floor. Halling knelt and closed Pritchard's still warm fingers over the butt of the weapon, and then let it drop to the carpet. It was Pritchard's own pistol. He opened the drawer of the desk from which he had taken it that morning to make it look as though the dead man had snatched it out in his last desperate moment.

Halling, who had thought of everything, wore gloves, so he left no fingerprints. Nor was there a spot of blood nor anything else incriminating on him. Next he went into the outer office once more and fetched the ladder the clerks used for reaching files on high shelves. This he put just outside Pritchard's door, which opened inward. Then he entered Pritchard's room again, and, the key being on the inside of the door, he locked himself in with the dead body.

This was the thing he had so cleverly thought out, the thing that made his plan suspicion-proof.  Pritchard's room had only one door. When the body was found with that door locked on the inside the police would be bound to accept the suggestion of the self-inflicted wound and deem the business merely suicide.

Over the door, however, was a big transom window used for extra light and ventilation. It opened, as such windows do, on a central pivot, and was closed by a spring catch on the inside. Pritchard, a tall man, could easily reach up and open it. Halling, a small one, had to stand on the chair beside the door— but that chair had a wooden seat, so he left no impression.

He opened the spring catch, laid a cloth he had brought along the sill so as not to leave tell-tale marks, and then easily muscled through the transom to the ladder outside. He only had to shut the window, and the spring catch automatically locked it. Pritchard's body was therefore in a room from which nobody could have got out, for the only exits were locked from the inside. And as Pritchard often did lock himself in his room, suspicion simply could not be fixed on anyone else.

He put the ladder back and went home feeling safe. And the police, when they rang him up at 7.30 next morning, confirmed that sense of security.

They gently broke the news to him that his partner had made away with himself in his office. They told him in accents of sympathy that the cleaning women had discovered the tragedy half-an-hour before. When Halling reached the office eighty minutes later he himself developed the 'suicide' line.

He told the Inspector in charge of the case that, though he had never dreamed that poor Pritchard would go to such terrible extremes, it was his duty to say that only a few days before he had discovered evidence in the books that liis partner had been robbing the firm. He had, in fact, taxed Pritchard with this, and it looked as though the poor devil, seeing that his crime was discovered, had shot himself rather than face the music.

Thus did Halling provide the 'motive' for an obvious suicide. And yet, strangely, the police were no longer sympathetic.

The Inspector said dryly: 'It's a queer thing, Mr. Halling, but your head clerk, who arrived half-an-hour ago; says that Mr. Pritchard suspected you of just the same sort of robbery.'

Halling was indignantly scouting the idea when a policeman came into the room and said to the Inspector:

'Tally's exactly, sir.'

The Inspector put out his hand and the, policeman produced from behind his back a strip of plain, brown linoleum. Halling saw with a chilly thrill that it had been cut from the floor of the clerk's office. He got a worse thrill when he saw what was on it.

Outlined in white powder were the prints of two shoe soles. They were unmistakable, too. They had those circles and other high relief decorations that are the trade design of a certain non-skid rubber sole. Also two of those circles were broken in a way that made Halling gasp and thrust his feet sharply under his chair.

The Inspector gave a bleak smile.

'Wearing the same shoes to-day, eh?' he said. 'Your head clerk who identified your footprints thought you would. That's why we had this bit of linoleum near the door cleaned so that your, shoes should register as you came in.'

Halling began to splutter protests against such nonsense, but the Inspector cut him short.

'It's a fair cop, Halling, though I'll admit you might have got away with it if jonly, when you went , to hide in that, cupboard on the half-landing, you hadn't knocked over— or maybe one of the cleaning women did it earlier— a bottle of grate polish!

'Anyhow, you stood in the black, messy stuff for quite a time, not noticing it in the dark, and when you crept back to kill Pritchard you left a trail on the stairs and along the corridor to your room. You couldn't see it in the bad light, but a cleaning woman saw it, and it led to this office.

'We didn't see it that way at first, because the locked door , made it seem certain suicide, but we dusted round with finger-print powder by way of precaution, and we found more of these footprints— on the wooden seat of the chair inside Pritchard's door, on the ladder— and one actually against the side of the transom window where you'd steadied yourself getting through.

'We saw then how the door, and the window had been locked on the inside after the killing.

'Then, when your clerk identified your footprints and told us how Pritchard had suspected you, we saw you must be the man who did it.... And now I'd like to look at your shoes, please.'

Knowing the game was up, Halling made a wild dash, for Pritchard's revolver, still lying on the floor.

The Inspector knocked him over, had him handcuffed, and took his shoes from him.

'Thought so,' he said as he examined them. 'Here's the grate polish still thick under the arch of the instep. This convicts you Halling— luckily, for I don't see how we could have suspected anyone of foul play if— well, you'd only watched where you were stepping a little more carefully.'

____________________

9: Just Ordinary Human

Weekly Mail & Cardiff Times 9 March 1935, as "The Flaw in Perfection"

Townsville Daily Bulletin (Qld.) 6 Nov 1936

THE GLITTERING car that drew all eyes, even in Mayfair, plunged deeper into darker Dockside. It reached decaying streets where grimy children broke off pavement games to cat-call after it.

'Much more of this?' Tony Vraile asked the girl sitting behind him.

'Upsetting your lordly conscience, eh?' Murdoch Reynolds sneered. Murdoch Reynolds was feeling pleased with himself. Not only had he secured the seat on the great actress's right hand, but, as a Tribune of the People and an inevitable Cabinet Minister, he was glad of such an opportunity of scoring off the idle aristocracy. Tony was the eighth Viscount Vraile.

From his place on Vivienne Belgarde's left Sir Gerrard Fyson, the industrial millionaire, said: 'What annoys me most with all this squalor is its crass inefficiency.'

'It's the fruit of the industrial system of which you are so fine a flower,' Murdoch Reynolds scoffed. 'And let me tell you, these crazy rows of rotten houses are worse inside. I know. I had to fight my way up from just— them.'

'Hang it all,' Sir Gerrard Fyson snapped. 'So did I,' he looked quickly at the beautiful girl, 'or nearly as bad. But as a practical man I know that taking a firm line with these people—'

The actress cut across the impending discussion:

'Worse to come, Tony. Presently there'll be places where this car can't go. We'll have to finish on foot.'

Her steady beauty faced the young aristocrat calmly, her intelligent eyes studied him, and the others, for re actions. His blunt, attractive features returned a shamefaced grin.

'I was thinking of you,' he muttered. 'Doesn't seem quite the spot to expose you in.'

The car had stopped in a gutter of a street between sooty and sagging houses. It was called Angel-lane, but neither its aspect nor its inhabitants looked so very heavenly. In many windows the backs of cardboard cartons took the place of glass panes. Near them was a leery shop that looked as though the local dust cart had contributed most of the goods exposed for sale.

Gerrard Fyson scowling round, said: 'I'm with Vraile there. What possessed you to bring us to this garbage heap, my dear?'

'Even a great artist can learn the road to sympathy by seeing the seamy side of life— I, at least, honor you, my dear,' said Murdoch Reynolds loftily.

Vlvienne Belgarde said simply: 'I wanted to show you where I was brought up.'

The three men stared at her, Gerrard Fyson incredulously, Tony Vraile with a silent whistle, Murdoch Reynolds with a slight tightening of his handsome, senatorial face.

They could not believe her. She was beautiful and famous. She had not only won a great place in their great world by immense accomplishment, but she was that world's supreme note of exquisite refinement in luxurious femininity. For these things and her charm these three men were in love with her. She was not only adorable, but she was a great prize. To marry her was to obtain that perfect mate that would crown their worldly ambitions as well as personal happiness. The mere idea of linking her wonder to such slums as these was absurd and unthinkable.

Vivienne left the car and, standing in the soupy muf of the pavement, slipped out of her Russian ermine coat, tossing it back into the seat. Beneath she wore a frock so plain and shabby as to be drab. Yet she seemed to wear it naturally— was that the actress in her? Tony, at her elbow, thought it was.

'What is the great idea, Vivlenne V he asked. 'Testing out a part in a new play?'

Two grubby little girls swinging round and round a chipped lamp post by means of the world's filthiest ropes, checked their corkscrew whirlings to jeer at Gerrard Fyson's spats. Their alley-cat voices brought other sticky-faced urchins on to the scene with an Incredible rapidity. All seemed to find so much Bond Street tailor rig not only unconstitutional but comic. Strange, it was the men's clothes that caused the jeers. Vivlenne was taken as a matter of course.

Murdoch Reynolds, as an authority on the workers, tried to disperse these offspring of the proletariat with sharp and appropriate words. They simply ya-hooed' him and called him 'aeroplane ears', which left him fuming, for he wasn't proud of the jut and extent of that part of him.

Vivienne said deliberately: 'If yer don't go 'ome an' get yer Mas' ter chops.' That stifled them. They were hearing their own idiom in a tone that meant business.

Murdoch Reynolds, who recognised that idiom, looked sharply at Vivienne, his lips pursing.

'By Jinks, Vivienne, you're a wonder,' Gerrard Fyson said. 'There isn't an actress living who could put it over like that!'

'Acting— Is that what you think it?' she said. Then she saw a woman coming round the shop.

'Cheer-O, Moggy,' she cried.

The woman stopped and blinked. She was a working model of the slum slattern. Her skirts were bunched and draggled from scrubbing. Her stockings sagged over unspeakable shoes. A male cap crowned her whispy and untidy head. She steadied the jug of beer she carried with her free hand, and screeched : 'Why— lor! lummy — If it ain't young Vi!'

'A girl friend of mine,' Vivienne smiled into Gerrard Fyson's eyes. 'We used to play together on this pavement— that sort of thing.'

She pointed at the crude drawing of an oblong chalked on a drier section of the flags.

'What on earth's that?' asked Tony.

'Hop-scotch,' said Murdoch stiffly, 'the pastime of the poor. No hard tennis courts or squash rackets in the slums, lord Vraile.'

'And no gardens, Tony,' Vivienne said steadily. 'We played in the gutter—all of us. I was quite a champion, wasn't I, Moggy?'

'Not 'arf you weren't,' leered the slattern. 'You always was a one, young Vi.'

Tony was studying the oblong with its numbered sections:

'How does it go?' he asked.

Vivienne showed him. The men gasped as she bunched up her skirts to free her slim legs. She hopped to where a flat stone lay at the base of the oblong. Hopping, she kicked it into the first section, and without putting the other foot to the ground, hopped the stone from section to section, working it up one side of the chalked diagram to turn and work it down the other side. But at the top she over-kicked, and, amid a yell of derision from the gathered urchins, the stone shot off the oblong.

Murdoch Reynolds and Gerrard Fyson avoided each other's eyes. They knew enough to know they had seen a pavement-trained expert.

The slattern woman snickered. 'Rotten, young Vi ... 'Ere you, old me dinner beer. I'll show 'er.' she thrust the jug towards Murdoch Reynolds preparatory to bunching up her own skirts.

'I say— confound it all... a bit too thick, Vivienne,' the politician expostulated. 'If this gets known in my constituency...!'

Sir Gerrard Fyson put in uncomfortably: "I agree— er— my dear. Not — er— quite the thing for one ot your position or— or ours.' Vivlenne smiled calmly at the slattern: 'Can't take you on now. Mog. Got a date down home."

She led them out of that diabolical Angel Lane into worse. They walked through a gangway so narrow that Gerrard Fyson, who was big and plump, edged sideways for fear of his clothes touching the oozy brick walls. The children followed them in an ex cited mob. Tbe pinched walls of the .passage carried their whistle-pipe voice plainly. One shrill female squeak kept crying: 'I tells yer I 'earn 'im....'My constitutiony,' 'e said. 'E—  a Memb'r o' Parl'm'nt, I tells yer.' And another confirmed: 'Yes, that right I 'eard 'im. Too... coo, fancy a Memb'r o' Parl'm'nt 'ugging Scabby Mog's beer?'

Murdoch Reynold's face went sour and he caught Gerrard Fyson's understanding eye cocked towards him. Little things like that could play the deuce with the career of an ambitious man.

They crossed a road. They came to a long, narrow lozenge of dark asphalt between two rows of low, dirty buildings. The place was called Fokks Rents. The buildings were sagging and foul. They seemed to be breaking down under the accumulated grime of centuries.

Tony Vraile muttered: 'My hat— a regular sewer!'

'I lived the first fifteen years of my life here. Tony,' Vivienne told him quietly.

Between the houses a swarm of screaming children were playing. They paused, most emphatically, to Rape at the party. This drew the at tention of a group of men lolling round the lamp-post in the middle of the Rents. These stared sullenly and resentfully with the desperate eyes of the unemployed, until one gaped at Sir Gerrard, and sheepishly touched his cap. 'rour turn,' Murdoch Reynolds sneered acridly into the millionaire's ear. 'One of your cast-off factory hands no doubt— this prettv story will set all over town.' 'Confound it' growled Sir Gerrard. 'It'll play old Harry.... If we'd only been gilded nincompoops whom nobody knows, like Vraile, It wouldn't have been so bad....'

But not even Tony was to escape. As they passed the group a youna and het(n man grinned at him and said: 'Arternoon, me lord.'

Thoroughly taken aback Tony stuttered: 'Oh— oh, good afternoon. I know your face, only?'

'National Sporting Club, me lord,' said the man. 'I'm Tod Breen, middle weight runner-up.'

'Why— so you are,' Tony said, and mediately a shrill chorus bleated: 'Ear that?... Tod called 'im a Lord.... an' 'e'e Bhalcin' 'ands!'

'That puts the lid on it,' groaned Murdoch Reynolds. 'The papers simply cant miss that.' '

'Perhaps we can make 'em treat it as a mere slumming stunt of Vivienne's,' Gerrard Fyson muttered desperately. Even that hope was shattered. Vivienne went straight to one of the frowsty houses. As one thoroughly at home she pulled a bit of cord that came through the door, where a handle ought to be. It opened the door. Peering into the dreg'? gloom within she called in a voice none of the children could miss 'You home. Ma? How goes It, Dad?' The crowd took It up In & flash.

'It's Ma Little's young Vi,' a score of voices cried. ' 'Er We a nactress . . . 'Er 'oo went on th' stige when Daddy Little 'ad 'is stroke.'

Murdoch Reynolds groaned aloud. Sir Gerrard Fyson muttered angrily: 'She's playing some fool game with us.'

Pressure of the excited crowd made them follow Vivienne into the house and close the door. They had stepped straight into a big room. It was crowded and cluttered and dingy. It smelt slightly of rotting fabric. It was not only a living-room it was a bedroom. Space in Foggs Rents was more valuable than in Mayfalr. There were lodger families in every other room of that

On the big bed that filled one corner of the room was a large, inert man. He was old and had a strong, clean cut face, quite a common man, but I man with character. He lay very still not even turning his eyes towards them. He was in the last stages of paralysis. A small, old bundle of a woman aadrlBen from a basket chair at the sound of Vivienne's voice. 8h*..and, In fact, the wbole room was as neat is circumstances allowed. But these men of a de luxe world b» little of neatness only abjectness and squalor. To them the little old woman was just the human bundle of rain they'd expect in such a hovel— and Vivienne was kissing her.

Vivienne had her arms round her and was kissing her, and it was no stage kiss but tbe real thing vlth the heart in it. When the actress turned towards tbe men, she still kept her arm about the old creature and she said: 'Ma, this is Sir Gerrard Fyson, the great business millionaire, and Mr. Murdoch Reynolds, who is a Member of Parliament, and that is Lord Vraile... This is my mother!'

Gerrard Fyson shot an acid glance at Vivienne and merely bowed. Murdoch Reynolds said sulkily: 'Oh— how do.'

Tony Vraile found himself looking into two very blue and slightly frightened eyes set in a small bright but wrinkled apple of a face. He grinned, took Ma Little's hand and said: 'I say— this is awfully nice.'

Gerrard Fyson muttered, 'Darned blundering ass,' but Ma Little looked suddenly less frightened. Her hand fluttered like a bird in Tony's as she tried a curtsey from some dim old memory. He held her hand tight and laughed until she answered with a shy smile. He thought he had seen very few women who had just that simplicity and sweetness as they smiled.

Of course, she was flustered... A millionaire, a Member of Parliament and a real, live Lord in her parlour Lord sakes, how ought she behave? She stared timidly at them. She stared appealingly at Vivienne: she said nervously— 'Would your— your gentlefolk like a cup o' tea, Vi? I got th' kettle on th' 'ob. Won't take more'n 'arf a minnit—'

Vivienne said nothing, only looked at the men who wanted to marry her.

Murdoch Reynolds said breathlessly: 'Can't be done. ... Got to get away at once.... I mean, a party conference, you know.'

Gerrard Fyson was just as urgent if a trifle more finished:

'So sorry,' he said, 'But I've driven things too fine as it is. I'm afraid I must rush.'

There was an uneasy silence. Vivienne lotting at these lovers. The men who had wanted to love her looked at anything but her.

Slowly she moved to the door.

'Can vou find your way to my car?' she asked quietly. 'Well, Dixon will drop you anywhere you ask.  And tell him he needn't come back. I'll take, a taxi.'

She held the door open to them. As they went began to mutter apologies again, but she said evenly:

'I thought it fair that you should know…'

They did not even think how brave and decent that had been— these men who had wanted to marry her. All they thought of was the narrowness of their escape... That girl's charms and cleverness and apparent breeding, had nearly trapped them into ruining themselves in the eyes of their great world. For, as Murdoch Reynolds muttered to Sir Gerrard Fyson: 'Whatever she herself is, there would always be that behind her. We could never live it down...'

Sir Gerrard not merely nodded, but swore a most emphatic agreement. He was furious with Vivienne for nearly dragging him down.

Vivienne stood holding the door, her lovely face blank and proud, staring straight ahead with unseeing eyes. It was rather sense than knowledge that told her that only two men had passed out— that there was too long a pause before the escape of the third.

She turned to find Tony, Viscount Vraile, hatless, sitting on the arm of a wooden chair, chatting to Ma Little like an old friend.

'Aren't— aren't you going, too, Tony?' she asked huskily.

'Eh?' he said, turning round in surprise. 'Well— no. If you and Mrs. Little don't mind, I'd rather stay and have that cup of tea.'

Mr Little clucked in sheer delight, and ran to the hob.

'The others,' Vivienne said gently as she came close to him, 'have gone while the going's good.'

He eyed her frankly, smiling: 'What's that got to do with me, Vivienne?'

'Don't you understand, Tony,' she said huskily. 'They saw I was— was impossible. This is the home I was bred in. I was part and parcel of this for all my youth... I'm of the slums, the same as those kids playing outside.... The same as Ma and Dad Little here. And they— they'll always be here. They don't want to move away to some better place. This is home to them…  even if it is the slums and— and I mean to remain their daughter.'

'I dont see that it makes a scrap of difference,' he said quietly.

'It did to them,' Vivienne said, nodding towards the door through which Murdoch Reynolds and Gerrard Fyson had hurried.

'Oh— them,' he shrugged.

'Tony,' she breathed. 'You're a lord and there's your family.'

'I'm in love with a great lady,' he said gravely. 'An even greater lady than I suspected 20 minutes ago.'

She made an adorable movement towards him, checked:

'Tony,' she breathed, 'Think... your family— what will they say to my father and mother?'

You count more than anything anybody can say— and I like your mother and father,' he smiled.

'You ougher tell him the real truth, Vi ... We ain't 'er Ma and Pa, me Lord.... Not reely. She was got off a ship wot sunk.... my ole— me 'usband was bo'sun o' the ship wot did the rescuing like. There were'nt none others saved. They were going ter put 'er in a orphanage, nobody owning 'er, yer see, but Little .... my ole man, that is, couldn't bear that, 'im 'aving taken such a liking ter the little thing on the way ter port So, as we 'ad no chicks of our own, we 'dopted 'er... But it'a our belief 'er folks were gentlefolks. Look at the lady she's become. I mean ter say... It stands ter reason she couldn't 'a got that from the likes of us.'

Tony, Lord Vraile looked at her smiling, looked at the fine face of the man on the bed. He took Ma Little's hand and patted it.

'Don't quite agree there, you know,' he said quietly. 'I think she's got quite a lot from you.'

'Tony!' Vivienne cried huskily.

'Oh— I'm not funning, Vi,' he said. 'I mean— darn it all character means a hang sight more than accent, doesn't it?'

'Tony,' she whispered with dangerously bright eyes. 'You're— you're rather wonderful.'

'Lord, no,' he said embarrassed. 'Just an ordinary, human sort of chump...'

There was a splutter and hiss from the bob.

'Hallo, the old kettle's boiling over. Now you sit and talk to Vi, Mrs. Little. I'm a dab at making tea.'

He was too. He knew all the mysteries from warming the pot onward

Ma Little came beaming back from him, to whisper. 'Oughtn't I get out me best service, Vi, darlin'— the one I'm keeping fer yer Dad's burying? Think 'e'd mind waiting  while I rinsed it at the sink…?'

'He wouldn't,' Vivienne smiled softly, 'but he won't mind your every day mugs either... Put them out.'

'Oh— I couldn't— 'im being a lord.... Not that 'e seems one.'

'He's more than a lord,' Vivienne said. 'He's a great gentleman...'

She went to help her future husband make the tea.

_____________________

10: The Thing of Brass

Australian Worker (Sydney) 28 Feb 1934

GEORGE TOVEY went missing on March 9, 1931. He said: 'Well, good night all,' to the office at large, and walked out into the blue.

There was no reason for his disappearance. He was a big, stolid, chap holding a safe clerical job with a firm of dental instrument makers. There was no woman in the case, he was solidly marrried to a nice girl, two children and a Baby Oxtin.

There were no financial worries. He had never been rackety like his younger brother Vernon, who wasted his life, to George's disgust, wandering in little-known places. Nor had Vernon anything to do with his vanishment, since Vernon had been lost to knowledge for four years. And it wasn't health, either.

There was no explanation at all. He had just left at the normal time for going home in the normal way, and had gone out of sight. No search could find him, the police could not trace his movements. Broadcasting could not locate him.

At the end of eight days he arrived home at his usual hour, apparently of the opinion that he had come straight from his office. He was startled at his wife's hysterics, and it took quite a time to convince him that there was an eight day blank in his life.

He knew nothing at all of what had happened between his leaving the office and arriving home. He was quite sound in health, mentally and physically, but he simply did not know where he had been or what he had been doing during those eight days. Nor was there anything about him to give a clue. His clothes were certainly very grubby and dusty. They looked as ithough he had been perspiring a great deal, but they were the same clothes, even to the contents of the pockets— he hadn't, for instance, spent any money.

There was just one difference, though. Under his waistcoat, stuck through the loop of his braces, was a curious brass instrument. It was a sort of elaborate poker. It had a handle carved primitively, with weird, and rather wicked figures, and from this handle there stuck a thin spike— but what it was and how he had got it George Tovey hadn't the slightest knowledge. It was the sort of curio Vernon brought home from his travels, he thought.

Millie, his wife, agreed, but protested that Vernon had never brought this thing to the house or that she had ever set eyes on it before. If was plain that George must have picked it up in his blind wanderings, perhaps in the East End, but where and how, seeing he'd spent nothing, nobody could guess, and he could not tell them.

The blankness of his mind was amazing. He did, after seeing the brass poker thing, mutter something about Vernon being in trouble, but he didn't know why he said it. And since Vernon wasn't in England of even traceable, he agreed in time that probably the sight of the poker thing had merely brought Vernon to his mind.

IN fact, the, whole affair, including how he had existed for eight days on nothing, was a mystery, and since he was unable to solve it they had to fall back on temporary loss of memory through some cause unknown. His firm accepted that. His doctor certified him cured and in sound health, and, since he was a good worker, he was taken back. And there was no reason to fear. He slipped into his humdrum groove as though nothing had happened— or would again.

Nothing did, and the thing was practically forgotten when his brother Vernon returned to England more than two years later.

Vernon was as casual in his own way as George. He just turned up as though, finding himsellf passing the end of the street, he thought he might as well drop in. He arrived during the evening meal, and was as offhand about his adventures, in Africa this time, as George was about his office day.

It was only when they went into the sitting-room and he saw the brass poker thing hanging on the wall that he cried out: 'Good Lord!' and looked queerly at his elder brother.

Little Mrs. Tovey asked: 'Do you know. what that is, Vernon?'

'Do I know?' he gasped. 'By jove, I do— it's the Ogboni!'

'What's that?' asked George.

Vernon stared at .him quite a tiihe before saying deliberately:

'It's a big ju-ju— a powerful fetish instrument of the Hausa people, of Africa. The most powerful talisman of its kind. The man, usually the priest-chief who holds that, has absolute command over the tribesmen…. the, power of life and death.... It's— it's amazing that you should have one, George. Few Europeans ever see it, and no tribe will part with it— if it can help it. How did you get it?'

George, thinking young Vernon had grown queerly excited over it, answered: 'That's what I'd like to know myself.'

And he told, of his loss of memory.

He expected young Vernon to be interested; well, a little, anyhow, even though his own adventures were so much more thrilling. He was quite startled by the wonder and awe in Verhon's eyes.

'The 9th March, 1931,' he gasped. 'Good heavens!' And as George blinked at his violence: 'On that date I was a prisoner condemned to death by the little-known Hausa tribe that owned that Ogboni.'

'That Ogboni? You're cracked, Vernon,' George frowned.

'I feel— cracked,' his brother said. 'But it's true— because it was you, using that Ogboni; who saved my life.'

'Me!' gasped George. 'Don't be a fool!'

'You— absolutely you.'

'But— you're crazy. I've never been out of England.'

He paused, remembering his eight-day blankness.

'Even— no, I wouldn't have had time to get to Africa and back... even if it was sense.'

'No,' Vernon said, huskily. 'You wouldn't have— and I don't think you did, in. any ordinary way. And and it isn't sense — only this is what happened. I'd taken a chance exploring this unknown belt, and this Hausa tribe had caught me. They decided to 'chop' me. They had a taboo against white men. They flung, me into a dark, smelly hut, and I knew it was the end for me. But they didn't kill me at once, partly 'because they also had a taboo against saqrificing sick victims to their ju-jus, and I had had a bad touch of bush fever.

'Well, I lay in that hut semi-delirious, and had, the most amazing dream. Because I knew it was all up with me I naturally started thinking of home and you. Then, as the fever got. a stronger hold, I reverted to being a kid in a scrape, and started calling on you to come and get me out of this hole, as I used to when we were boys. I worked myself up into a light-headed sort of madness calling and calling on you. And then, there you were, standing beside me in that beastly hut, wearing your city clothes, even your bowler hat, and asking in your sober way what the trouble was; and what you could do for me.

'In my delirium it seemed all very natural. There seemed nothing at all out of the way in your sitting there, just as you are now, discussing what was the best thing to do. In the end we decided that the only hope was for you to control these savages through their superstitions. I said to you: "If you can only get hold of their Ogboni you can force them to do anything you command."

'And you said, in your matter-of-fact way: "Right-o. I'll do that."

'And out you went to get Ogboni, as though you were only going across the road to buy a stamp, The next thing I remembered was your coming back with that in your hand.'

Vernon pointed to the poker thing on the wall. 'You said: "is this it? .What do I do with it?"  I told you to go to the door of the hut, and hold it up, and call the chief.

'It worked splendidly. The chief came crawling. You had only to shake Ogboni at him and he grovelled. I told you to tell him to cut my bonds and have me taken to a healthier hut. And you did. Yes, that was odd, you spoke this Hausa dialect even better than I.

'Those savages dared not disobey. They nursed and fed and treated me so well that in about three days' I was strong enough to be moved. Then, still using the power of Ogboni, you forced them to provide a carrier party, and take me through the jungle to the nearest friendly village.

'When I came to I was being well looked after in that village, but you weren't there, and, with my senses back, I decided it had all been a dream, that I must have managed to make my escape from the Hausas in my delirium and that the rest was a fever fantasy. And I've thought that until now.'

'Well, what else could it have been?' George grunted.

'But— don't you see. You vanished utterly at exactly the same time as I called on you for help.'

'Don't be an ass,' said George. 'D'you mean, to say I hopped over to Africa without knowing— or remembering a thing?'

'I don't know how it happened— only— well, explain how you got that Ogboni.'

'Must be a dozen explanations,' shrugged George. 'All I know is, yours is darn silly. Why, for one thing I wouldn't have had time...'

'Time wouldn't count in the flight of the spirit.'

'Now you're talking absolute rot,' sniffed George. 'Why, the only Negro I ever remember seeing was a comic old thing with red triangles painted over his eyebrows, a snake tattooed on his chest, and a lion skin round his waist. Must have been some wild man in a circus when I was a kid—'

'No,' said Vernon. 'Not when you were a kid— that was the chief of this Hausa tribe.'

____________________

11: The Novena

Catholic Freeman's Journal (Sydney) 13 June 1935

'I DON'T want to be sentimental about this,' said the visitor, and his grey face grew even more repressed at the mere idea. 'I am not a sentimental man.'

One did not have to know such a money magnate. His reputation was forced upon one by every paper that fawned upon or railed at tight-fisted wealth. Pity was a vice to such a man.

'I'm really wondering why you visit me?' the priest asked.

He was more than wondering. He was thinking it unique. He gazed out of his windows at the row of small villas that made up his district. There was no abject poverty here to salve a conscience, nor wealth to suggest business advantages. Just a humdrum, suburban dormitory, existing in reasonable comfort between the upper millstone of Income Tax and the nether one of the Dole. The sort of neighborhood where even death was an inevitable convention in a placid life, rather than a tragedy.

'Have you a man named Hyden among your parishioners?' was all the millionaire said.

'Lawrence Hyden, you mean?' Father Bottrill asked in surprise. 'Lives at Coniston. Woodfold Gardens?'

Gregory Roth's grimness seemed to tighten up at Father Bottrill's recognition of the name. But all he said was:

'Tell me about him.'

'Unusual,' the priest objected.

'I'll tell you about it, if he's the man,' Gregory Roth said.

'You don't know him, then?— Or— what is it?'

'You'll see later. Tell me about him. It's quite alright.'

'What do you want to know? I mean there's nothing much to tell. He's a very ordinary person.'

'Everything about him. He has a family?'

'A big family of six, only one boy; and all very young.'

'And the youngest girls are no more than babies,' Gregory put in.

'You know?' said Father Bottrill. 'But—'

'Go on,' said the millionaire; his face looked greyer. 'What's his position? — that, sort of thing.'

'What is there to say? He— his family— even his circumstances are very ordinary. I mean, the whole neighborhood is made up of Hydens. Men of about forty, going to the city every day; some sort of higher clerical job, or a little firm of their own, you know. The only difference is he hasn't a 'Baby car; has too many human babies for'that, I suppose.'

He paused, expecting some response for his small quip. But Gregory Roth either didn't know the suburbs or was not in the mood for jokes, small or large.

Father Bottrill went on with a sigh:

'It really is difficult to say much. He's not a bad chap, Hyden— probably a very decent chap if one knew him well, but one can't know them all well— so many of them— so similar. His kids seem jolly. Yes, he looks after them well, careful about schools and clothes, and so on; but then they're all like that. The house is one in a road of semi-detached villas, well kept, but again, they all are. There's solid self-respect in such people that keep things secret. And— well— What more can I say? I don't know. He's just one in a multitude.'

Gregory Roth stared at him with lightened lips, then said with reluctance, 'Hard up?'

'Eh?' blinked Father Bottrill. 'What makes you ask?'

'Is he?'

'I simply don't know,' the priest said. 'I've seen no sign of it. Not that that means anything. Most about here have been hit by the financial depression. Only, well, they're not the kind to show it. it's a sort of pluck they have— just tighten up the belt, but make no outward show.'

'H'm!' mumbled Gregory Roth.

'I assure you it's a fact,' Father Bottrill said as though he'd been doubted. 'I can tell you casg after case of real distress never exposed.'

'Quite. But I'm only concerned with Hyden. You don't know whether he's hard up? Not even though he has six children?'

'He's less likely to show it, with six children. He'd keep it from them— afraid of spoiling their morals, you see. He'd show an even braver face to the world for the sake of those children. You understand what I mean?'

'No. But I can follow your argument. So you don't know. Do you know if he's ill?'

'Ill?' Father Bottrill wondered what the man was driving at. 'I don't think he is.'

'But you don't know?'

'Well, I should say he isn't. He still goes daily to the city. As a matter of fact l met him yesterday.'

'And that means nothing,' Gregory Roth said. 'The type you describe would still go to the city, though they were dying— if they could.'

'Why, yes. I think you're right there,' the priest agreed. 'They'd go on as long as they could stand on their feet— for the sake of their families.' He stared hard at the millionaire.

'Do you mean Hyden's like that.'

'I believe he is,' Gregory Roth said, and again he seemed reluctant.

'You mean— I say, do you employ Hyden?'

'No. I neither know of nor have met the man,' the millionaire said, as though to suggest any connection was an affront.

Father Bottrill could only stare bewildered. The millionaire sat eyeing him firmly and coldly, wondering, it seemed, If the priest would, dare to think him a fool. He said after a bleak discouraging moment.

'I suppose you're one of those who believe in prayer.'

'My cloth would argue it,' the priest smiled. 'But apart from that I do— personally. Many people do.'

'I don't,' the millionaire said. His tone left no doubt about his personal opinion of such rubbish. 'And that's what makes it so— odd.'

He saw a quickening in Father Bottrill's eyes, and said cuttingly: 'Look here, I won't have you think I've gone daft. I haven't. It's only because the thing's a nuisance. But you'd better have the hard facts. Perhaps you noticed a week or so ago I figured in the news— an industrial merger. The Sunday papers were ridiculous about it.'

'Seventy millions made in a single deal. Wasn't that it?'

'An absurd suggestion,' the man snapped. 'Still, there was a deal, and I made a lot of money. The Sunday papers had their front pages full of it. And on Sunday afternoon this infernal thing began.'

'This thing connected with Hyden?'

'I didn't know he was Hyden then— just a man who— who got into my— thoughts.'

He looked at the priest ready to glare down a smile. 'I was resting in the afternoon. I generally do— sitting back thinking things out. Most fruitful— usually. You mustn't think I was asleep. I never sleep in the day— what's the night for? Well, I was sitting like that, thinking over this coup of mine, naturally; then I realised I was with another man who was also thinking of it.'

'With?'

'I can't attempt to explain. The thing's too unspecific and absurd. It seemed this; I was sitting back in my chair, and he was sitting back in his— somewhere, in some other house; only somehow we were together, because, I suppose, we were thinking of the same thing. A Sunday newspaper lay across his knees. He had read of my coup and was envying me.'

'Envy? I thought you said prayer was in this?'

'Well, I won't say envy, then. No, not envy, because the man was in agony. His actual thoughts were, as I felt then, 'if I only had a fraction of that money— only a fraction!— It would save the kids. Dying wouldn't be so fearful then.'

He glared at Father Bottrill. 'If you expect me to give any more explanation than that, you're not going to get it. You must, take it from me that the thing wasn't a dream, that I had an actual sense of it being real. I'm not going to enter into any argument, about the psychic.'

'That's all right,' said the priest. 'I'm really more worried about; your word "dying." If this, was Hyden, how do you know? You see, it's the first I've heard of it, for, as I say, I met him yesterday; and even as far as his wife and family go— well I'm pretty confident they don't know either.'

'I knew.' Gregory Roth frowned. 'I don't know how I knew, definitely, that he had been to a specialist during the week, that he had been told that he had an incurable growth, and that he had— has— only a few months to live.'

He frowned. 'Believe me, I have no doubts about it whatever — that is, unless you are going to prove me wrong. In this— er— experience the man sat in terrible agony, worrying about his wife, worrying about his children, wondering what would become of them when he was dead.'

'And wishing he had only a fraction of the coup, you had just made to make their security a certainty,' the priest said.

'Yes,' the millionaire frowned. 'That is— that's how he fastened on me, I suppose. Seemed wrong to him that I should have so much, when he was in such dire straits. He'd been losing in business, a small business, hit by the slump. He'd been using up on his savings, draining himself to keep family and office going; and now, when most of those savings had gone, he was going to die. The family he'd educated to live comfortably would have nothing. Their future tortured him.'

'Poor fellow— six children— five girls, too,' Father Bottrill mused. 'He's brought them up with such hope. No wonder he prayed for a fraction of your success.'

'Prayed?' Gregory Roth snapped agnostically.

'Something brought you here,' Father Bottrill said gently.

'Well, if you like— he prayed. He's been doing it off and on even as he sat thinking of me, wishing he had a fraction of my money; and after a time he also went over to the corner of tho room and knelt down before a picture of a woman.'

'A picture of Our Lady?'

'Eh? The Virgin? No, it wasn't her. Someone younger. He prayed for an hour. All his dread of the poverty and the future of his. children in it. It was terrible!'

'You heard his prayer?' demanded Father Bottrill.

'I couldn't help it. I couldn't get my mind away from him,' Gregory Roth said petulantly. 'Haven't been able to get it away for the last nine days.'

'A novena,' the priest tried to explain.

'I don't know what that means,' the millionaire said, and then his frayed nerves made him suddenly fluent. 'But the fellow had been at me all the time. Sometimes three or four times a day the experience is repeated. It catches me in the oddest hours.'

'Men can pray at all hours,' Father Bottrill said. 'Odd or otherwise.'

'Too odd for me,' Gregory Roth snapped. 'The thing's a plague; always getting between me and things of real importance, always holding up before me the fact that I who had so much money already, had been given so much more, though I have no children, no anxieties, while he who has the anxieties of six children has nothing. As though that put me under some obligation.'

'Perhaps it does,' the priest said quietly.

'Nonsense,' Gregory Roth said. 'Finance would be in a pretty queer state if it were run on those lines. But I'm not here to argue ethics. I'm here to stop the thing. My nerves won't stand much more of it.'

'How?'

'I wan't you to find out if it's all really true, not a mere— mere fantasy.'

'But your curiously close knowledge of Lawrence Hyden convinces me it is true.' The priest's' eyes twinkled. 'Even apart from my quite unscientific belief in prayer. And how did you know he was Hyden, and that he lived in my parish, by the way?'

Gregory Roth frowned for a moment.

'I don't know,' he admitted. 'Apart from the fact that I seemed to realise his name instinctively, and the district he lived in, and that he was a Catholic, you being the local priest seemed the right, person for enquiries.'

'It does seem inevitable,' the priest smiled. 'And you want me to find out if Hyden is really dying, and so convince you that the experience is not fantasy all the way through?'

'That wouldn't end it,' Gregory Roth said. 'I mean I've got to be rid of the thing. The whole business is absurd; but if the man is dying, if his family does face this wreckage, it's plain that I'm never going to get it off my mind unless I do something.'

'A fraction of that coup to make his children secure?' the priest asked.

'Something like that,' Gregory Roth said in defensive tones. 'After all, I'm wealthy enough to buy my comfort.'

'You want me to see to this— to see Hyden—'

'If you will. Discreetly, of course. I don't want to appear a bigger fool than needs be.'

THREE DAYS later Father Bottrill sat in Gregory Roth's office.

'Your experience was correct,' he said. 'Lawrence Hyden has received his death sentence. He has only six months to live. He was startled when I drew it out of him. Not even his wife knows yet; he is too brave to tell her— and perhaps not brave enough.'

'And his affairs?'

'As you thought. He leaves his family penniless.'

The hard lips tightened.

'How much would safeguard them?'

'He told me he had made a novena for a certain sum,' began the priest, and stopped and looked at the millionaire. Gregory Roth met his look half angrily for a minutes, shrugged, took a cheque book from a drawer and wrote.

'Yes, that is the sum he prayed for,' Father Bottrill said softly. 'Odd how prayers are answered, isn't it?'

'Oh, prayer!' said the millionaire. He stood up impatiently to show the priest to the door.

Half way across the room Father Bottrill paused apologetically. He handed across a picture.

'What is this!' the millionaire snapped.

'Oh! the picture of the woman he prayed to.

'Who is she?'

'A Carmelite saint,' the priest said— 'St. Therese of Lisieux. We call her "The Little Flower." '

Father Bottrill put. out his hand for the return of the picture, but Gregory Roth said; 'H'm! Interesting. Do you mind if I keep it?'

Father Bottrill, smiling, left it with him; he had rather hoped he'd have to.

________________________

12: Sylvia is Freed!

Pearson’s Magazine, March 1925

Australian Women's Weekly, 17 Aug 1935

TWO native boys, with the physique of wrestlers, plucked me away from Guttie's desk at the moment when there seemed nothing for it but to smash his fat, raw, leering face. They ran me right out into the porch and flung me down the steps. I landed in the arms of a tall, highly-embroidered mandarin of the Yellow Girdle clan, slid down him, and sat hard on his felt slippers.

With quite astonishing ease— for I am no bantam— he lifted me to my feet, rescued my sun-hat, and with the wonderful charm of the smiling Chinaman presented it to me with:

"Deign to cover your honorable head from the hungry sun, Mister Alban Procter. Those hoodlums haven't hurt you?"

That was my first meeting with the remarkable young man, Cheleeman. You have nearly the whole of him there. Charming, kindly, aristocratic, immensely powerful, and mentally a strange combination of the subtle East and the straightforwardness of the American University, where he had been schooled.

"I don't think I know you," I said, straightening myself out. "But thanks all the same."

"Why should you know so mean a personality?" he smiled. "My meaningless and insignificant name is Cheleeman."

"But you know me," I said. I was too young at the Treaty Port to appreciate the immense power of that name.

"I know you," he said gravely. "I am for all time your slave."

I took in the richness of his dress, the meaning of his mandarin button.

"I don't think this is my moment for feeling so important a person," I grinned irritably.

"No," he said, and he regarded Guttie's house and then me. "You should have remembered that when you tackle a tiger in his den you should take a second gunman."

"Look here," I said staring, "you seem to know a lot about me. Seeing I've never met or heard of you—"

"Without going out of doors one may know the whole world— especially in China," he smiled. "That is my bus there," he went on, pointing to a RollsRoyce a little way away. "Let us talk the things we have to talk about in comfort."

SETTLED back in the luxurious cushions of that fine car while a stoic chauffeur in neat uniform whirled us forward at the thoroughly reckless pace of native drivers, I stared at Cheleeman. He was tall and he was young. He had the fine, calm features and the not too oblique eyes of the Manchu. He had that sense of placid force, courage and intelligence proper to his class, with a touch of alertness and crispness begot of an education in the United States. His smile gave him the immense attractiveness of all high-bred Chinamen.

"Why are you interested in me?" I asked him, puzzled.

"More than interested, Mr. Procter. I said I was your slave. It is true," he said smiling, but very serious.

"Oh, come now," I smiled back. "I feel honored that you should say it to an inconspicuous person like me—"

He laughed in a quick, silent zest.

"I understand how easy it is to feel a bond between us," he said. "You have quickly realised the convention of my race, the, to you, flowery language and the humbleness of diction—"

"All virtues have their source in etiquette," I said quietly.

"Ah, you have studied Confucius," he said, putting his hand on my knee. "So few of your race take the trouble —that is why so few realise those am-bitions which they aspire to through intercourse with us. You add to my obligation."

"I know of no such obligation."

"No, and yet a week ago, when a sampan was upset in the river, you plunged into the water, and, at considerable risk, to yourself, for the alligators were already scenting prey, you pulled an old Chinaman to the safety of the bank."

"Yes, I did that," I said, puzzled. "But any man—"

"There were several white men who might have done it, but only you thought an old 'Chink' was worth the risk. Yet that old 'Chink' was some-body's father, and we Chinamen have a deep and holy reverence for our parents—"

"He was your father?" I cried, beginning to understand.

"It is so, Mr. Procter, and therefore I am your beholden slave for the rest of my life." We swept through lovely gardens such as only the patient care of Chinamen can create, and drew up before a splendid house.

"This is my wretched abode," he said. "Will you condescend to waste a few of the precious moments of your time in it?... And I've got some tophole, pre-war Scotch worth sampling."

In a superb room full of beautiful lacquer, bronze, jade, and silk we drank modern whisky beside a gilt dragon desk that carried a telephone. After some moments spent in the calm of a Buddha, Cheleeman said startlingly:

"Guttie was absolutely obdurate over the Pyne debt then?"

"Great Scott!" I gasped. "How do you even know about that debt?"

"I know all that the bazaar whispers, and that is much," he smiled. "And Guttie's attitude... Putrid flesh has but one flavor. He will not let go what he holds. He is a scoundrel— Guttie— but much familiarity with infamy has taught him how to make his crimes unassailably legal."

"It's legal all right," I growled; "the law will even aid him to recover the ten thousand dollars old Pyne owes him— however he got hold of them."

"I DON'T think Guttie had to cheat— very much," said Cheleeman blandly. "Give old Pyne half a dozen pegs and a pack of cards or a roulette wheel and he can be guaranteed to gamble away even his hope in the hereafter."

"That's not exacth my worry," I said. "I don't mind old Pyne being ruined, kicked into the gutter, hounded out of the white set. That's his pigeon. It's because the whole thing is aimed devilishly at someone else—"

"I know," smiled Cleleeman. "As our proverb says, 'It is the beautiful bird that gets caged.' "

"Look here—" I snapped.

"My friend," he said smoothly, "remember I am your friend. And since Miss Sylvia Pyne is enfolded in the honor of your friendship—"

"We will leave the lady's name out," I growled stiffly.

"Can we?"

"No, by heavens we can't!" I cried. "The thing was bad enough before, I mean the debt that that cur holds over old Pyne, but now that he has suddenly brought Sylvia into it, offered to take her hand in full payment—"

"You are wrong— about the suddenness of it, Alban Procter," he said smoothly. He saw my anger boiling up. "Our dishonorable and hateful Guttie has had his mind obsessed by the beauty of Miss Sylvia for many years. He has already tried to win her with his highly inadequate charms twice before.... Oh, before you came out here to join the Administration, Mr. Alban. Each time the exquisite and high-minded lady has," his eyes twinkled, "handed him the frozen mitt. Naturally she would. Guttie is ugly, he has a repulsive heart, he is a man of mixed breed, he is a scoundrel. So since she would not come to his cooing, he determined she should yield to his whip. And that was so easy to manage, seeing her father is that old, besotted Pyne."

"BUT to force a girl to marry him against her feelings, it's hideous, illegal, horrible—"

"The hammering of old Pyne, with his complete ruin and hers, will be perfectly legal. And he will do it."

"Yes," I groaned, "he's that type of brute; he'll do it."

"Unless Miss Sylvia consents to the alternative."

"But she can't; it's loathsome. She won't—"

"She won't? Then why did you force your interview on Guttie, Alban Procter?"

"You know too much, you see too much," I growled at him, but, as his interest was obviously friendly: "Well, what can you expect? She's not made of iron. Even though she hates the brute, she can't see her father ruined. You yourself must know how she feels."

"Not at all," he said blandly. "I am an Oriental, you know. Our outlook on women is not the same as yours. For her I do not see this as a tragedy."

"But—but your bringing me here? I thought you were interested in her."

"Oh, no; in you. It is you who saved my honored father."

"Then— then— how? Why?"

"You love Miss Sylvia, Alban Procter."

"You know that?"

"Oh, yes; Guttie knows it too. He has tried to get you removed. You were reprimanded for your handling of the Ting quarter row the other day; you were bewildered by that reprimand. That was Guttie's work. He is very powerful and cunning, within his limits. He wishes you to be removed up-country."

"He is afraid of me— good!"

"Merely physically." smiled Chelee-man. "He fears you may hurt him, even kill him. Otherwise he is not afraid. He has Miss Sylvia in the hollow of his hand, and nothing you can do can save her— he is certain of that."

"And what can I do, outside beating him up?" I groaned. "His position is within the law. What can we do?"

"If you would condescend to allow me the favor of offering my miserable aid, Alban Procter."

"You think you can help?"

"I foresaw that I might obtain my happy opportunity of aiding the man who had saved my father's life when I perceived how your mind turned to Miss Sylvia and noted Guttie's plottings against you. That is why I am so well informed. That is why I am prepared already to help. Yes, in my mean way, I think I can help."

"You can? You will? I am eternally grateful. How?"

"I will ask you all to dinner, that is it," he beamed. "You and Guttie and Miss Sylvia and old Pyne shall come to dinner at my inadequate house."

I goggled amazement at him. "But how will that help?" I gasped.

"We shall see."

"And in any case that brute won't come."

"He will come. He is clever, he is powerful; but a mandarin of the Yellow Girdle is more powerful."

THAT dinner was the queerest meal I have ever sat at. It was a delicious meal, its lovely dishes, in sequences of fours as a well-regulated Chinese meal must be, were served sumptuously amid lovely surroundings. And Cheleeman was a suave and delightful host. The queerness of the meal came from us Europeans—if one can count Guttie a European, since he had the taints of half a dozen bloods, Oriental and otherwise, in him.

And I suppose the greatest dash of queerness came from Guttie. Old Pyne, for all his gambler ways, had breeding, and was as polished and urbane as Cheleeman, even in the face of his enemy. Sylvia was her father's daughter. She was reserved, but her quick beauty and charm of manner carried things off gallantly. I sat mainly quiet, an interested spectator— but Guttie, Guttie was uneasy. He was alternately suspicious and fearful, bold and blustering.

He tried to bully Cheleeman when he saw who his fellow-guests were. He wanted to know if this was a trap, if this was a conference to try and get round him, the rich and terrible Guttie. If so, Cheleeman was wasting his dinner. He knew exactly where he held the whip handle, and he wasn't letting go.

Cheleeman talked of Chinese prints. Exquisitely, smoothly, with all the subtlety of his race, he left Guttie in the air. Guttie tried again and again to get back to the topic; the bland, easy power of Cheleeman always headed him off. It was when he realised the mastery of this apparently smooth and simple mandarin of the Yellow Girdle that he began to get anxious. His gross and flabby face began to suffer heavily from perspiration. He looked frequently at the boys who hovered about serving the meal, noting how muscular they all were. He took to staring at the imperturbable Cheleeman with a touch of awe in his anxiety.

HE had, up to this, considered the mandarin a mere Chink, someone a fellow of his astute brains could easily trick. He had come to the meal because even a man of his financial force had to keep in the good graces of the clan of the Yellow Girdle, however much he felt contempt for the easy-going local head. Now he began to have doubts about Cheleeman's easiness. The smooth way that the polished young Chinese had him baffled at every turn taught him that there was steel under the silk of his manner.

When we withdrew to the lovely little room in which Cheleeman's desk stood, his quaking flesh was aware of danger, though his evil, grasping will was still resolute.

"Perhaps this is a better place to talk business, Mr. Guttie," Cheleeman sighed, after a servant had set sweet-meats, pipes, cigarettes, and liqueurs before each of us.

"Business?" snarled Guttie. "Who said I wanted to talk business?"

"Surely yourself," smiled Cheleeman. "You have mentioned it often enough during the evening."

Guttie glared round at us all. "All right then, but we won't have any darned flowery Chinese diplomacy about this. I just want to know what sort of trap you think you've got me into."

"Shall we call it a trap for your warm heart?" said Cheleeman, smiling.

"My warm Hell!" sneered Guttie. "I'm not even trying to understand what you're driving at."

"It is simple," said Cheleeman calmly. "We all meet here— friends. One of us is under certain obligations to you. Might it not be possible to discuss that obligation in a kindly spirit and find some way—"

"Have it without frills," snapped Guttie. "The little thing you call an obligation is a ten thousand dollar debt owed to me. I can't see any sort of kindly discussion that is going to alter the full force of that."

"Even when one takes into consideration the way the debt arose?"

"You mean it is a gambling debt?" sneered Guttie. "Well, losses at cards have to be honored as well as others."

"Even when these cards, were, shall we say, too expertly manipulated?"

"You accusing me of cheating?" snarled Guttie, rising. "It's a lie; you have no proof—"

"And the mere saying of that is proof enough," smiled Cheleeman. "And as for not having proof—"

"I've had enough of this," said Guttie truculently. "Tell your boy to call my car. I'm going."

"So," smiled Cheleeman, but he did not move, and, as Guttie did, two very large Chinamen came through the one door of the room, slid the heavy teak panel which closed it across the opening, turned the key, and then stood as motionless as statues before it, barring the way.

GUTTIE'S flabby face went sallow, but he said brazenly: "That's the game, is it? Well, I didn't come unprepared."

He reached his hand slowly hip-wards, produced a large automatic pistol, and with a wolfish grin pointed it at the bland Chinaman's head. Sylvia gasped, I prepared to spring— Cheleeman sat and smiled.

"You will open that door," snarled Guttie. Cheleeman continued to smile. "I will count ten—"

"Why always ten?" said Cheleeman. "It lacks imagination. Why not seven or five or three— or one—"

Guttie gasped, started, stared at the pistol— pulled the trigger.

"You dog!" he snarled. He had reason. No explosions came.

"When dealing with honorable gentlemen of your kind, the wise take precautions," Cheleeman said, quite pleasantly.

"But this pistol has been in my pocket all evening—"

"I never rob a guest in my house. But— you had a new barber this evening at yours."

Guttie gave vent to a little snarling cry that voiced his fear of Cheleeman and the power behind him. He hunched his bull-body as though to charge. I rose, fists ready. Cheleeman, still smiling, put out that strong arm of his and held me to my seat. And Guttie did not charge. Two big Chinese moved from the recesses of the room— one never knows where the Orient has secret doors— and stood beside the big blackguard. They only held, each, a wrist, but Guttie, panting and writh-ing, could not tear himself free.

"Well!" he gasped. "Well, what's the game, hey? What do you think you are going to get out of this, hey?"

"We will go back to our discussion of this debt—"

"We won't!" Guttie raged. "Understand, you may have trapped me, you may kill me— but that debt is going to be paid, to the last farthing."

"Nothing will alter that?"

"One thing," he jeered. "The girl knows what it is."

Sylvia hid her face in her hands. I snapped, "You cur, stop that!"

"Apart from that," said Cheleeman smoothly, "it is to be you alone who decides on the payment?"

"And I decide that the payment will be in full. Ten thousand dollars to the last dollar."

"And cent?" smiled the Chinese.

"Aye, to the last copper cash," snarled Guttie. "You get me?"

"Perfectly. But even you might be satisfied with part payment."

I WAS wondering why Cheleeman should so harp on that point. It was as though he were manoeuvring Guttie to say something. When Guttie burst out, "When I'm satisfied. I'll let you know all right." I saw that he had achieved his mysterious end, for he smiled his bland smile on us and said. "You heard that. He will tell us when he is satisfied in the matter of payment."

"What's behind that?" asked Guttie suspiciously.

"Why, nothing, my friend. Merely that on those terms we are ready to begin paying now."

Guttie was no less startled than the rest of us. Sylvia looked up with a quick light of hope in her lovely eyes. Old Pyne stirred in a sort of uncom-fortable surprise. I was rigid with astonishment. As for Guttie, he just gaped and growled: "You're going to pay me— now?"

"In this very room."

"The whole of the ten thousand dollars?"

"In your own words, every copper cash of it— or as much as you care to take," smiled Cheleeman.

Old Pyne, being what he was, protested at another shouldering his burden. S0 did Sylvia. Guttie, with a lowering face, snarled:

"Where's the trick in it?"

"Why trick?" beamed the Chinese. I mean all I say. The ten thousand dollars will be yours if you take it. Go to that desk. You will see that I have already prepared a receipt for you. All it needs is your signature— when you are satisfied."

Guttie went to the dragon desk. He stared down at a sheet of paper there.

He started:

"My own letter paper?"

"And the typing was done with your own typewriter; note the defective 'e.' You see, I wished to make it absolutely in form, as it is, even down to the receipt stamp."

Guttie, still staring at the paper, snarled: "It doesn't name the sum?"

"No, it is just a final discharge of Mr. Pyne's debt to you. I thought that perhaps you might not feel called upon to take the entire sum, considering all the circumstances, including the way you won it."

"We'll see about that," said Guttie shrilly.

Yes, I think we'd better see," beamed Cheleeman. He made a sign. Guttie was at once sitting in the chair before the desk.

He was sitting there in a peculiar fashion and in a way he no doubt resented, but he had no say in the matter. Four sturdy Chinese had placed him in this queer pose. Queer it was. Arms had swung in from the big chair and clamped him tight. Bronze bands in some way clamped his left hand flat to the desk, palm upward. His right arm was free from the elbow, that is he could reach pen and ink and sign the receipt before him. In all other respects he was helpless. And the ferocious and frightened glare he flung at the bland Cheleeman, after a brief struggle, showed he knew he was helpless.

"If you cursed well think," he began, then he let out a litle squeal. "What's that?"

Something had fallen down from the ceiling, which was about sixteen feet above his head, and had landed in the middle of his pinioned palm. It rolled from there to the desk with a soft tap. In the bright light it revealed itself as a small coin with a square hole through it. We all gasped at once, but it was Guttie's voice that shrilled above ours:

"A cash— a copper cash." It was that one ridiculous, small-value coin of Chinese commerce.

"It is polite to take a man at his word," said the bland Cheleeman. "Payment has now begun, and will go on till the last copper cash." Another coin fell through the air, landed on the palm with a minute thud, and rolled off. Another copper cash. Another followed. Another. Always hitting the centre of the palm, always rolling off. In a minute thirty had fallen, and there was a tendency for the small Chinese coins to heap about the hand. A grave servant brushed them away into a huge sack. And the coins went on falling, falling, falling steadily...

"You think you're mighty smart, don't you?" sneered Guttie presently.

Cheleeman shrugged. "How cruelly you wrong the natural politeness of my race," he smiled. "Are you not content with the courtesy that pays you in the coin you desired?"

"Shut your sly mouth," snarled Guttie. "If you think you can beat me so childishly you're mistaken."

We were all deathly silent for— how long? I don't know. All that broke the stillness was the tiny thud of the coins on the outstretched palm, and the rap as they rolled to the desk. Only now and then a quiet servant stirred and swept the coins clinking into the vast bag. And always the coins were falling, falling, falling steadily, regularly, with an almost terrible monotony, from some hidden slot high up in that roof.

I don't think any of us quite realised what the unceasing falling from that height meant until abruptly Guttie gave a strangled gasp and tried, with a burst of violence, to tear his left hand free. We saw by his purple face, and the sweat that stood all over it, that he was beginning to suffer. He wrenched and struggled, and the coins fell steadily one by one on his out-stretched palm even as he struggled. He could not win free by even an inch. He gave it up as suddenly as he had begun. He shouted in a shaking voice:

"Curse it, how long is this kid's game to go on?"

"My friend, surely you are not impatient so soon? You have barely received one half-dollar of the ten thousand owing to you."

"Half a dollar!" he gasped. "After all this time! How long do you keep up this fool joke?"

"Until you are paid to the last cash, surely," beamed Cheleeman. "Or until you decide that you are satisfied."

"The last cash? That means—?"

"But surely that is easy on paper," smiled Cheleeman. "I am giving you the current exchange, eleven copper cash to the cent. There being a hundred cents in the dollar, that means eleven hundred cash to the dollar. The debt being ten thousand dollars—"

"Eleven million cash!" cried Guttie, almost on a scream.

"Exactly, eleven million cash."

"You can't do it!" he yelled.

"I can," Cheleeman beamed. "But you—?"

"I'll see you damned!" Guttie snarled, and he fell silent and the copper cash came dropping, dropping, always dropping.

And now that constant, monotonous dropping had a terrible significance to us. We remembered how dropping water will wear away a stone, even from a short height. But these were metal cash falling through a height of at least sixteen feet, and most of them were striking that palm— not a rock of stone, but a palm of flesh and blood— edge on. Each impact on that soft restricted surface was a sharp blow. As blow followed monotonous blow the cumulative effect must be awful.

WE could see that it was. The outstretched palm which the impassive servant kept so clear was beginning to swell up. It showed puffy and discolored, and as every coin hit the fingers jerked and writhed impotently against the bonds that held them firm. And Guttie's face showed the pain he was enduring also. It was moist, pallid, working. There was a wild agony in his eyes, his whole body was strained with pain— but quite helpless.

After an hour he swore in a cracked voice, demanded hoarsely:

"This has got to stop. Do you hear? It's got to stop— I can't stand it."

"You can stop it," said Cheleeman softly. "Your right hand is free. There is a pen, there is ink, and there is the receipt before you."

"I'll see you damned!" he snarled. And the coins went on dropping, dropping.

Ten minutes later: "You fiend, you devil out of hell! Stop this, I tell you. Stop it! I'll have you gaoled."

"I think not," said Cheleeman smoothly. "There are things in your past that would render your going into court dangerous— for you."

"Pah, I'm not frightened of your threats. What do you know?"

"We Chinese know a good deal more than we speak of aloud. The details of the Palamja Mine deal, for instance."

I could see that even the tortured shoulders of Guttie winced at that. But he tried to face it out.

"Pah— bluff! If you knew anything about that you would have used it instead of this torture of yours."

"Would sending you to gaol for the rest of your life absolve Mr. Pyne of his debt? No, you could still exact the uttermost copper cash from him. Also blackmail is distasteful to me— save in self-defence."

"You haven't proof. You haven't proof."

"I can get fifty Chinese to swear to the details of the Palamja Mine transaction, if needs be," said Cheleeman smoothly.

Guttie knew he was cornered. Whether those Chinese swore truly or falsely, the Yellow Girdle clan could certainly make them swear to one story. Guttie would go to gaol. He saw his defeat. He yelled:

"And even then, how does this help you? Obtaining a receipt under threat—violence—"

"Surely you are wrong. We have three witnesses here, to say nothing of my Chinese servants. We can all testify that all I did was to place the money in the palm of your hand. No more. That you signed of your own free will, since I am quite content for you to leave your signature over till you are paid to the last copper cash. You only sign when you want to, my friend; I— I only go on paying you. There are still over ten million cash to come to you."

"Shut your soft-sawdering mouth!" snarled Guttie, and he closed his eyes, as though not seeing his left hand, which was now blue and terrible in its puffiness, would help him endure the drop, drop, drop of the merciless coins.

Three minutes later he howled, stretched his hand to the receipt, clutched it for a minute, then with another yell crumpled it into a ball and flung it away.

"I won't sign!" he screamed. "I won't sign!"

Nobody answered him. The coins went dropping, dropping. A grave Chinese, Cheleeman's secretary, came forward and placed another paper before Guttie. It was an identical receipt, on his own paper, typed with his own typewriter. He gulped as he saw it, saw the ruthless efficiency it implied. He glared with real fright at the smiling Cheleeman.

Two minutes later he began to howl and scream like a man unstrung. Sylvia could not bear it. With infinite courtesy, Cheleeman conducted her from the room. When he returned Guttie was limp and snivelling. He was wailing and pleading for mercy.

Old Pyne, his lips shaking, was for ending it then and there; he was will-ing to accept the crushing burden of his debt that Guttie would be released. Guttie listened, his eyes sly.

Cheleeman said softly: "Perhaps Mr. Guttie will meet you in magnanimity, Mr. Pyne. Seeing that you are touched by his sufferings, perhaps he will have a kindly thought for yours. He will sign that receipt from fellow-feeling."

"You don't get any of that darn sickly sentimentality from me!" snarled Guttie.

"You see— when you ride on a tiger it is not wise to dismount," said Cheleeman, quoting one of his race's proverbs. "With a man of that cruel and pitiless type you cannot exhibit pity. Have no compunction, Mr. Pyne. I treat him no worse than he treated you. He deliberately made you drunk so that he could trick you into that vast debt to him. He wanted to obtain this terrible hold over you and your daughter, and he was quite callous to the suffering both of you must endure in your souls. In the matter of suffering, is he worse off than you? His pain is merely physical. You and your daughter, and our good Alban here, were to be wrung to your hearts by him. Which suffering is worse?"

In a minute Guttie shouted savagely : "All right, curse you, you have won!"

He reached for the pen, stabbed it violently in the ink, sprawled his signature across the receipt stamp. Cheleeman looked at the paper. Went to his seat, sank back comfortably. The old secretary came forward, removed the receipt, dropped it into a waste-paper basket, and placed another typed and stamped sheet of Guttie's letter-paper before him.

"What's this?" snarled Guttie. "Haven't I signed?"

"You are childish, my friend," smiled Cheleeman. "Don't you think I know when you purposely falsify your writing? Don't you realise I know that your name is spelt 'Lewis' and not 'Louis' Guttie, and that there have to be two specific dots on the line following your signature before it will be honored? Perhaps you will try again."

Guttie tried again. Before twenty more coins had dropped on his unsightly and broken left palm he had signed a receipt in full discharge of the debt to old Pyne. The falling coins stopped as though by magic. Released, Guttie stood on his feet, glaring evilly at us.

"If you think you are going to get away with this," he began, snarling.

"Shiss! my good friend," smiled Cheleeman. "There is still that matter of the Palamja Mine in the air. I am sure you will do nothing to open that."

Guttie made a gesture of rage and hopelessness, glared about the room, decided that there were too many strong men in the room to try and get back that receipt by violence, lurched beaten to the door.

The two big Chinese opened it for him and stood aside. Another big Chinese followed him— with a bag not a quarter full of copper cash. Cheleeman, like all high-bred Chinese, was scrupulous in his dealings.

I left him ushering Guttie out with the greatest courtesy, while I went to look for Sylvia. I knew that nothing would ever come between me and Sylvia now.

_________________________

13: The Magic Detector

Newcastle Sun (NSW)  12 Jan 1942

'SO THE precious gewgaws of my honorable friend are still being pinched?'

Cheleeman, the Chinese police chief, occasionally liked to talk like that to his intimates among the English of the Treaty Port. Large and bland and magnificent, he was a Chinese of aristocracy and profound culture. His English was normally flawless, for he had been educated in England. Nevertheless, he found a chuckling satisfaction in using the flowery language of a stage Chinese.

'Still being stolen,' Bob Hayward grumbled. 'Why, the brute's making almost a daily good deed of it. It's getting so bad that— well, I'm thinking he's taking a particular delight in scoring off me.'

'And you've no suspicion who it is?'

'None. It could be Lan-Chok, my No. 1 boy, or any of the other eight, but I can't fix it on any of them. He's too clever, whoever he is— and, hang it, he grows bolder and cleverer.'

'A little ray of hope glimmers— cleverness is a wine that can be too strong for weak vessels.'

'You mean, he might overdo it and give himself away?'

'Perhaps, and also perhaps not,' Cheleeman mused. 'But can we make his own cleverness a snare for his neck?'

'Yes, but how?'

'There are ways. We have many methods, some quite intelligent and subtle. ... In fact, if you will wait a little while, I feel that I might be able to fix something.'

He rose, a towering and dignified figure, and moved towards the door, saying as he went out: 'Drinks at your elbow. Bob. Help yourself to a splosh, I won't be a jiffy.'

He returned in ten minutes, saying impassively: 'We will now transport ourselves to scene of said crime, and proceed with ancient science of detection.' And finished with a chuckle.

He led the way through the many courts of his house, clapped hands at the gate, and brought two of his private jinrickshas swiftly up.

Quickly the two men were carried through the town to Hayward's bungalow. There the presence of Cheleeman caused a wave of excitement that the house boys found difficult to conceal, for Cheleeman was not only a figure of awe, but also of dread. He had a reputation for police methods as clever and ruthless as his manner was suave and bland.

Yet Bob Hayward found nothing very wonderful in those methods. Cheleeman went through the bungalow examining those spots, especially the bedroom and study, from which the trinkets had been taken, with amazing casualness. His cross-examination of the weary-eyed boys was equally amateurish.

The way he said: 'Dismiss them all from the house. I will talk privately with you, Mr. Hayward,' was even comic, for it was plain that it only quickened the interest of the servants.

'Careful,' Hayward said softly. 'This bungalow's a regular whispering gallery for carrying sound.'

'They are too fearful to listen,' Cheleeman said, largely. 'And they are no match for me. I know of a most auspicious and well-tried method.' He winked ponderously and produced a bottle from his pocket.

'I have here a powder, a secret and most efficacious chemical powder. I sprinkle it over every likely object of plunder in this room— so. You observe it is an almost imperceptible dust... It will not be I noticed, or even seen by this thief, yet let him pick up any one of these trinkets I have treated and he is a marked man. The powder works into the pores of the skin. The moisture of his hand will react on it and presently it will turn a bright and startling green. So his guilt will be unmistakably proclaimed.'

Hayward almost snorted at the childishness of the trick.

'You will issue an unbreakable command that nobody is to dare enter this room from now until to-morrow night,' Cheleeman said firmly. 'Honest men will obey, only the thief will run the risk.'

'It takes some believing.' Hayward frowned. 'And there's another thing. Say I touch any of these things accidentally myself— am I to go green?'

'That, of course, I had foreseen,' Cheleeman drew another, smaller bottle from his pocket. 'If you do happen to touch any of these dusted articles, go at once and wash your hands, using a third of the fluid of this second bottle in the water. The chemical action set up will prevent the tell-tale green stain from appearing. Put it in your bathroom, where the thief is not likely to find it. Now leave this room as it is, until I return home with you to-morrow evening.'

They left the room, but Hayward was not a bit satisfied. As he told Cheleeman, his very presence would scare the thief, who would not be likely to make any attempt for several days.

'No,' said Cheleeman. 'I think he will try to-morrow; he is still so certain of his cleverness that it will be a matter of 'face' to beat you again in spite of risks.'

Hayward remained sceptical. He even felt it was more than likely that the thief had taken care to overhear all that Cheleeman had said.

NEXT EVENING Hayward picked up Cheleeman and a police assistant on his way home from his godowns. and, surely enough, there had been another theft, a silver running-cup had been stolen. Cheleeman chuckled. All the house boys came In and were lined up from the calm Lan-Chok to the grimy menial Tu-fu, Hayward, studying their blank faces, could see no sign of uneasiness in any of them.

It did not show even when Cheleeman ordered them to stretch out their hands, though he thought he caught just the glint of a triumphant leer In the eyes of Tse-yun, his No. 2 boy. Yet It was to Tse-yun that Cheleeman said: 'So you are the thief. For once you've been too clever.'

'But it is not true,' Tse-yun screamed. 'See my hands tell you— they are not green. There is nothing wrong with my hands.'

'Nothing— except that you have washed them. I know coolies and I studied all your hands yesterday. You alone of all the boys have given yours a good scrubbing.'

After Tse-yun had confessed everything under examination and had been taken to gaol, Bob Hayward said— 'Smart work, but what was the chemical dust, after all?'

'Sand that my own No. 1 boy scraped up from my compound, just ordinary sand,' Cheleeman said with a grin.

'And the fluid in the bottle?'

'Liquid soap to procure an unnatural cleanliness on the hands of the guilty one.'

'Then you just bluffed him?'

'No, played on his stupid cleverness. It was plain that the thief would understand the reason for my coming and listen to all I said— though you nearly spoiled that by suggesting I should talk softly. And having listened, he would be so sure that he could escape by using the magic cleanser that his cleverness could not resist an even more daring crime. That, and his natural inclination for grime on the paws, was all I needed.'

___________________

14: Spools of Peril

Australian Worker 11 Sep 1935

KLITZ, PRESS PHOTOGRAPHER of the Sub-Danubian Monitor, lowered the carriage window in order to beam down at the hay-whiskered man on the platform.

"Well, here we really must part, it seems, but it was entertaining to have your company so far," he smiled.

"Charmed, Herr Klitz," blinked the other. "I only wish I could go farther with you."

"I don't doubt that," Klitz sniggered.  "but I fear my country would make your habit of searching my baggage unhealthy— as well as hopeless.''

"Your baggage?" the whiskered one gaped.

"Surely—twice daily slnce  you so innocently jolned me at Parimina. How you , Engllsh keep things, up in the face of hopeless failure is a marvel."

"English?" blinked the other; "But I am a Georgian-Lett, as I have tell't you."

"And how your Secret Service manages to get such a reputation, if you're a fair specimen of its agents, beats me."

"Secret service? Me?" gasped the man. "But I have informed you, I am a traveller in tinned goulash."

"Yes, I've had many a quiet laugh over that," chuckled the newspaper man. "Isn't it time you stopped being a fool, as well as looking one, Mister Clement Mangan?"

"I say!" gulped the man. "You've seen through me."

"I could see through you in a dark room with my eyes shut," jeered Klitz. "I knew you'd come nosing round after my photos of the atrocities. I both heard about you, and saw you in Parlmina."

"But not in these whiskers. I mean the local Clarkson swore that even my mother would not know me in them."

"Or want to," grinned the journalist. "Perhaps your being too horrid to be human gave you away; It's all part of your natural national amaturishness,  anyhow. Why, directly you bribed the conductor of the Trans-Parlmina Wagon Lit to put you in with me I knew you, and, knowing how determined, you English are to prevent any trouble between Parlmina and Zend, I guessed you meant to steal my photos. In fact, I watched you search my luggagw that night. It gave me a peculiar joy."

"You mean because I didn't find tho photos," Clement Mangan sighed. "I must say you had me beat."

"Not only you," the, newspaper man exulted, "but the frontier guards and Customs men of Parlmina. Like you, they had heard a rumor that I had the photographs on me, and were scared stiff at the thought of my getting 'em out of the country."

"Naturally, they're trying to hush up those atrocities."

"They would," jeered Klitz. "When Zend sees from my photos how the Parlminas carved up their compatriots there'll be pink hell to pay."

"The League of Nations is also doing Its best to keep things quiet," Clement Mangan suggested. "That's why, I was on the spot. So far we've made the world think it was more local rioting not worth bothering about."

"When the Monitor prints my photos, tho,world will know better," said Klitz. "Europe, in fact, is due for a jolt."

"Also a war," Clement Mangan said quietly.

"Oh, maybe," shrugged Klltz.

"War doesn't disturb you?"

"Not so much as missing the scoop of my career, anyhow."

"War in Europe again," Clement Mangan frowned. "You know, if Zend sees these photos nothing will stop it flying at Parlmina's throat.  And the thing can't be limited to those. Others must be dragged in. Do you want to see the world going through that old horrlble slaughter again, Klitz, for the sake of a few photographs and your personal glory?"

"Not only my personal glory, Mangan," the newspaperman sneered. "Sub-Danubia really won't be so broken-hearted over such a war."

"No! It'll probably bag a slice of Zend, while the rest of us are busy bashing each others' heads,"  sighed Mangan. "But the beastliness of it, Klitz— haven't you any human feelings?"

"Plenty— and they'll be larger and finer when I put my two spools of film into my editor's hands. It'll be the triumph of my career, Mangan. I shall be famous throughout Europe. I shall have brought these first-hand photos out of Parlmina in spite of the watchers on three frontiers.

"Hard to believe that, eh, after all your hunting?" jeered Klitz. "Oh, I know all about that. After you drew blank with my baggage that first night you went through my bedding, and even the nttlngs of the compartment when I went along to breakfast. In fact, I went so you should have the chance. Even then you couldn't believe I had you beaten. You had another go at the hotel at Grudisia, while we waited for the boat. You even went through my underclothes when I went for my bath on the steamer."

"I knew you couldn't have hidden it in your loofah," Clement Mangan said. "You hadn't one. And the towels were bathroom fixtures; as for soap, I never dreamt of you turning to that."

"Loofah!" Klitz's oyes narrowed. "Oh, I didn't heed such things. I had a sounder hiding place. Safe even from the Customs. And how comic you did look, hovering round as my baggage was searched at Trevesta,

"I suppose you brainy pashas do get a kick watching the flounderlngs of lesser mortals."

"You bet we do," Klltz guffawed. "Especially since I devised a hiding place that you could handle without knowing you had what you wanted in your grasp. Yes, you've actually had those two spools in your hands more than once."

"My dear Klitz— in my hand, you say, and put them down! Is it possible!" .

"It's fact; and you never even suspected. You couldn't. What you were hunting for were the fine, fat film spools beloved of the tourist snapshotter, Mangan. There are others."

Klitz glanced at the station clock. "A minute to go; in two minutes I'll be across my own frontier... I can safely have the benefit of the last laugh, eh? Well, those spools weren't that kind, though they are not so extraordinary, either. I believe even in England there was, lately, a rage for a tiny camera, a sort of toy, not much larger than a match box. My camera was like that, Mangan, only it wasn't s toy. It carries tiny film rolls not much thicker than a fountain pen, and a third of its length. All the same, each film takes eight pictures  of such sharpness that they can be enlarged to half-page newspaper blocks without any loss of detail. I threw my camera into the Tjava, by the way. I knew the frontier people couldn't hold me, even if they suspected me, if they found no photographic apparatus on me."

"So that was what you dropped into the river; I thought it was a petrol  cigarette lighter."

"So your eyes are as sharp as that," Klitz said in surprise, "Well, that kind of  camera does look like a petrol Iighter... The films, of course, I did not throw away. I was quite sure I could smuggle them out of Parlmina— even under your eyes, Mangan. Shall I toll you how? First, I carefully wrapped each spool in stout lead foil, then I bound them in adhesive medical tape— making them thoroughly watertight, you understand, and then— but I'll wait until tko guard sends this train away, Mangan, before I tell you the hiding, place..."

"Please don't risk robbing yourself of that last laugh, Klitz," Clement Mangan protested gently. "I do so love to watch the way your false teeth drop."

"False teeth!" the press photographer was goggling. "Here, why bring in my false teeth?''

"They mean so much to simple minds like mine," Mangan sighed. "For instance, does one clean false teeth with ordinary tooth-paste, Klitz? I mean, when one has no real teeth left, only artificial upper and lower plates like you!"

"Himmel! You know that! How?" Klitz gulped. "And what's that about toothpaste?"

"Why that, rightly or wrongly, I felt that toothpaste was not compatible with false teeth— especially such a large omnibus tube such as you carry, Klitz. And another odd thing. Though you seem to have used half an inch of that big tube, it  appeared to me almost virginal in gloss, so to speak. I mean, I crumple my own, shockingly. And yet it didn't look half as new as your very new toothbrush. Not a bristle out of parting in that, as one would expect when you have already a worn, not to say veteran, dental-plate brush in stock. What I mean is, that plate brush accounted for all your molar activities, so to speak— then why the maiden toothbrush? Why the fat tube of Dentodint? Such trivialities appeal to my lesser brain, Klitz, so that when you went to breakfast on  the train that day, I toyed with same. I even pressed that vast, fat tube and, naturally, felt the two cylinders of film spools hidden inside. I thought it amazingly clever of you, Klltz. It was so simple, yet so completely hoodwinking. You had only to unwind the fat end of the tube, extract a certain modicum of tooth-paste, push your spools in the place of same, and fold the lead back in the usual way."

The guard's whistle sounded before Klitz managed to gulp: "You found them the first day, yet— yet you went on searching?"

"Oh, that was tact," Mangan apologised. "I was so sure that a clever chap like you would suspect I'd found the films if I stopped hunting.''

"But— just now, when my baggage was examined and passed out— that tube of tooth-paste was still there," Klitz howled.

"Oh, no, not that one. Its mass production twin, so to speak, but not yours," Clement Mangan called as the train began to move. "I bought a duplicate at Trevesta and adjusted it so as not to shock you into suspicion.... Here's the tube you brought from Parlmina, Klitz— with spools still inside."

He held out an open hand in which reposed a big, partly-used, tube of toothpaste.

Klitz took one look at it and yelled:

"My— you've got my photos— and to look at you…"

"That's where the laugh comes in, Klitz— for someone!" Clement Mangan shouted after the departing train.

____________________________

15: Murderer At Large

World's News (Sydney) 19 Sep 1942

ACROSS the lane the newspaper placards in front of Mrs. Welland's shop still blared at them through the downpour:

THE ESCAPED MURDERER.

DANGEROUS HOMICIDAL MANIAC

STILL AT LARGE.

But now the heated opinions those placards had aroused among the group sheltering under the church lych-gate were abruptly stifled, and a deadly silence reigned instead.

It was a commonplace group. Three women caught by the storm while shopping, two children, and five men— Wells, the burly publican; Thwaites, the hardware merchant and local athlete; Cotton, the hefty navvy; little Huggett, the draper— and the man who had just joined them.

It was he who had cut short their contemptuous criticisms of the police for allowing one man, even a murderer, to terrorise a whole district. He was a short man, but as broad and muscular as a bull. He was shabby, unshaven, bedraggled— just a tramp. Only there was that about him that told them he was no tramp.

There was an ugly, lowering, animal-like thrust of the head, a quick, furtive alertness in his bloodshot and everrolling eyes, an air of wild strangeness that bred fear.

They did not have to— did not want to look at his face again to know who he was. The papers that advertised him so clamorously had printed unmistakable photographs of  "The Escaped Murderer."

They had all known him the moment he had shambled under the lych-gate out of the rain. That was why they had been struck dumb. They had realised instantly how lonely they were. Apart from Mrs. Welland's little shop opposite, there wasn't another house in the lane for five hundred yards either way, while Mrs. Welland, herself, was a feeble old body who always sat in the parlor behind her shop until disturbed by the door bell.

This torrential rain forbade all wayfaring, too. They were pinned there as effectively as in a locked room with a homicidal maniac.

TIMID Mrs. Quinn, who had her children with her, twittered, went green and looked like screaming, but Mr. Wells frowned her to silence with a sharp look. If she started anything it was all up.

This murderer would run amok, as he had before, at the slightest hint of danger to himself. Mrs. Quinn knew that as well' as the rest. Hadn't they talked over that very point?

It was awful. They could feel the sick fright of danger in the very air. It was so plain that the killer himself was not easy about them. His bloodshot eyes rolled from one to the other suspiciously. He rocked a little on his feet, like a man ready to leap into instant action.

His gaze fixed itself for a moment on Huggett, who plainly had the jumps, and the fool shifted like a scared hare and stuck his head out into the rain.

The rest held their breath. If the little coward went out into that downpour the murderer would know they knew him, for no sane man would leave shelter in such a downfall. The., brute would attack and slay them all at once.... Little Huggett hung hesitant, caught Wells' glare, shifted back into shelter with a watery grin on his face.

"Bucketsful," he simpered. "Looks like lasting all day, too."

Sturdy Mrs. Wooding gave a strangled croak of terror at that inanity, and as the murderer pivoted sharply at the sound, their insides seemed suddenly flat-empty in fear. Thwaites managed to babble something about it being bad for the big match, and Wells, with an effort you could hear in his voice, snapped up the cue, saying it mightn't be so bad, after all, for a wet pitch would give England a chance.

The awful tension eased just a little. But only a little. They were all too conscious of the deadly silence of the murderer, the alertness of his rolling eyes.... He was there, poised, ready to strike at any moment. They could feel death hanging in the air about them.

Old Miss Framley even felt more; she could not take her eyes off the killer's right arm.

Cotton, the navvy, glared at her, trying to distract her. But she could not tear ner eyes away. She stared at that arm as though mesmerised by it. Cotton—all of them— knew why. The hand of that arm was in the man's trouser pocket, and from what the papers said, there was a great, sharp butcher's knife down that trouser leg, through a hole in the pocket... the knife he used in all his killings.

It made Cotton sick to think of that knife, especially as they had all scoffed a bit at the chap's ability to whip it out like lightning, as the papers had it, and slash throats before men knew he was striking. He himself had been hugely scornful. declaring that he guaranteed to get a good, knock-down swipe to the feller's jaw before he could get the knife half out.

He looked sidelong at the- murderer now and felt sick at his boast. With the man three feet away, he might strike just too late, while the mere act of raising the man's anger... it'd be horrible! Yet they ought to do something... those others, definitely ought to. They'd bragged enough of what they'd do, how their strength and swiftness would make short work of this very chap. Wells and Thwaites had been so certain sure just now that they anyhow would never let a murderer get away with it as this killer had. They'd bragged loud and confident that they only needed to get handy to the chap to settle his hash for ever....

Well, there they were, only an arm's length away, and Thwaites, for all his sporting record, was green, saggy-mouthed and scared paralysed, while Wells' purple face looked as though he was about to get a stroke from sheer funk. Three strong men— and one murderer had them goofy with fear. Three strong men unable to do a thing, too terrified to act.

Couldn't count little Huggett, of course. He hadn't bragged, and he didn't mean anything, muscularly speaking... except as a danger. Gosh! Hadn't the little fool any sense?

Little Huggett was fumbling in his pockets. They could feel the murderer tense and crouch. The sense of peril was so intense that it choked even the women's instinct to scream. In a minute the knife would be leaping and red—

Little Huggett dragged out a packet of cigarettes.

"Must pass time somehow," he mumbled, and put a fag into his mouth. Then he seemed to think of the others  and held out the packet to Cotton. Sheer need of doing something made the navvy take one, and the others dared not refuse because of the tension. Even- the murderer took one.

Wells fumbled shakily with his matches, but Huggett saved him by clicking on his petrol lighter. He lit Thwaites' cigarette, too— held the flame towards the killer.

The murderer leered stupidly and leant forward to draw— and little Huggett jabbed the flame straight into his eyes.

In a moment the lych-gate was a rave of oaths and screaming women. But it was old Miss Framley who brought them to action by screeching:

"His right arm!... Hold it! Hold him! Huggett's given you your chance— take it... you three big fools..."

They realised that little Huggett's foolishness had made the murderer take his hand from his pocket and the knife. Almost mad with relief they dashed in and grappled the killer.

_______________

16: His Guiding Star

Daily Telegraph (Sydney) 13 April 1941

THE woman's hard eyes gleamed and her step quickened. Yes, there he was again, sitting on the same bench. It was Arthur keeping the tryst as they had kept it so long ago— who could have imagined a man would be so sentimental? But then, who could have dreamed that that raw lout of a boy would have become so distinguished-looking— and rich! Pity she had not kept her figure and looks— still, that beauty parlor had done wonders and he always had been a smart dresser.

She walked towards the bench, her lips fixed in her shyest smile. It didn't work. That old clergyman was talking to Arthur. Still, she was not going to take risks. A seat behind Arthur was empty; she sat on it, almost touching Arthur's shoulder. The clergyman always left just before one o'clock, and directly he did she would make herself known to Arthur... They could not have their touching reunion in the presence of a third party.

She frowned— would it be touching? How exactly had she turned him down in that last letter to Canada? She could not remember, but she could remember what she had been like... a "sweet" little thing; soft, poetical, yearning, just such another as Arthur himself. Only she had had that sound, practical streak always underneath. Had that shown in her letter? No, she was sure she had kept it from nim as she always had. It'd probably been full of tears and wails against poverty and Fate that were forcing her to marry another man.

A bad slip if she had, but it had looked sensible at the time. Arthur didn't seem able to do anything but starve in Canada, and Tom Cralle looked a good catch, spent his money like a prince, anyhow.

How was she to know that he was only a small clerk splashing about with a couple of hundred legacy to dazzle her? The shyster! She'd soon shown him where he got off once the money was gone. If she'd wanted to marry a clerk she'd have married Arthur, she had loved Arthur.

Well, she hadn't made a mistake about Charlie. He made big money and was the sort that let her spend it. If he hadn't been the kind to worry himself sick over debts she would still have been well off. She'd shown tantrums when he talked about bills and so he'd gone dumb and she did not know how badly he'd let her down until he died bankrupt.

A weak character, and she'd had to suffer for it. For two years she'd had to drag out life on the pittance she'd managed to scrape together from the ruins... and then she'd seen that personal advertisement that ran:

ELLA.

June 17 will soon be here, I'll be waiting that week in the place we used to meet fifteen years ago.

ARTHUR.

She could not doubt that that was meant for her. Her name was Ella. Her birthday was on June 17, and Arthur knew she always bought that paper. Anyhow, she had tested it. She and Arthur used to meet on the seats set round a certain statue in the Embankment Gardens, during their lunch hour— 12 to 1— every day; she had only to go there to make sure.

On Tuesday, when she had gone to the gardens, four men had been sitting on those seats. She did not recognise Arthur, but he might have been any of them, even the rather seedy clergyman. She couldn't quite believe that the fine-looking man, with the austere face and clothes that looked like five thousand a year, could be Arthur.

Next day this man and the clergyman still sat on the seats. Hope grew within her, but she had to be sure. She followed the clergyman to a nearby church and learnt from its noticeboard he was a Mr. Strillingfleet.

So Arthur was the , distinguished one! And here he was again today, waiting for her. In another few minutes— she glanced at her wrist watch; wasn't it time that tiresome clergyman went back to his lunch? What on earth could Arthur and he find to talk about? She leant closer and for the first time listened to their low-voiced conversation.

"Oh, yes, if she sees my advertisement she'll know I mean this place," Arthur was saying. "We used to meet here every day, you know. We were both so very poor that we could not afford to go to a cafe for lunch.

"I remember that in moments of recklessness I used to buy fruit to share with her, pretending it was part of my lunch. It was the only little present I could give her...

"Then I remember being ill, 'flu and hunger combined, and she fed me on meat-extract sandwiches. Told me that her landlady had packed them but that she could never eat them.

"It was only when I'd wolfed the last that I saw the gleam of hunger in her eyes. She'd bought that concentrated invalid food for me out of her pitiful earnings— I'd probably eaten a week's meals or a new hat she'd set her heart on... how brave and generous children in love are!"

The woman was leaning back, her painted lips trembling, her hand at her throat. Arthur had seen through that— remembered it? How ravenous she had been as she watched him eat those sandwiches, and how glad— glad— glad she'd been to go hungry for him.

"A girl of fine character," the old clergyman said.

"A lovely character," Arthur told him. "We were only children then, but the memories of her have been my strength ever since. Because of her I went to Canada— to find my chance. She saw what was in me, and, even though she wrote breaking our engagement, I could read the dear spirit of sacrifice in her letter.

"She feared that my attachment to her would hold me back and was willing to suffer herself rather than I should be handicapped. Her tender and unselfish courage — can you wonder that she has always remained with me as the sweetest and most inspiring memory of my life?"

"There are noble women in the world," the old clergyman said.

"Too few of them," Arthur said. "So few that when a man finds one she becomes his guiding star, the greatest thing, maybe, in his life."

"And yet," the clergyman cleared his throat nervously. "Don't you fear... I mean young love like yours, children's love, there is no beauty to compare with it... but, it is children's love. Things change... If she has changed — or you — it might be tragic…"

"Yes." Arthur's voice was husky. "A tragedy. One could scarcely believe in goodness then... But she won't have changed. I know that, for I know her... she was fine gold; too lovely, too clean of heart. "If she does not come to-day I think she must be dead," Arthur admitted softly. "I'm not unprepared... and I have my memory. Nothing can rob me of that or spoil it. Neither riches nor honors have ever blurred it... I can carry her with me as she was, lovely, gentle, and untarnishable to the end..."

"I must go," the clergyman said, getting up. "I am glad I have met you and you have talked to me."

"I'll stay half an hour more," Arthur said. "I still hope."

The clergyman moved off.

Ella watched him. She had only to lift her hand and touch Arthur's shoulder... He had riches, honors... they would be hers...

What was it he had said, "The sweetest and most inspiring thing" in his life. A memory "lovely, gentle, and— untarnishable!"

The sob she gave startled Arthur. He looked over his shoulder. But he only saw a slightly over-dressed and rather common woman rise and hurry away... Hurry away— to leave him to the one lovely thing in his life, and hers. The memory of the girl that she had been.

__________________

17: State Papers

Bathurst Times (NSW) 5 Feb 1914

THE MAN at next table was whispering. With a shock, I realised that he was whispering to me.

'You're an Englishman?' he whispered. 'Aren't you an Englishman?'

He had a penetrative whisper, and I could hear him quite distinctly, though I doubt if anyone else could; we were rather aloof in an emptyish cafe. This cafe, by the way, was in Esin, which is the capital town of the Empire of Altonnia.

'I say,' I demanded, 'are you talking to me?'

'Yes,' whispered the man. He kept his eyes fixed straight ahead on the orchestra.

'Yes, I am.'

'But don't be an ass about it. Don't look at me. Do as I do— or, rather, read that paper on the table.'

The man was quite mad. 'I've read it already,' I told him huffily '

' Oh ! don't be a fool,' said the man testily, and I suddenly realised that he was sweating gently.

'I don't want you to read it. What I want you to do is to make them imagine you're reading it— see?'

'Quite,' I snapped. I wasn't a fool at all, but had only been taken off my guard by the extraordinariness of the, whole episode. I did not think the man mad. I thought him a rogue.

'Confidence, trick,' I told my mind. All the same, I picked up the paper— the Woche.

'Who are— they?' I demanded colloquially.

The man at the other table, a small quick man with bright sea-gull eyes, held his liquor glass to the light with a clever ('damn clever,' thought I) affectation of being concerned only with its color and texture.

'If you look through the door,' he said, 'you'll see two men trying their hardest not to appear police-officers They are them. They are police officers. They are going to arrest me when I go outside this place.'

'The devil,' I said, apparently to Die Woche.  'Why?'

'You're an Englishman all light? he demanded.

'I am,' I told him. I was beginning, in spite of myself, to be interested. I was beginning to be excited.

'Do you mind- telling me something about yourself— your name?'

I stiffened. It was roguery after all. In an uncanny way the other man, with out taking his eyes off the orchestra saw me stiffen.

'I must know some thing about you,' he said in a whisper 'It's rather important.'

I thought a moment. After all, the name didn't hurt.  And it might be important.

'My name's Merriman,' I said. 'Compton Merriman.'

Even on the unemotional face of the other appeared suddenly, and went suddenly, a flicker of relief.

'The big game hunter?'

'Yes.'

'I thought it was you, Mr. Merriman,' said the whisperer, still whispering. He had leaned back in his chair, and was apparent drinking in with all his soul the Kreisler variation of a Viennese waltze played remarkably well (as only in Altonnia would one have found it played remarkably well) by the seedy orchestra violinist.

'I thought it was you. That's why I took the risk.'

'Want to hear anything more?' I asked grimly.

'No, thanks. I know all there is to know already,' said the astonishing little man.

My attitude said, I suppose, 'I think you're a liar!' For again, uncannily the whisperer perceived what was in my mind, and answered it.

'As a matter of fact, you'll find a picture of yourself in the Woche you aren't, reading! A picture and a paragraph describing what you've been killing, in Africa, what you've killed all over the world, and the tight corners you've got yourself out of. It's a tight corner business that takes me just now.'

'That how you know, then?' I said, ignoring the hinder part of the sentence, which I saw no reason  for not thinking sheer flattery.

'That— and other things. I know a good many men in England; you know— and I'm a member of the 'Travellers' myself.'

My simmering' interest blazed up actively, as the little man had meant it to blaze up actively.

'By Jove, you you?' I burst out. 'What's your name?'

The little man smiled' a little.

'Not so loud,' he insisted. 'We'll let my name drop for the moment. It's best for this business that you don't know'.'

'Ah, the business,' I echoed. 'What is the business?'

The little, bright-eyed man felt casually in his pocket for his cigar' case. His movements were leisurely. All the same, my occupation had taught me to use my eyes, and I saw that the casual movement had merely been undertaken to enable the whisperer to sweep the entirety of the café with a keen and absorbing gaze.

As. he chose his cigar, he whispered again— I noticed that he managed the whole business of smoking, taking the cigar from his lips and whispering between puffs, in a consummate, manner.

'It's a damned ticklish business,' continued the other. 'It's rendered more damned ticklish, by the presence of that big, red-headed fellow over to the left of us.'

'I know,' I retorted. 'In spite of the absorption of Die Woche, I've been watching the lout. His eyes had never left you in spite of the magnetic attraction of his plate and liver sausage.'

'Good man,' ejaculated the whisperer. 'His eyes have no right to leave me. He's in here for that purpose. He's blood brother to the twain outside.'

'A police officer?'

'A police officer.'

'Again why?' I asked. 'If they want you, why don't they take you: Why wait?'

'My reason for speaking to you is the reason why. I've got something that they want to take— undestroyed. If they touch me in here, there might be a row. With all these people about that— something might be passed off. Out in the street, the thing should be on me— should, ' he insisted.

'I see,' I said. ' And where will the something they want be when they 'take' you?' I flipped over a page of Die Woche. I saw the photo of myself. It was horrible.

'Eh?' he hissed cheerily. 'But you're a man built for the job—' he touched a copy of the Fliegende Blatter lying upon the table.

'It'll be in this Fliegende Blatter. It is, as a matter of fact, in it now— folded— it's paper y'know.'

'Ah,' said I— 'paper!' I began to see light.

'It's my own Fliegende. Before I go, I will take it up. I will make as though to put it in my pocket, but will think better of it and simply fling it back in my chair. And after I am gone—'

'It might enter my head to read the Fliegende?'

'You've got it.'

'I see,' I thought. 'It's quite straight, of course— the business, I mean?'

'Utterly.'

I hung. It was only show. I was the type of man, uncommon, but not quite so uncommon as city-dwelling modern people imagine, created absolutely for adventure. Adventure was my wine. Love of adventure, not love of killing, had made me a fairly good (some said the finest in huntingdom) big-game stalker and resourceful hunter.

'All right,' I told him. 'I'll read the Fliegende.'

The little man sat up stiff, and, almost visibly, showed his enormous relief.

'Thank the Lord,' he hissed. 'You can't guess what a momentous thing your agreement is.'

'No,' I said. But I believe I could, I waited. 'There are more instructions, of course?'

'Not many— the most important is that the paper inside the Fliegende mustn't leave you for an instant,  day or night They may find out about you; they are pretty cunning and thorough; but by nothing on earth or over it must you let 'em have it, let anybody have it. Destroy it first. Destroy it at the slightest danger.'

'All right,' I said. 'It shan't leave me. I'll see to that. Where do I deliver? England?'

The whisperer paused. 'No— Belgium. Take it to Frederick Richardson. He is the British Consul at Orldwerp, just over the border; and once Richardson gets it, it's safe. His place is number seven, Rue du Pont.'

'He'll get it,' said I.

'For Heaven's sake see that he docs. The paper might win a war or lose a war. It's worth while remembering that.' He rose to go.

'I'll remember it,' I told him. 'Trust me.'

'They'll watch you all the way to Richardson's door— watch you and try to get it.'

'I'll watch too, I'm good at watching.'

'Good luck,' he whispered. He went through the little by-way with the Fliegende and went out.

The two official-looking men swung at his. heels and followed him. My eyes came back to the interior, of the café just as the big, red-headed man was reaching for the Fliegende. My hand grasped it but two seconds before his.

'I beg your pardon,' I said naively. 'Would you mind taking my Woche? I have yet to read the Fliegende.'

The red-haired man glared, and I could see him wavering between suspicion and the throttling sense of red-tapeism of Altonnia officialdom. He was wondering whether he dared demand the paper and risk a row that might force him to disclose his identity. Blessed Altonnian red tape: it won. In thirty seconds I was slipping an envelope that cracked with oil-paper of plan-tracing, up my sleeve.

ii

I WAS OUTSIDE the cafe ten minutes later.

I had been thinking rapidly and I knew what I had got to do, I had to get across the border to Richardson, the Consul of Orldwerp, Belgium, in the sharpest possible manner. My best bet would be to go straight to the railway station at once.  I could then get on a train before they even started suspecting me. Once they started suspecting me, I'd have a hot time.  Once they caught me with those papers, I'd be gaoled. They don't mince matters in Altonnia. Also, this was something they could not mince matters about. Papers that would win or lose a war must be something mighty big. It must be something of enormous worth both to England and Altonnia.'

'Then,' thought I, 'here's the station.'

The simplest ways are the best! I took one step forward. At that moment I was assaulted in the back by a small elephant. I sprang round sharply. I found Red Hair.

At once I gathered what was Red Hair's little game. Red Hair was so palpably going to be rude as an Altonnian cannot be. Instead of raising his hat and apologising as is the nature of his race, he was glaring and choking with a most admirable (sham) anger.  Directly our eyes met he called me a clumsy English pig, who get in the way of respectable law abiding Altonnians.

It was clever. In about two minutes I saw that both this police officer and myself were going to be arrested by another police officer for brawling. Once arrested, of course, they could search me quietly.

I saw that Red Hair only looked a fool, and realised that I would have to act like lightning. I found that by this time my habits of life were being described as London, Cockney, and swinish. More, the man was obviously waiting for my retort that would land the episode into that stratum of violence from whence only a policeman could extricate it. I saw him waiting for my retort as an actor waits for his cue. In thirty seconds he fancied he would have me on the way to the lock-up.

So I said, 'I say, I'm awfully sorry. Have I hurt you?'

If I had ducked his head in a bucket of water he could not have been more startled. He stepped back for a moment in his astonishment, and for a moment I thought I was all light But only for a moment. Red Hair was certainly no fool. He simply turned my apology into a further insult and came at me in the attitude of one determined to punch my head.

In this he was stupid; for one thing the Altonnian mind— though its gifts in other directions are great— has not the head punching attributes in the greatest degree, for another, I have.

Red Hair came at me with his big hands slung loose as a wrestler— anyhow, certainly not a boxer— might come, and he slashed at my head in an absurd manner I did not slash at all. I stepped quickly under his arms and hit him twice, once in the ribs to bring his chin forward and on the chin to knock him out. Then I ran.

I ran very quickly because I knew the faster I ran at first, the more chances I had of getting out of sight before onlookers collected enough wits to run after me. For the same reason I went round all the corners I could. There is nothing like a multitude of corners for cutting one off from the vulgar gaze of the curious. When I had gone round a number of corners, and had run, I decided, far enough, I pulled up and began to walk slowly and to think.

Presently I turned into barber's shop and thought more. It is easy to think under the soothing hands of a barber. Also on this occasion the barber did me a distinct service. He took off my excessively English moustache, he cut and trimmed my hair, which fortunately was rather thick, in the stiff, upstanding manner proper to the conventional citizens of Altonnia. When I left that barber's, I was half disguised. I went along to a cheap, ready-made tailor to complete my disguise.

My plan had already formed in my head. I was in the middle of Altonnia and I had to get out of it and over the border into Belgium. There were only two ways of doing so— by air or by land. As I had no aeroplane, land was my only choice, and of the. land conveyances, the railway was the quickest mode possible. I had to go by railway.

But I had to go in such a manner that they would recognise and stop me. I must not on any account be stopped.

iii

THEY DID NOT come up with me until late that night, about five hours later. This Was not altogether their fault. I daresay they had watched pretty keenly the principal railway stations, but I had modestly avoided the principal railway stations. I slipped into some allotment gardens and got into my disguise, then I worked my way through these gardens, and by a series of field-paths made my way to a little wayside station that was not watched. A man used to game hunting finds cross-country work easy.

They came up with me, at a junction— I think it was Spesberg— where one. changes for Belgium from the local line (it was here, by the way, I took my through ticket.)

There was a big rapscallion on the platform who kept his eyes busy on all waiting passengers. I saw him eyeing me, and fitting the telegraphed description to me. To get away from him I went to the bar and ordered a drink. This was a stupid move, for he came after me, and I saw his eyes fixed on my right hand. I knew at once that I had given myself away. The knuckles of my right hand were split and raw and had obviously been engaged in the business of knocking someone out. In the big man's eyes I saw that he knew I was the man who had knocked Red Hair out.

I got into my carriage he disappeared into the station office.

'Telegraphing,' I thought.... 'They'll be waiting for me at the next stop,' and I looked quickly down at my map and swore under my breath.

The next stop was only four miles from the frontier. It was horrible to think that I might be caught so near success. Just as the train stalled the man metamorphosed abruptly out of the night, ran along the platform, and jumped into my compartment. He did it so neatly that I hadn't a chance He was in before I could move, and had plumped down on the seat in front and was smiling at me. I smiled back

'You were nearly left then,' I told him.

'Oh, no,' he said, 'I timed it very well. I rarely get left.'

He looked me squarely in the eyes and I perceived that he considered he had said something distinctly clever I was glad to see it. Of all the people one has to deal with the conscientiously clever man is by far the most simple. He is so busy being clever, I suppose. At once, also, he began to talk, and presently was asking me about myself. I told him as much as he wanted. I said I had been to the Panoramas (a fashionable resort on the coast). I said that I had had the best sea-bathing I had over known. It had been fairly rough, and I like it so.

This was perfectly true. I had been at the Panoramas but two days ago, just before I went to Esin.

'Ah,' he smiled, and in his clever way of seizing a chance, 'Ah, but you have not come off scathless in your encounter with the sea.'  He looked knowingly at my knuckles. 'It retaliates '

He smiled again as I put my hands quickly in my pockets He knew he was very clever. So did I. He had said exactly what I wanted him to say.

'Oh no,' I told him. 'That was not the sea— that was a man's chin I had reason to hit a man this morning.'

He was taken aback. It had never occurred to him that it would be as profitable for me to force his hand as he to force mine.

'At the Panoramas?' he asked.

'No— at Esin.'

He sat and blinked at me Like all very clever men he felt quite lost facing a simple fact. But I had more for his bewilderment.

'Well,' I said, 'what are you going to do about it?'

He did a little more than blink now.

'Hey?' he gasped.

I smiled at him.

'Persons who disappear into the station to telegraph and then deliberately choose my carriage at the last moment, are persons I naturally suspect. I suspect them finally when they have policeman's boots and then pockets bulge— with handcuffs. What do you intend to do, my friend?'

He eyed me narrowly.  He put his right hand to his handcuff pocket.

'Since you are so urgent, I will tell you,' he said, endeavoring to meet me with my own lightness, 'I am going to arrest you.'

'Or to try and arrest me?' I asked him

'No,' he retorted, certain in his great bulk. 'No, I am going to arrest you—' His hand came out with the handcuffs.

'You re certain,' I insisted.

'Quite,' he snapped 'You will find my chin not so easy as Blumenfield's. Put out your hands '

'Since you are so urgent, I will,' I said. And I took my hands out of my coat pockets and held them to him But he did not handcuff me. Instead, he jumped back a foot and sat as far as he could away, from me in the corner.

'It does not do to repeat an old joke every time I meet one of you gentlemen of the police,' I told him. 'Therefore, I have decided to use another.' I wagged the tiny automatic pistol in my right hand at him. 'You will agree with me, I think, that it has quite as much point as the blow on the chin.'

iv

'DON'T SHOOT,' he said, 'don't shoot!'

'I hope not,' I told him. 'Drop the handcuffs.'

Metal clinked on the floor; his, hands went up. I could see, in his eyes that he was thinking quickly. I felt inclined to say to him, 'Think away as hard as you can, my friend, for you are very safely caught.' But, fortunately, I did not say it. For, abruptly, he did a very brave and clever thing— the one thing in fact that he could do with his hands in the air. He inclined them sideways suddenly, reached out to the side of the carriage and pulled the communication cord.

'Now,' he said, quietly sitting still, 'shoot away, Mr. Spy.'

I could see the sweat of the fear of death dewing his face. I rose at my end of the carriage and bowed to him.

'Not at all,' I answered, as the train began to slow down, 'I know a brave man when I see him, and I respect him.'

My left hand found the door catch behind, and I bowed again, pushing open the door. Then, before he could move, I had jumped out and was clear of the train just as the brakes ground; home and the train began to stop.

v

AS I STRUCK the ground I appreciated rather than saw the snap of his revolver.  He could not expect to hit me, and he did not. What he expected to do was to draw people's attention to his side of the train so that search might begin immediately it stopped.

In this he was successful. The train pulled up practically in its own length, and before it had quite ceased to move, men were jumping down on to sandy plain after me, certain that, though I could have taken no hurt from my fall on this soft ground, I could not be far away. I could hear the babel of shouts and commands of the, passengers quite plainly, for l was not far away.

I was, in fact, no further away than the other side of the train. You see, I knew exactly what would happen. I was a fugitive, and they could only think of me as a fugitive. They would think of me only as running away, so they ran after me, or rather they ran in the direction they imagined I would have run, that is, over the plain away from the train.

On my part I had stayed exactly where I had dropped while the train ground on its brakes slowly .past me. Then I had risen and whipped quickly across the ballast behind the last carriage into the calm of the further side. At first I saw-some faces at the lighted windows, but these disappeared directly it was apparent that all the excitement was on the other side.

As soon as they had disappeared I climbed up on to the footboard of a first-class coach (the train carried but few passengers, and these were mainly third and fourth class), and stealthily finding a compartment whose closed doors and uninhabited seats proved that it had not been occupied, I got inside— and under the seat.

I felt exceedingly safe under the seat. I knew that the policeman and all in the train would imagine me out there on the plain, either running or hiding, but certainly there. When they found that it was useless to try and catch me in the night, they would come back, still animated by the comfortable certainty that I was on the plain.

They would then go on to the nearest town, and the clever policeman would be rather pleased with himself as he telegraphed, for he would be communicating to all the town, military posts, and block houses (and these were excessive in number), and those towns, military posts, and block houses would send out a cordon, a positive net of men that must certainly catch anything on the plain. Interest in the train I was in would cease from that moment, for all interest would be concentrated on the plain they imagined I was inland so I would be safe. At least I would be safe until I reached Orldwerp.

Unfortunately, such is the languidness of continental trains, I would not reach Orldwerp until nearly midday; and by that time I felt the Altonnians would have come to the conclusion that, after all, I was not on the plain.

They would wire to their agents in the Belgium town, and Orldwerp would be swarming with strong men anxious to come between me and Frederick Richardson. I should have a very warm time. I should need all my energies for that warm time, so, though my position was not an ideally comfortable one, and was less comfortable when the train started (as I had guessed it would) a few minutes later, I set myself to foster my energies. I went to sleep.

vi

MY judgment was right, or I suppose it was right, for I slept through the journey without disturbance and only woke up at Anverst, which is in Belgium, and but one or two stations removed from Orldwerp itself. Here I assumed the normal existence of a citizen on top of the seat instead of under it. Also, since Anverst is something of a junction, and because a junction on the continent is but an excuse for wasting time, I got out and stretched my legs.

They certainly needed it. Anverst is a bleak place, but I did not regret my half-hour's stay there, I strolled about. I had what I needed a good deal, cafe au lait. I bought French papers from the lady who presided over the bookstall and chatted with her; I also chatted with other amiable people, including the station master and the guard.

When I resumed my seat in the train I was conscious of having spent at least a pleasant as well as profitable stay at Anverst, whatever Orldwerp had in store for me. Orldwerp certainly had much in store for me. I saw this directly I drew into the station. Unfortunately I had not been able to carry the wardrobe of disguises about with me that the man in the story usually does.

I was still the same pleasant fellow that had held up the Altonnian policeman in the train. The Altonnian agents at Orldwerp station knew me at once. There were three of them, and I could see their keen determination to do what Altonnia expected of every man— that is, his duty, gleaming in each of their six eyes. They watched me from the moment I stepped from the train, like cats.

If the little bevy of gendarmes which adorn every continental station had not been there, I do not doubt they would have been at me like cats. They would have taken their chance of getting that paper in the rough and tumble of an assault. The gendarmes being there, they were going to move heaven and earth to attain their ends by strategy.

It was interesting. I dawdled by the train and by the bookstall, for the time I had determined to dawdle, that is fifteen minutes, and I watched the three fume. When I thought they had fumed enough, I made my first move. I went up to that Altonnian agent who was dressed like a hotel concierge, and asked him if his hotel was at all a decent one. It is always amusing to watch underhand people suffering from a direct attack.

To watch this fellow was exceedingly amusing. He gasped. He stammered. He forgot all the neat things about his hotel he had primed himself to say. Then, with a giant effort he pulled himself together, and in the most unnatural way in the world, he strove to be natural. I was exceedingly amused, and I was much more natural than he. I did the dull but earnest tourist. Acted with supreme gravity. I let him persuade me.

Like the real tourist lamb, I shuffled after him towards the hotel 'bus and so into the clutches of the second Altonnian agent, the driver of the 'bus. And like the dull tourist I showed no surprise, that this particular hotel— I think they called it Hotel de la Paix— should have only attracted one other client, that is the third Altonnian agent who had been hanging about the station in the modest disguise of an ordinary human being.

I kept up my air of amiable idiocy while they drove me through a residential quarter where common sense and my own knowledge of Orldwerp told me there was no possibility of ever finding a hotel. Indeed, I only resumed intelligence when I faced the concierge, the other client and a third and more authoritative fellow in a discreet room of a private house discreetly isolated in a suburb.

I then woke up. I nodded brightly at the authoritative man. I smiled at him.

'I hope you will make your search a quick one. I do not wish to stay at this end of Orldwerp very long. I have always found it relaxing.'

The authoritative man looked at me quickly. He was an oldish man, and a courteous one.

He bowed to me. 'We understand each other, then,' he said.

'Perfectly. I have been understanding you— all of you— since I saw your longing eyes fixed on me at the Orldwerp terminus.'

He bowed again. 'I see,' he said. 'You understand the game is up.'

I looked at the clock. 'I understand the game is finished,' I told him.

He seemed perplexed. 'You hint,' he said, 'that you have not certain papers? '

'Search me,' I suggested.

The oldish man looked at me under his eyebrows. Then he nodded to his men. They searched me. They did it exceedingly well. As searchers, they must have been at the top of their profession. I was thoroughly overhauled. But they found nothing. At last they stood back from me with gestures of final frustration. The oldish man looked at me puzzled, taken aback.

'There seems to have been a mistake,' he muttered.

'There does,' I said briskly.

'We— we certainly thought you possessed— possessed— vital to us.'

'I rather assumed that there must be a reason for the little attentions I have received since I left Esin,' I admitted.

He bowed again. 'I must apologise,' he murmured.

'I accept it,' I told him, and he bowed me out of the house.

vii

HALF-AN-HOUR later I was with Richardson. Richardson was glowing with enthusiasm.

'You got the papers?' I asked.

'Got them— rather. It is the biggest coup of the era. But it was risky sending them like that— you know what they were?'

'What were they?' I asked.

'The mobilisation plans of the Altonnian army— for aggression. It might have meant invasion, ruin to us if you had not got them. How did you think of the idea, so simple, so natural, yet so jolly effective?'

'In a simple way,' I told him. 'At one time in my life I happened to be a journalist. Journalists often have to "express" copy by rail. That is, by paying a special fee, putting manuscript into the hands of the train-guard and telegraphing for those papers to be met at their destination. At Anverst I realised that I should have a warm time when I arrived at Orldwerp. The Altonnian agents would use desperate means to obtain those plans by a final effort. I had a chat with the stationmaster at Anverst. He told me the method of "training" dispatches common to English journalists was also common to journalists in Belgium. The rest was simple enough. I bought a large envelope. I addressed it to you. I paid my fee, and the guard of the train took it. Then I wired to you to send to meet it. While your man was meeting and taking it from Orldwerp station, I put the Altonnian agents off the scent by attracting them to me. When I knew the plans were safe, I let them act, with the result that they were fooled— the papers are ours. Simple enough, eh?'

'It was splendid,' said Richardson

______________________

18: Mr. Sugars Remembers

World's News (Sydney) 26 Sep 1934

WHEN Frank Watkins, the "fence," got the cryptic 'phone message from "The Big Chap," he was more than ever impressed by that unknown master's cleverness.

Chuckling at the way his employer had the police absolutely beaten, he packed the jewellery he had bought from half a dozen burglars into a neat brown-paper package as instructed, and set off by a roundabout way to meet his boss.

As he walked down his meek suburban road a big, bulky man of the type you never looked at twice drifted alongside.

"Well, Frankie," this man said, with bored affability. "Off to meet 'The Big Chap'?"

Frank Watkins' heart turned over so powerfully that he felt sick. All the same, he couldn't believe it. "The Big Chap's" methods were so clever and secret, nobody could know about him. And yet... He looked sharply along the road— a "bobby," who had no right to be there at this hour of the morning, was standing meditatively barring the end of it.

"There's another behind," murmured the bulky, nondescript man at his side. "Also that chap sweeping the gutter across the way is a plainclothes 'busy.'  Heroics don't seem indicated, Frankie."

"I don't know what or who the devil you are," snarled frank Watkins in fear.

"The pleasure is mine," sighed the other. 'I'm Julius Sugars, Inspector, C.I.D."

"Oh," groaned Prank Watkins, going green. "I've heard of you. You're—"

"The last man anybody takes for a policeman. That's my gift," said Mr. Sugars. "We will now go to a place apart and talk it over— and I'll take that parcel. I hate to see a man of your temperament carrying things."

Frank Watkins sat sweating in the charge room of the local police station. He stared at Julius Sugars, who was a double terror to crooks because he did not look it, and he told himself he must not squeak. Julius Sugars said sadly:

"We know you're not the big noise, Frankie. You just buy the jewels from the housebreakers in order to pass them on to the real receiver. He's one of the new school— lives abroad and out of way of arrest most of the year, I fancy; probably in hotels de luxe on the Riviera. He only shows up. in England at discreet intervals to collect what youand others have accumulated. Then, unsuspected by anyone, he returns to the Continent again, disposes of the loot to crooked Dutch buyers and diamond cutters, and then goes off to continue his deluxe existence at the Lido or Deauville until the time for his next visit. Almost a foolproof arrangement,eh? eh? Even though we arrest you, he remains untouched, Frankie."

"Yes, and it'll take more than the brains you have to catch him," Frank Watkins growled.

"Naturally-that's why I thought it so wise of me to call in the aid of yours."

"I'm no 'squeaker,' " Frank Watkins blustered.

"No, you're a journeyman 'fence' with a record so long that your next judge is going to be very severe with you."

"You don't bluff me," the "fence" muttered uneasily.

"Do I have to, Frankie— you know so much?" Mr. Sugars lifted a glittering necklace from the mass of jewels he had taken from the brown-paper parcel. "You know all about this, for instance. A watchman was killed when it was stolen. That means a hanging— for someone."

Frank Watkin's nerve began to go.

"What, do you think I can tell you, anyhow?" he mumbled.

"To begin— an explanation of the cryptic message you got over the 'phone forty minutes ago," said Mr. Sugars. "It was arranging a meeting, wasn't it?"

"You— you've tapped my 'phone?" the fence gulped in terror.

"We've been interested in you for months," beamed Mr. Sugars. "Not for your own sweet sake, but because we want The Big Chap. He's the real figure behind half of the jewel thefts in the past year. To lay him by the heels is so important that— well, we're ready to be friendly even with Frankie Watkins."

The fence snatched at his chance.

"I can't tell you anything really, Mr. Sugars, sir," he cried. "I don't know a thing about him. All I get is these 'phone messages telling me where to meet him."

"Don't let's be shy of names at this stage," Mr. Sugars murmured.

"All right. It's, always one of these big stores, Scarfage's or Halford's. That's cover for him, you see. He can hide himself in the crowds of shoppers, dodge through the departments and slip off through one of dozens of entrances, if needs be. I go to these stores as he orders— this time it's Scarfage's. I hang about in the Enquiry Bureau. I'm generally there minutes— anyhow, long enough for him to make sure I'm not being trailed or up to any monkey tricks. Then he slides up to me, asks me something that brings in the number he knows me by and his own number, then as we stand chatting like two friends, I slip him that brown-paper parcel and he slips me one exactly like it in turn."

"His contains your money, eh?" nodded Julius Sugars. "It seems trusting, but I take it he knows too much about you for you to dare to double-cross him. Now, what's he like?"

"I don't know— honest, Mr. Sugars. He's different every time. First he was a big, red-faced, whiskered Dutchman; then he was a coffee-coloured little Levantine. Then he had a beard— I mean, you just can't tell what sort of build and face he really has— "

"But you know he's the same man all the time, eh?" murmured Mr. Sugars. "Yes, I see you do. Hmml A master of disguise. That might be Odo the Actor. Yes, I see you have the same suspicion."

"Thinking's nothing," snarled Frank Watkins. "You've got to get the evidence on him first."

"Quite," sighed Mr. Sugars. "And obviously he knows how to make that difficult. Vanishes into the crowd once he leaves you, of course. Probably manages to change his disguise at once, so that as he leaves by one of the dozen doors it would be impossible to identify him. Hmm! Clever— but Odo always was." He frowned like a worried uncle. "He's still fond of cigar smoking?"

"Chain smoker," muttered the fence. "What's that got to do with it?"

"Oh, the habits of fellow-men are always interesting," sighed Mr. Sugars. "And you were on your way to meet him, eh? Probably by a roundabout way to avoid risk? Yes; well, that suggests you' still have time to keep your appointment. You have? Well, I think you'd better keep it, Frankie."

Frank Watkins tried to wriggle out of it, but this slow and apparently dull man had filled him with such a wholesome terror— especially with regard to the murder attached to that stolen necklace— that he had to give in. Also, he was so sure of the cleverness of "The Big Chap" that he felt certain he could escape any trap. Moreover, all he himself had to do was very simple. He just had to meet "The Big Chap" as arranged, and effect the exchange of the parcels. There was no more to It, except that he had to give "The Big Chap" a cigar.

There was even no harm nor hint of double-crossing in that cigar. It was a genuine half-crown Corona-Corona which Frank Watkins watched Mr. Sugars buy from an ordinary tobacconist. And when Frank Watkins met "The Big Chap" in the Inquiry Bureau at Scarfage's "The Big Chap" saw no harm in it either.

"The Big Chap" was made up as a deeply-tanned, white-moustached old colonel this time. The exchange of the parcels was managed with the usual lack of alarm, though the old colonel seemed surprised when Frank Watkins offered him a cigar— as instructed by Mr. Sugars. Still, the sight of a Corona-Corona was too much for him. He took it, dropped the stub of the cigar he was smoking, and lit up. Then he vanished into the milling crowd of shoppers.

The black-haired, moustacheless Italian nobleman whom a plain-clothes detective detained at one of Scarfage's doors half an hour later was quietly and dangerously angry at the "outrage." The manner with which he threatened to bring the matter before his Ambassador was so genuinely aristocratic that the detective was nervously sure he had made a bloomer— until Mr. Sugars sauntered up and carried them off to the Onager's room.

"Well, we've got you at last, Odo," Mr. Sugars said genially, and then, with a sudden and unexpected swiftness, went through the furious nobleman's pockets. In one he found a receipt for goods bought at the stores.

"Quite, a parcel of underclothing and things," beamed Mr. Sugars examining the receipt: "To be sent to the Cav. Antonne Desparge at the Plaza-Ritz.... Splendid! And since he was packing and sending the things the assistant who served you was quite ready to add the brown-paper parcel you carried to the package. Waste of time to deny it, Odo; this receipt will enable us to find the assistant and the parcel with the jewels inside, and the assistant will identify you as the owner."

Odo the Actor knew that his game was up.

"Smart chap for one who doesn't look it," he jeered. "How did you manage it?"

"Remembering you, Odo," beamed Mr. Sugars. "You were always almost a gentleman, even off the stage. But you never could resist cigars, nor bring yourself to tear the band off an expensive cigar when you smoked one."

He took the Corona-Corona he had bought from Odo's mouth. The band was still on it.

"I gave orders that anyone smoking a cigar with a band was to be stopped as he left this store. There are things even such cleverness as yours overlooks, Odo— that is your own small, instinctive habits. And the habits of fellow-men have always interested me— especially in crooks."

________________

19: The Parson

Tungamah and Lake Rowan Express and St. James Gazette (Vic) 18 May 1916

PERHAPS his name really wasn't Smike, but, since he was quite unable to pronounce anything— even the name of an archangel— without a sniff, Smike had been adopted permanently.

Smike, of course, was a hero. He hadn't been a hero until Kitchener found him; he had been a gas company plumber; only Kitchener has a rare way with gas company plumbers, and the like, and had made an excellent job of Smike. Everybody recognised this. When Smike came home from Flanders six inches larger in chest, dirtier than any civilian could ever hope to be (in face), and with half a trench on him in the shape of mud, he had it all his own way. His brother said nothing about the socks he borrowed, quite by mistake; his girl let him kiss her, even though his face was how it was; and his mother didn't hint that the doormat had been put down for a special purpose.

Smike had a glorious seven days' leave. He improved the shining hour in spite of Zeppelins, extra on tobacco, and little things called no-treating and licensing measures. He gave people a run for their money, too. He had a rich, fruity stock of yarns, some of them, perhaps— well, I never could quite believe the one in which he captured three German generals and a Prince of the Blood, not to say the gun that fires the "Jack Johnsons," and lost all the glory of it by taking them to his colonel when that officer wanted to see nothing so much as his tea. But some of them, if only by accident, are truthful. The one about the Parson is like that. You see, I got it quick before he could think of anything nutty to say about the parson.

Smike had been— well— distant, to say the least, to parsons in his pre-Kitchener life. So that when he saluted a curate... Well, this is the story.

"YER sniffiee"— but perhaps I'd bet' ter not keep up the sniffing business. Yer see,'we 'ad a parson in our crush."

"Chaplain, eh?" said unsuspicious I.

"Our crush, our lotter landed aristocracy, our platoon, I mean," said Smike, and I knew by his face the sarcastic act was on. "Well, we 'ad a parson in our crush. Not reely a full-grown parson, but young of same. That is, 'e 'adn't quite got there. 'E was goin' there, but the war stopped im. E was a chapel feller, was studying at a Thermometical College "

"Perhaps it was a Theological College," I suggested.

"Praps," agreed Smike, without passion. " 'E used words just like that, too. Big words wot gave yer growin' pains. Well, 'e was in this Theom— this college— an' war come, an 'e got it, like a call, or the light or somethin' like that. So "'e pushed the Them-and-cetra College into a itch an' joined up. 'E joined up with us. "Yer see 'e was a little strange in 'is ways."

Smike belongs to the Toughs, a rich full-blooded regiment; if you know the corps you will quite understand, that a student of a Nonconformist theological college to join it must be extraordinarily strange in his ways I understand. I nodded agreement '

"Eighteen Carrats— 'is real name is— saw 'im join up with 'is black floppy at, an' 'is black cloes, an' 'is white coller an' 'is little Mack bow, an' e told us all about 'ini. But we knowed there was somethin' wrong all the time. 'E was' quiet. 'E always did exactly wot even the lance told mi to do, 'e never got 'ot with a man an' spoke 'is mind straight an' Purple same as the rest when things went wrong. 'E never looked on the canteen when it was mellow. Oh, we knew 'e weren't scarcely uman, in once."

"I don t think 'e was 'appy with us." Smike had glimpses of compunction. "P'raps we were a rough lot, made like that, you know; p'raps we found 'is ways funny— silly, in fact— an given in make a man wrathy. But then, yer see, 'e wasn't like us, nor us like 'im. We 'ad no locust standeye."

"Eh?" I put.

"One of 'is words— I think 'e meant we didn't mix. Well, we didn't, an' there 'being only one of 'm, an' a platoon of us, 'e got it crool. All of us put it acrost 'im. If we wanted to work off some of the 'eart to 'eart anger we'd got from a talk with the Serg'ant— we worked it off on 'im if somebody was going to be pushed in th' face— well, soine'ow 'is face was the very one to push. If we wanted to slip our fatigues onto someone— if it could be done, that is— 'e was the one wot got th' slip. 'E got it in the neck from everybody an' anyow. Oh, a reel wearin' time 'e must ave 'ad with us."

Smike paused a space.

I don't know as 'ow that sort of feller ain't askin' for it, if 'e joins a crush like ours. We ain't little red devils, but qw ain't of the angel build, neither. E was too quiet. 'E'd never join in th' fun. Yer'd see 'im goin' to sit by 'imself when the rest of the boys were goin' off with the girls to the enema, or the Empire. An' 'e'd sit there for an hour Iookin' at nothin'. Bull-dog Bryne-Dog for short, 'e was said e was contemplatin' 'Eaven an the after life, an' asked 'im as much. 'E smiled, soft, an' said that Eaven an the rest was a bit out, but contemplatin' was right. Dog asked why 'e did it. The Parson smiled the same as before, an' asked Dog if 'e never thought about 'is soul. Dog was too surprised to 'it 'im. But as 'e said afterwards, 'e couldn't 'ave done it any'ow; it'd be like 'ittin' a girl.

" An he acted queer, too. Too quiet again. Ed take double-dose of fatigues with a all smilin' calm, an' then take more on top of that. 'E reelý become the fatigue king of the platoon— an of course, we let 'im. Anybody could walk over 'im.. Never word 'e said. Why— l sneaked 'is spare trousers just before a kit in spection an' 'e took it like a lamb. Took all 'e 'ad to come when it was found they weren't there. Took all 'e got from the sergeant an' hut corporal an' went out an' bought 'issalf a noo pair without even sayin' a 'blow you'. Oh, 'e was queer. An' being that, e ad a rotten time.

"But it was Dog who give 'im the worst time."

Memories of Dog gave Smike's face an unearthly glow.

"Dog never loved 'im from the first I think it was because the Parson was a big feller, an' Dog thought 'e ought to fight 'im. Dog 'ad wacked everybody else already, yer see. That an' the feller's quietness got on Dog's nerves. Dog tried to make 'im fight, but it was no go, an' that soured ole Dog's soul. 'E hazed the feller proper. Always at 'im, 'e was. Always roughin' with 'is tongue. Never fettin' 'im alone, marchin', on fatigue, in the hut— everywhere. 'E couldn't let the Parson alone. Once 'e was so carried away that 'e 'it 'im. 'It 'im a real hard swipe."

"Ah!" I said, "and what happened then?"

Smike sniffed. It was the only way he had of showing his injured manhood.

"Th' other cheek happened. For a moment I thought the Parson was going to. slam back— 'e was a big, thick chap, did I tell you?— 'is grey eyes began to glitter, an' 'e stiffened up on 'is feet. I could see 'is fists grippin' till the knuckles was white. An' then— an' then 'e smiled, an' sat down on 'is bed."

" 'E got it worse after that, specially from Dog. 'E got it worse an' worse right up to the time we found 'im out in the trenches."

"So," I said, "you did find him out?"

"We did," said Smike gravely. "We found 'im out proper. It was a month after we'd been out in the trenches. A cool month, too. Our chaps 'ad been 'aving lots of frightfulness. Then Huns 'ad 'ated us proper. An' we 'adn't been able to do anythin' in return-makes men bitter that sort of thin' does. Well, we'd been like the rest, but worse. We'd been punched and pulped from trench to trench until we were sick of ourselves. We was raw all through. At times like that yer 'ate, too; only yer 'ate the men near you. Yer 'ate their faces an' the way they grins. Yer 'ate their voices an' the way they wears their clo'es, yer'd 'ate yer best girl if she was there. An' the Dog, of course, did most of 'is 'ating on the Parson.

"I remember it just as if I was seein' it on a cinema. We'd gone out at night to have a try at 'em, an' we'd left a lot of good fellers on the wrong side of the parapets-fellers we'd grown to like as pals, fellers who'd drunk an' sung an' gone to the pictures with us, and borrowed Woodbines, an' shared the last parcel from 'ome. An'-they were there on the other side, an' in the grey an' the cold of the mornin' we was sore all through-bitterly sore.

"An' just about that time we found out that our little officer boy 'adn't come back with us."

Smike, very sober, waited a little.

"Yer smile at little officer boys," he went on, "but, all the same, what yer feel about them gets into the blood. Yer remember 'ow they laughed, when yer wanted to lie down an' die; yer remember 'ow sporting they 'ave been, an' 'ow at times they looked the other way, when lookin'.at yer would 'ave meant C.B. or worse. Yer remember a lot of things about them... an' when they don't come back over the parapet with the rest-sone'ow it 'urts.... That's what we were like. Our little officer chap 'adn't come back an' we were bad about it.

"Dog was particular bad. 'E an' th' officer 'ad got friendly because they both played back in the platoon football team. 'E took it personal. When 'e wasn't near breakin' down, 'e was' near murder,

" 'E wanted all of us to go out an' fetch the officer in. 'E said 'e knew 'e wasn't killed, but wounded sore, an' 'e'd bleed to death out there beyond and sand-bags, if the Germans didn't shoot 'im to pieces as 'e lay. Someone told 'im that 'e 'ad seen Mr. Angus go out-right out, without error. Dog said that this was a lie. Th' officer was out there, bleedin' to death, an' we only said 'e was dead because we were a lot of blinkin' cowards afraid to go an' fetch 'im in. 'E was near mad. 'E went for all of us, but most 'e went for the Parson. 'E told the Parson thai 'e was white livered an' a cur not to come out with 'im to fetch the little officer in.

" 'E said everythin' 'e could in 'is mad pain. Th' Parson was a skunk, a coward, an' the lot. 'E near flayed the Parson alive with 'is tongue. Th' Parson was quiet, 'e didn't smile, but took it sadly like, an' some'ow I liked 'im for that. 'E seemed to be feelin' all Dog felt. Then Dog began on the Parson's religious side. 'E began to say 'e was no Christian. 'E began to ask what 'is religion meant if it let a man lie out there bleedin' to death, an' a butt for the Hun snipers. 'E asked, bitterly, wot was the good of a man preacliin' if 'e didn't live up to it.

' 'The Parson took it quiet— my, I began to feel good about 'im, an' 'e said, presently: 'I know, Bryne; I know 'ow you feel. If it was any use.

' An' Dog said he 'ad some learnin' ye know, 'ad Dog— 'e said,   "That's wot the priest and the Levite said about the feller what fell in with robbers. Skunks, just like you."

"The Parson looked at 'im quietly. Then 'e reached a trench ladder. 'Yer right, Bryne,' 'e said. 'Come on.' And 'e went up first."

"I remember It plain-plain. 'E went up quite easy, an' 'e stood at the top, on the bags right in front ,of the Huns, an' 'e ses to Dog on the ladder. 'After all, one should do,' 'e ses. 'Leave it to me.' Dog walks up after 'im steady. But 'e never opened 'is mouth, an' now— now I can see the white look on 'is face.

"They went up, both of them, an' over, out of sight. An' we 'eard the 'Hun firm' get up big-rifles an' machine-guns an' bombs. A big row sudden."

"Yes, Smike gulped all right then.

"A feller found them with a periI scope a 'our later. 'E said Dog was down, but the Parson 'ad 'im across 'is knees. I saw it myself, Dog with 'is 'shoulders on the Parson's lap, lookin' up to the Parson, who was talkin' to 'im. An' th' Parson's back was between Dog an' the Hun loopholes. They were in a bit of a dip, that 'id them. But they didn't attempt to move, though the Huns lobbed a bomb along every now an' then, that came close. They were like that all day— all day."

Smike looked straight at his hands and his hands were working.

"We go to them after dark, a party of us. The Parson was still speakin' soft to Dog, an I 'eard Dog answerin' soft too, as though 'e was 'earin' big news.... We got to them, an' whispered across in th' night, an' the Parson said clear, 'Ere they are, Byrne. You're all right now. You're safe.' Dog 'ad got it bad in the body, but the field-dressin' was on 'im, an' when we'd got 'im in we knew 'e'd pull roun'. ...

"Then we went to the Parson.

"An' we found out why the Parson 'adn't come in or brought Dog in. Dog's shoulders had prevented us seeing...

"The Parson's leg was gone just above the right knee. Gone, smashed off... 'E died....

"I remember wot Dog said as we lugged 'im over the bags. 'E said, 'My God, 'e's a white Christian right through 'im.' ...An'— an', by God, 'e was!"

_______________

20: Headlong

The Strand Magazine, March 1921

Chronicle (Adelaide) 18 June 1921

THIS IS how Gemma came to know Raphael Phare. The whim that had led her to motor to this infinitely remote hamlet of the moors had expired after five minutes' examination of its lonely bleakness. The big and slightly furtive fellow who kept the only shop had then given her a long list of the things he could not supply for her refreshment, and she had been forced to fall back on a glass of vitiated ginger-ale and a big of biscuits. She left the shop quickly because, as she told herself, the big man made her shiver.

Ten minutes after she had arrived she was in her high-power car again, her hand already on the starting gear, and a great satisfaction that sho could get away from this gloomy place so easily and quickly in her heart. It was then she found a man standing beside her on the footboard. He was a genial young man, with an easy, mundane, almost indolent air; the sort of neat and perfect young man who seems to be bred exclusively for social decoration and the accomplishment of much Jazz.

Gemma's first decisions about him were: (1) that his smart clothes clashed with scenery; (2) that he had managed to materialise from nowhere in particular with an astonishing adroitness and silence.

He seemed to understand her thoughts es he stood on the footboard smiling in an amiable and polite way. And he .

'Sorry to butt in on you, and all that, but really, could you give me a lift? I'd be enormously obliged, you know.'

Gemma was perfectly willing to give him a lift, but his arrival was so unexpected she could only say— 'Oh— oh, how much— that is, how far?'

'About thirty or forty miles— p'haps fifty.'

Gemma stared at him.  'Why, that would be farther than Martindayle!' she cried.

'No, not farther,' he smiled back. 'Martindayle's the place. But—' He seemed to be regarding Gemma with a rather intelligent attention.

She felt abruptly that the decorative air was not all of him. There was something else underneath— something that was alert and firm and rather forceful. She saw, too, that his handsomeness had a lean and capable air, and that under cover of his social smile the eyes were curiously level and shrewd. She said quickly, her vivid and gallant little face blushing under his scrutiny:—

'That's all right. I'll take you to Martindayle.'

'Awful sorry to have to ask you, he said; and again he said, 'but—'

'No need for sorrow,' she told him. 'I'm going to Martindayle.'

'It's that "but," ' he said, his smile full of social friendliness. 'It's— er —it's rather risky.'

'I know the road,' said Gemma.

'I mean it's dangerous.'

Gemma stared at him, wondering whether this was some curious form of humor. He smiled at her with the utmost good feeling. 'I mean— Well, you know, half an hour ago a man was shooting at me with a revolver, and before that a large fellow did his best to get me with his knife.'

Gemma stared, too astonished to be anything but bewildered. He went on, 'Of course, it's more than likely to happen again between here and Martindayle — yes, any number of times.'

'Shooting at you?' gasped Gemma.

'And other things. It's awful mean to drag you in, but— but what am I to do?'

Again Gemma could only stare at the pleasant and apparently unperturbed face.

'Of course, I can say, "In the name of the law," and so on; but to a girl like you—'

'The law!' cried Gemma, her hazel eyes widening. 'Are you connected with the law?'

'Well, yes,' began the young man. Then he stopped. 'Sorry— just a jiffy,' he said. He slipped from the car with a curious smooth swiftness, went across the street with an indolence that was markedly rapid, and confronted the large, shifty man of the general shop. The large, shifty man had been acting in a strange manner. He had stolen cautiously to his doorway. Crouching behind what cover he could find, he was furtively watching the young man. As the young man crossed the road he drew back aa though he would fly, then he decided to be bold.

The young man stepped up to him— and amazing things happened. In a flash the large, shifty shopman had snatched some sort of club from under his apron. He swung it viciously to strike the young man down. And the young man hit him.

The young man, without losing for moment his air of sunny casualness, slipped under the swiping club, and his right drove in at the large body. The big man staggered and mowed wildly with his left arm. The other shifted lightly on his left his left elbow came back, and he snapped a beautifully-timed punch to the gross jaw.

The large shifty man hit his own floor-boards with a final bump, and the young man did not cease behaving in a strange fashion. He stepped over the prostrate shopkeeper and entered the shop. He crossed it calmly, and in the most unruffled manner proceeded to smash the telephone into a most decisive wreck. Then he walked back to the motor car and the astonished Gemma.

'That's the sort of things I mean,' he said smiling, as though continuing a conversation but slightly interrupted. 'Only it won't be a club; it'll probably be pistols or guns.'

'You mean— men will try to kill you between here and Martindayle?' she gasped.

'That's it,' he smiled. 'And you'd be dragged into it.'

'But, but—' she cried. 'It doesn't sound real!'

'Oh, it is. Really it's quite logical. If they don't stop my getting to Martindayle, then some of those men will be hanged. It's really only business for them to out me.'

'Get in!' cried Gemma. 'Get in quickly! I'll take you to Martindayle. I drove a  car in France, you know,' she added. 'Being shot at won't be altogether novel.'

Her hand went out, and under its touch the great car began to vibrate with awakened life. At the moment a motor cycle came snorting into the village behind them. It rushed halfway down the street. It stopped with a jerk. Its rider sprang from it, stared for an instant at the young man on the footboard, and then his hand snatched at his pocket. The young man on the footboard sprang into the car.

He cried, 'Get along, quick!'

The great car moved. Behind them the motor cyclist had whipped his hand from his pocket and in it was a pistol. He was firing at them.

Gemma saw three flecks of dust leap up from the roadway in front, heard something hit the back of the motor with a loud whack. She spun the car round on to a side road, where the houses would cut off the line of fire.

ii

THE GREAT car lunged with its pulsing speed up the side road. Gemma had opened out and they were covering the ground in giant leaps. Gemma, her firm little wrists resolutely controlling the kicking wheel, her eyes bright and keen with excitement, was conscious that the genial young man by her side was kneeling on the seat, but it was only when she heard the 'snap-snap-snap' of an automatic pistol that she realised ne was quite sedately firing at the cyclist.

They kicked and roared downward through a cutting. The young man sat down; he leant across so that his shoulder touched hers: she could feel ithe warmth of his face on her neck as he said into her ear:— 'Missed the beggar. Pace and bumps against fine shooting. 'Fraid he's off to rouse the clans.'

Gemma shouted back:— 'No matter. We're off the main road. We can make Martindayle by side roads— get round behind them. This road leads to a little place called Gricton. There are several tracks there by which we can dodge thm.'

'Oh,' shouted the young man, he'll telephone to Gricton.'

He had a map on his knee by now. His finger traced the route of the motor cyclist to a house. 'He's making for that; he'll send out a general S.O.S. from there.'

Gemma slowed in order to get some inkling of the rather amazing facts this cool young man was suggesting.

'But Gricton— one of the last villages on earth?' she cried.

'Oh, they're in Gricton,' he answered.

'Are they everywhere, then?' she cried startled.

'They are. They're all round this district.'

In her amazement Gemma slowed the great car to a walk. 'What are we up against— an army?' she demanded.

His eyes were examining her with intelligent appraisement, his lips smiling pleasantly all the while.

'Something like that,' he said. 'The biggest criminal organisation in modern times, anyhow.'

He pointed to his map; near the hamlet, Merrivale, they had just left, there were some markings in pen amd ink.

'That's the headquarters of the gang. It's an old munition factory, in which some sort of modern industry is supposed to be carried on. It's merely a sort of base and clearing-house of the gang. In all the villages within easy radius of it are members of the gang, most of them covering up their real activities in the manner of that dratted shopkeeper I have just been brusque with. That is why I wrecked his telephone, not because I wanted to stop a general alarm— that's already gone out— out to cover up my line of flight. That wretched motor cyclist has upset things properly. The whole district will be jumping with rogues. We've got to run through a regular barrage of 'em. All we can do now is dodge.'

Gemma, who had been looking at the map in off moments from steering, said— 'And we will dodge. Look, by taking to the moor we can cut across to the little lane there which meanders eastward. It crosses the main road to Martindayle at a lonely place— I remember it and there it is wandering south and east. We can get under Martindayle from the east by taking one of that network of side roads. That wiII fool them. They'll get information that we are running met through Gricton. They'll never dream we've taken to tne moor and doubled on our tracks.'

'Can you get across the moor?'

'It's bumpy, but it's feasible; anyhow, it is a chance to fool your gang and, yet it's not a bad alternative to being shot at.'

The young man, after examining the map, let out a vivid laugh. 'I really was lucky to meet you. You seem to be quite the right sort of person to encounter in a crisis; You're—'

'Hold tight,' said Gemma. 'This is where the bumps begin. I'm going to turn on to the moor.'

With a long, slithering double leap the great car was on the grassy flats of the open moor. They had to go forward at reduced speed, and even at that they were tossed about on the padded seat as though they were in a row-boat on a lopping sea. It was a risky and tossing run, in which breath was held too often to enable conversations to be kept up. But though they did not speak, each was acutely conscious of the other. Gemma was realising the dean, Jean, good looks and the oetonieaing capacity of the apparently indolent young man at her side.

The young man at her side had very little to do but to enjoy the exquisite outline of her delicate and yet gallant little profile, hot warm and generous lips, exquisitely lined the soft eyes with their entrancing lashes, and the irreverently, tipped, but wholly adorable little nose. A very absorbing, delicious, and vital face— his time was well spent.

Presently they came to the fillet of the by-lane, and had to dodge about to find a cart ramp across the evil little ditch. They came on one suddenly and with a brilliant dexterity that made him cry, out in admiration, Gemma brought the great car in a sweeping double turn on to the roadway.

In a rush of miles they sprang along this, the great engine purning and lilting in a song of speed. Through little coppices and over and down easy hills, by bleak houses and amid empty plains of grass they rocked and swung, curved and flowed onwards at a glory of pace. Standing things blurred under the eyes as they rushed upon and by them. They could hear the wind throating over the shield with a roar almost as deep as the dong of the cylinders.

Then— 'Beyond that copse, downhill, is the place where we cross the Martindayle road. Shall we stop?' shouted Gemma.

'We'll stop,' said the young man.

'Field-glasses in the pocket beside you,' said Gemma.

'I was lucky to meet you!' laughed the young man again. They reached the trees, the girl slipped the car well into the shade and then they were both out among the trees looking down at the broad band of road that ran along the floor of the valley, just beneath them.

'Our lane crosses there, you see,' pointed Gemma, 'and climbs and turns—'

'Our friends, I think,' said tlie young man, minting to the north. Gemma saw a big car travelling at no very great pace along the Martindayle-road. It was coming towards them, making apparently for MapLndayle. The young man was already examining it carefully through the fieldglasses. He said, 'It was quite the wisest thing, that stop. Look!'

The great car came with an almost painful slowness along the main road. The five men in it were sparing no pains, and their careful search had a terrible suggestion of efficiency in it. Although Gemma and the young man were well hidden by the trees and bushes, the girl had a nervous feeling that she must appear as large and as palpable as a giant advertisement. She stirred as though to get back deeper into cover.

'Don't move,' said the young man. 'They can't see us as we are, but any movement shows up astonishingly. Can't help admiring their thoroughness, can one? They leave absolutely nothing to chance— that's the military training in 'em.'

'Military training? Are they—?'

'Oh, a collection of redoubtable bad hats an' so on, many of 'em having seen service. The whole thing is organised on military lines, a most wonderful business, as rotten as things can be, but running on clockwork. That's why it's so formidable. That's why it must be smashed. But they aren't Johnnies to be careless with.'

The car crawled with its painful care along the main road.

As Gemma watched it she felt growing within her, a terror that seemed to keep pace in expansion with the slow movement of the car. It was a terror she would not have felt if she had dashed hot-blooded into an excitement of danger, but this cold-hearted, calculated procedure made her crawl with fear. Her breath caught, she looked away, anywhere rather than wsatch that creeping motor car. She found she was looking into the eyes of the young man. There was an immense reassurance in the candid, friendly imperturbablity of his blue eyes. He looked into hers and smiled. He put out his hand, and rested it on hers.

'Jumpy work, eh?' he said. 'But, I say, you have got tremendous grit.'

A touch of immense stimulation, words immensely encouraging. Gemma smiled and felt much better at once. Then the young man said, 'I say, will you take charge of these two books?'

He dipped into a big pocket inside his coat, brought out two small but fat ledgers, which had apparently been at one time locked, but now had their locks burst off. Gemma looked at him.

'This is the evidence— names, details of plunder, amounts, notes of the different coups— in fact, all the facts, to smash that gang are in those tffo books. Get them into the hands of the police somehow. Say Raphael Phare gave them to you. But whatever you do, don't let those blackguards get 'em back. Make a getaway while I hold 'em off. Dash straight down this road and past their car, which will be standing still— that would be the best, while I'm making 'em chase me across the moors, I mean.'

Gemma felt her heart beating suffcatin her hand, up to his face again.

'But why— why?'

The young man smiled, slipped his pistol out of his. pocket, and put in a full clip of cartridges. Gemma followed his gaze downhill. The big car had stopped. It had stopped at the crossing where their own road cut across. Even as she looked two men jumped out.

iii

GEMMA felt her heart beating suffocatingly in her throat. The sight of those men getting out of the car, looking uphill in their direction, seemed to make every nerve in her body scream. The young man was saying —

'Creep back now. You'll know when to start— when you hear the shooting. I'll strike across the moor to tlm left there, where the ground dips, and they'll be cut off by the hill from sight of the lane.When you hear me fire the whole of my clip without pausing, let her rip.'  He glanced down at the high road again. 'But, I say, one moment.'

The men who had jumped from the car were behaving strangely. They had looked up the hill, but they made no attempt to come up the lane. Instead they bent down examining the ground with a most intent care.

'Looking for tyre tracks,' said Raphael Phare. 'They are just making certain that a car has not crossed or turned into the road irom this lane. They don't really know what has happened to us yet. They are only taking just ordinary, business-like precautions. Admirable scoundrels, eh? I thought so— they are off to the next lane. Good job we hadn't crossed.'

Even as he was speaking the two men had returned to the big car. It had started, and once more it crept down the main road the two men with the field-glasses examining every inch of the countryside as it went.

Gemma and Raphael Phare waited until it was well round a bend. Raphael Phare held aloft a damp finger, and with a 'Wind in our favor; they won't hear us; let her go!' they started on their headlong rush down-hill. In ten minutes they were across the main road, tearing at a quite reckless speed over the dangerously uneven track that would bring them round under Martindayle from the east instead of the west.

Raphael Phare, with the map on his knees, was studying their route. Precently, when the road got a trifle better, and human intercourse was more possible, he drew attention to a small collection of spots clustered about their path.

'We overlooked that little one, I fear,' he said.

'Greenwark,' she answered, after a darting glance. 'Just a collection of houses, that's all.'

'A little more than that,' he said, evenly. 'The innkeeper and his main staff?'

'Even there!' she cried. And then,' I can take to my moors again.'

'No good,' he answered. 'We're in the elbow of that idiot stream, the Reedburn; there are no bridges, and we can't ford it. We'll have to risk it.'

'There's a nasty double turn in Greenwark and that will make me go slow.'

'Well, I hope they haven't been 'phoned.'

'Why should they be 'phoned— or rather, why should they expect us to head in this direction?'

'They'll be ready for us heading in any direction. By this time, too, they'll have known we haven't arrived in Gricton. That'll tell them we've doubled back somewhere. So a general warning will be flashed to all the villages to be ready for us.'

'A general warning— all the villages!' cried Gemma. 'It soande incredible.

'Sounds like a 'movie' scheme of things, doesn't it? Only I'm afraid it's true. You see, it is a beast of a big gang, something quite amazingly widespread in its organisation. It— but I had better give you the whole facts.'

'Ought you?' she cried; for, after all, she knew his work was official, and there- for probably secret.

'It's the least I can do,' he cried, and she knew he was smiling, felt the friendliness of him against her shoulder. 'And then— if you know, it may be helpful.'

'Oh, I want to know— if I may.'

'Well, perhaps, you've noticed, there has been a rash of big robberies in the last six months. The Kendal Bank robbery of twenty thousand pounds was one of them. That time when the biggest jewellers in Nottingham were cleared from the strongroom to attic was another. Then there were the big goods robberies from the railway sheds at Hullhampton, and the warehouse burglaries in a score of manufacturing towns. There's the widespread forgery of notes, too— all that sort of thing.

'There were worse things— the Gold Shipment robbery had a murder in it, and so did the raid on the Preston pay-roll; there have, in fact, been a number of very ugly happenings. And— I won't bore you with all the details— I, that is we, gradually became certain that the whole of these crimes could be grouped together. They had a certain method that indicated— well, one gang aa the author of the lot. That is the theory I have been working on for some time.'

'You working on it?' said Gemma, for he seemed to her so utterly unlike anv detective she had ever heard or read of.

'Yes; crime's my regular work. I'm a detective. Found I had a gift for that sort of thing when I was on the Intelligence in France. But this business: I followed out my theory, and presently l found I was right. There was a big gang, a tremendously big gang, at work. I found heaps of clues that led me up to Merrivale, to get the facts.'

'By yourself?'

'Couldn't show a crowd, you know. With scoundrels in every one of these villages we had to tread after the manner of the delicate Agag. And my going there wasn't so difficult. I turned up as a factory inspector, took a room, and in the most casual way began to inspect. You see, that big factory is a very good camouflage. There's quite a lot of legitimate work going on there. Electrical fittings and fixtures and any amount of small things in brass and metals are made there. Real work to cover up the coming and going of lorries with plunder, and the use of the sheds as storage, as well as an excuse for keeping any number of men about.

'In a general sense, that big factory is what I said it was, a G.H.Q. The chief brains, a real sort of headquarter staff, live there and plan robberies for all over the country. They plan long and well. The men in the factory go to wherever the burglary is to be. The thing is pulled off. They get the stuff secretly by lorries to this place, and from there it is cleared gradually and carefully throughout not merely this country but the world. It really is a gigantic and beautifirily systematized organisation — burglary carried on in the joint-stock manner. The men grouped in the villages about are there for definite ends. They are workers, with the gang, they act as spies and guards, they help to put plunder into circulation through their shops — notes, for example, or jewellery that has been broken up and then redesigned, and so on. Oh, it's an elaborate and beautiful and dangerous concern, I can assure you.'

'And you went into that lions' den alone —and beat them!'

'Well, yes, I did. I spent best part of a week yoking round. That wasn't really hard. You see, my casual and decorative air convinced 'em I couldn't possibly be dangerous— they thought I was some ass of a relative of a Minister, who had been pushed into a cushy inspector's job. There you are, then.

'I wandered about and found out what I wanted — the place where these books were kept. It was a sort of secret office, and so I went along and gelignited the safe and got the books. I had to run for it, but I had fixed up a hiding-place, and I was able to spend an hour or so going into those books. They made me understand how anxious the gang would be to get me. They form a complete case.'

Gemma interrupted him.

'Do you think these people in front belong to the gang?'

iv

THEIR RUSH had now cirried them to the outskirts of the village of Greenwark. The street narrowed to the dangerous turn, and in the narrowest part ot the street three men and a trap were doing strange things The horse in the trap was backing and sidling all over the place. The men appeared in difficulties, but one glance at them showed that they were not really in difficulties,  showed why Gemma had felt they might be enemies. It was not the horse that was restive; the driver was the man responsible for his antics, though he was covering up his manner of handling the reins cunningly.

Just when the motor slowed and came upon them the crisis was reached. The trap swung broadside to the road, its wheels went bump into the ditch, the whole concern stopped, completely blocking the fairway. The men sprang from the trap, apparently saw the motor for the first time, and came towards it with anxiously waving hands.

'Can you stop your car, sir?' cried one man. 'That old horse is frightened o' motors.'

Another man came forward and stood by the car on Gemma's side.

'Go back, my friend, and swing your horse round,' said Raphael. 'We'll get by.'

The man who had spoken hesitated. His hand went down to his pocket. Raphael passed what she afterwards found to be a life preserver into Gemma's hand. He did it secretly. He aaid to the man, 'I say, is this right for Martindayle? I'm rather in a hurry.'

The man stepped close up to the car, his hand definitely to his pocket. The man next Gemma moved up to the splashboard. Gemma being a mere girl, he kept his eyes mainly on Raphael.

'Oh, you're goin' to Martindayle, are you?' growled the first fellow

And he stopped growling. He was looking down the barrel of Raphael's automatic. He made a spasmodic movement, turned, ran, plucked out his pistol, fired it wildly. Raphael fired, and he went down. The horse reared at the shot, wrenched the trap out of the ditch, turned, and tore down the village street, knocking over the man who stood by its head. In that moment Gemma struck the man at her side. The man at her side had been foolish. He had stepped on to the footboard, and made a lunge at Raphael, a lunge that was too late as well as too short. He had ignored Gemma.

Gemma felt her heart sick, but she slipped her arm free in a flash, lifted it, and brought the preserver down. It was not a decisive blow, but the preserver was weighted with lead. The man went limp over the steerlng-wheel. Gemma was staring, half-sobbing, when Raphael tossed the unconscious figure out of the car and with a firm grasp brought Gemma's hands to the wheel.

She understood at once. They went through the difficult village of Greenwark perilously but safely. Now, obviously, it was a race against enemies, a race in which their opponents must be tricked and baffled if they were to get throuugh at all. The man who had been knocked down had risen and run off almost at once. He would give the general alarm.

They dodged end doubled along the roads. At a junction, instead of striking east and south towards Martindayle, they whipped north and west again. They curved round at racing speed until they circled their own track. They crossed the Martindayle road above their old crossing, and, taking wildly to the bumpy moor, pushed to the side lanes of the west They saw men moving after them. The country was quick with them. They would appear in the distance, and they would shout and shoot.

Once a motor cyclist swept round a bend upon them. He yelled at the sight of them, tried to check his machine. They could see his frantic anxiety. Gemma's hand had flashed to the brake, for the lane was narrow. Raphael snatched it away. With an exquisite touch he deflected the great car on to the cyclist. Their mudguards touched him, the man and machine were flung terribly into the hedge.

Again on a broad stretch of road a great car came roaring after them. They knew of it by the sudden whipping of a bullet over their heads. A second came, clipiping the brass of the wind-screen, starring the glass. Raphael was up at once, and firing back. He didn't kill anything, as he said, but he made them shaky. Bullets whistled by, well out of range. As he fired he yelled, 'A Rolls-Royce— can you beat it?'

'No!' she shouted back.

They swept on, thundering at an almost manko rush of speed; the great car behind creeping up, creeping up. It overtook them relentlessly. Raphael crouched, steadying his pistol. Abruptly he loosed the whole of a clip. He paused, looking back. Gemma was aware of a definite cessation of noise. Raphael slipped down beside her.

'In the radiator, every one. That settles them.'

They passed through a hamlet, where a man flung a small barrel across their path, and missed by a fraction.

'That's Kamsing,' cried Gemma.

Raphael examined the map.

'Nearly home! he cried. 'Another fifteen miles only to Martindayle.'

They swept on. They kept to the main road now, risking all. Down out of the village and away they rushed, through a bunch of trees that went by in a hafe and a roar, twisted, straightened, leaped with a stride on to open and wild country— and Gemma shouted. She shouted and grabbed at the brakes, and was too late. On the road, across the road, lay a number of planks, and in the planks were nails. The tyres took them, whipped them up. There were ghastly noises of brake and shattering metal and expiring tires. The great car lurched and heaved, staggered across the road, slid with a sickening crash into the high bank.

At that moment men on the farther side of the road began shooting. Raphael dragged Gemma out of the car, urged her up the bank. He turned and fired twice. A man toppled out of the gorse across the road, fell floundering down the bank to the road. Raphael fired again turned, and his powerful arm practically lifted the slight girl up the bank and into the scrub beyond.

They dived into the bushes, keeping low. A man ran out of the gorse across the road. Raphael fired, and the man scuttled back. They wormed and dodged through the scrub. Out of the bush before them a man started up, shouted, and fired. Raphael dived for him, crashed into his middle, fists and head and shoulders, striking sickeningly and the fool went down. He twisted as he fell. Raphael Phare struck him once with the butt of his pistol, and he lay still. They were going on, but Gemma stopped and picked up the man's revolver, and, seeing that, Raphael made a lightning and successful search for cartridges in the man's coat.

Thus, when they heard men tearing through the bushes behind them, both fired, Gemma imitating the slight sweeping movement of Raphael's hands. They heard a scream and the crash of a heavy body into the scrub, and then a man running back. On the road they heard the roar and rush of a hurtling car. There was shouting and the car stopped; they heard the bustle of men piling out. A voice shouted, 'They're lower down the road; lower down. This way: come on!'

They heard the stamping of feet going in the direction of Martindayle. They immediately turned and worked back along their tracks. Gemma followed the the young man as he moved swiftly, showing not a sign of himself. She noted that he was moving in the direction of the road. Behind them they could hear the movements of men beating a way through the bushes. It was getting distant. There were do shoute.

They pressed towards the road. Gemma wondered what this nimble-witted young man was up to. She soon saw. They came to the rod. On the road was the figure of the man who had been shot. There was their wrecked car. Almost alongside their car was a big motor; its engine was running, and it was empty.  Its chauffeur was up on the bank, pistol in hand, staring under his palm over the bushes, following the movements of his brother rogues. He was in an excellent position to reach the car at a bound. He was in an excellent position for Raphael to reach him. The young man touched Gemma's hand, and she remained quiet in the bushes, and in a moment he was gone.

There was not a sound, not a sign. Suddenly his lean figure shot out of the scrub and on to the chauffeur. There was a swinging and terrible blow, and the fellow went down. Gemma reached the car only a second after Raphael. They clambered into it. They started it. They dipped down the road, well under the bank. They gathered speed—

Suddenly a man sprang into view, shouted, and fired. They opened out, rushed towards Martindayle at top speed.

Three miles on, they met a motor waggonette. It was full of policemen. They had had word, of course, of Raphael Phare's dangerous mission to the munition factory, and, having had the report that there were strange happenings and shooting in that district, they had put two and two together and sent a good force out along the Martindayle-road.

Raphael Phare immediately joined them. Gemma was sent back with a policeman, in the car they had commandeered, with instructions to send more policemen, and to carry the secret books to quarters where Immediate action, could be taken on the information they contained. It was a parting as hurried as had been the meeting. And yet there was something more in it— a lifetime of emotions seemed to have been packed into their short companionship.

She saw him go, and she knew an acute anxiety that he should be going back to that factory, to that gang of criminals, to danger— perhaps to death. She felt that for one so young, so clever, so good-looking to go back to death was terrible. And— and she wanted to know so much about him.

So, as the car started, she ran beside it and put out her hand and cried—

'Come back— come back!'

And both, of them looked, for one of those moments that seem to be made up of eternities, into each other's eyes, and their hands gripped hard and lingered in the grip. And he smiled back at her, his old genial, assured smile.

HE CAME to her house in two days. She rose from, her chair in the big drawingroom and went towards him, smiling and blushing.

'You came through— splendid! And you beat them?'

'We've smashed 'em. We've got three of the leaders of the headquarter staff, so to speak; three are dead, and the other two we'll catch all right, I fancy. Those books help us. As for the rest of the gang—'

'Three killed!' she cried, her breath catching. 'There was a fight?'

'An episode,' he smiled. 'It began by wanting to be a fight. They thought a mere waggonette load of police was a small imposition, but when policemen, in cars began to arrive from all points of the compass it became a mere scramble. They scrambled. We've got most of them and all the loot and all the plans. And what we haven't got we'll clear up easily enough. That gang's done for.'

'And all through you!' she cried, her face bright.

'I think you had quite a lot to do with it, too,' he smiled back.

'Me!' she breathed— 'me! And that reminds me— you've found me. And I didn't even tell you my name.'

'I know it now,' he said. 'It's the jolliest kind of name.'

'Is it?'

'Gemma,' he said. 'Plucky, delicious little Gemma.'

He walked to her and stood close.

'How— how did you find out how to— to find me?' she said, softly.

'Detecting,' he said, 'is my job. Any detective can find anything if—'

'If—'

'If he wants it as hard as I want Gemma.'

_________________

21: The Pen

The Grand Magazine, August 1919

Chronicle (Adelaide) 6 Dec 1919

LEADBITTER WOOD left the lounge and went straight to his crowded and untidy study. He sat at his desk, took up his pen and wrote three opening words of an article on alkali poisoning. He was then struck down. He died so swiftly that his pen remained held firmly in his dead fingers....

HIS DEATH was not discovered until nearly eight o'clock, dinner time, for Leadbitter Wood had a cruel way of dealing with those who expected him to interrupt science for the trivialities of tea.

Hubert Gold, his secretary and cousin, returning from a visit to town, went to his study and found him. Hubert came back along the hall to the lounge quietly and mildly, as was his way, but showing considerable agitation; his colorless and characterless face was bathed in a diffident perspiration, and his lips, hands, and even his body were twitching from the shock. It was characteristic of him that he seemed to apologise for having to mention to Violet that her father had been killed.

His confusion was too great for Violet to understand anything, save that an accident had happened and that her father was probably dead. The confusion lessened the shock. In a flurry she hurried along the passage, only half feeling the blow, John Adam, who was going to marry Violet in spite of her father, and Hubert Gould following after her. When she reached the study and saw what and how it had happened, she was half-way towards accepting the inevitable.

The killing had occurred quite simply. One of the big metal deed-boxes Leadbitter would shove anywhere, on shelves and floor alike, had fallen from the shelf directly over him. It had struck the back of his head as he bent over his writing pad and had broken his neck. The body was pushed a little forward over  the desk by the blow, the face had dropped on to the pad, the hand, outflung, still clutched his elaborately chased fountain pen. Death had come very swiftly, very certainly, and in an entirely commonplace way.

It was so simple that they could not admit that this accident had meant death.

John Adam cried out— 'He's stunned, probably, only stunned; one of those boxes wouldn't do more than stun him!'

Violet caught at the hope.

'Yes,' she cried. ''Yes, quick— get something— there's brandy in the lounge— Hubert...'

'I felt his heart,' stuttered Hubert. 'I assure you, Violet. I felt his heart and it—it really isn't beating. I'm sorry, but I'm afraid it really isn't beating. He's— he's dead.'

John was already at the dead savant's side. His hand was touching the flesh , of Leadbitter's cheek and neck, and it was dreadfully cold.

But,' he began faltering, 'I can't understand these things— these boxes aren't really heavy.'

'No,' agreed Hubert, looking about, as though he ought to do something but he didn't quite know what. 'As you say, Mr. Adam, they're not really heavy. Not as  a rule, that is— not as a rule.'

Violet was full of anguish and anger; why be so particular over such ft trifle, she thought. She said abruptly—

'Some of them are enormously heavy. Some have big books in them and he keeps specimens of metals, ingots of metals, in others.'

'Yes,' urged Hubert in his eternally agreeing way. 'Yes, some contain heavy specimens of metal. I am afraid, I'm sorry, but that deed-box, that particular one had a number of specimens in— in its interior.'

ii

THE ACT had been so simple, so humdrum, and yet so final. The coroner's jury had nothing more to do than assist at the formal proceedings, ending in a formal verdict. All the witnesses, including Violet, were bound to testify to the dead scientist's carelessness.

One juryman, not from suspicion, but because he felt someone must say something, asked if it wasn't strange that Leadbitter Wood had placed so heavy a box not only on the shelf, but so insecurely on the shelf immediately above his head. Violet had to explain that this was exactly the sort of thing her father was in the habit of doing.

Hubert Gould confirmed this by admitting that when the dead man had the deed-box hoisted up there he had pointed out the danger. He had pointed out that it was obvious that one side was tilted up by a layer of books and papers, and that it hung wobbling,  a vibration might bring it down on the man.

After giving this evidence Hubert Gould hesitated. Obviously he was diffident of the dead man's retort.

'What did the deceased answer?' he was asked.

'Mr. Wood— the late Mr. Wood was extremely— I'm sorry to say, tart on occasions,' Hubert Gould had said nervously.

'And was he on this occasion?'

'Yes: that is, not more so than usual. He said, I fear he suggested, that I should not be an old woman; and he offered the opinion that his skull was not so soft as— as— well, mine. '

'We see that even a man of science of the late Mr. Leadbitter Wood's reputation— international reputation— could err in small matters such as these, and that this error cost him his life.  It should warn all of us,' said the coroner, pleased with the opportunity of axiomatic rhetoric.

Leadbitter Wood's carelessness being proved, the train of accidents which had led to his death was quickly set out. The heavy metal-filled deed-box was insecurely placed on the shelf immediately above the dead man's head; the shelves themselves were rather old and not too secure, and their central strut reached the floor on a level with Leadbitter Wood's chair. The boards  under the chair were loose.

It was easy to reconstruct the last few seconds of his life. A heavy man, he had sat violently into his chair, he had pulled the chair violently towards the desk; the floor boards kicked and sagged under him, the strut had jiggled the shelves, and the heavy box had been started on the glissade which had ended in the impact that had struck him dead.

It was asked why the crash had not been heard. Facts suggested there had been no very great crash (though who could tell?). After striking Leadbitter Wood the box had spun off against a saddleback armchair, which had also helped to check its fall to the ground. In any case, the scientist's study was built out from the house, at the end of the passage— he had been determined to get away from all noise; and again sounds in his room were accepted in the ordinary routine; noises were a part of his calling. Explosions often occurred in the course of his chemical experiments for example.

iii

VIOLET accepted the coroner's verdict unreservedly until, a day after the funeral, she began answering the many letters of condolence with her fathers pen.  She was describing the death of her father to a brother scientist. She had written down, 'It was the result of an accident, caused—' when a dark and awful feeling swept over her, a feeling as though someone, something, was near her, something was dominating her.

For a moment it was as though a power enormous imminent, but unseen had swept her away. She was wiped out; her personality was blank in an awful disturbing moment. A blackness of horror and fear submerged her, she felt she was going down— down—

With a tremendous effort of will she regained control of herself, gripped her soul together, and returned to her task. A thrill of terror went through her as she turned back to her letter.

The words 'an accident' had been scored through.

They were violently and heavily scored through with ink still wet from the chased fountain pen,  but in a manner not here, not in her delicate Gothic penmanship, but in a fashion violent, vehement, irascible, such as only—

She stood up trembling.

'No, no, it can't be— he's dead,' she breathed, before she realised what she was saying.

Holding the pen, trembling, wrung by a dark and terrible emotion, she looked down at the letter she had written, the words she— of course, it must have been she— had scored out.

'Not an accident,' she whispered. Not an accident? I know it wasn't an accident. It wasn't an accident. It wasn't. Tell me— tell me.'

She sat down at the paper. There was something, someone near her, about her, she was conscious of it— she was calling to it. She strove to write.

'Tell me,' she whispered terribly, fearfully.

Nothing happened.

After a minute John came in to her; asked her if he could do anything for her.

She was bewildered, distrait. This incredible, this dark and brooding moment that had attacked her, that awful and familiar scoring, out of the words— She could only answer in a shaken and terrified voice—

No, she needed nothing, no help. She would stop writing now; the strain of it—

John agreed that her task must be terribly exacting, she must not sadden herself too much. He advised a walk, a good brisk walk over the heath.

During the whole of the walk the words that had been scored out came back to her.

'It wasn't an accident,' she kept on saying. 'It wasn't an accident.'

She repeated the words. But now, walking, she did not feel their power. They did not convince her. She felt them morbid, untrue. She was ready to agree, as all agreed, that Leadbitter Wood's death had been an accident. It was as though the dark spell had been removed now that she was away from the room, desk, and pen.

Yet she was worried.

At tea she said to John and Hubert Gould: 'I suppose— I suppose father's death was the result of a mishap? It couldn't have been anything else?'

John Adam started upright, stared, or was it glared, at her.

'Why do you say that? What else could it have been?' he demanded. 'Why, everything points to it. It couldn’t have been anything else: not possibly,' he continued.

Hubert Gould twittered with embarrassment. The cake slid from the plate he wad holding; he said— 'Oh— yes— oh, I'm very sorry.'

'What do you think, Hubert,' asked Violet.

'Oh, well, the verdict, you know— the inquest— I'm sorry, but the— er—verdict— it was decided it was an accident—'

'Yes,' admitted Violet, 'yes, I know that the verdict was— but it might have been a mistake. There might have been something which the jury didn't know, which none of us— which I— didn't know.'

John protested— rather vigorously, Violet thought.

'What else could they have been told? What else was there to tell? The facts are plain, quite plain, the accident so obvious. What possible reason—?'

'I don't know,' said Violet, with pain in her heart; 'I don't know why, but somehow I feel that it might not have been an accident. Perhaps—'

Hubert Gould sat staring at his knees, which he was using to support his plate: his meek face, as usual, shining with that nervous dew which attacked him at embarrassing moments.

'I'm sorry that you should take it like— er— this. I mean what makes you feel that perhaps— perhaps—'

'I don't know,' breathed Violet, a vague and confused terror in her voice; 'I don't know why I should suspect anything else, only— only this afternoon it suddenly came to me that it wasn't— that father's death wasn't, perhaps, quite, an accident.''

Hubert's diffident lips moved irresolutely. He coughed.

'I fear— I fear, that is, you know, there would have to be some reason— I mean if it wasn't an accident, there would have to be some reason.'

Violet frowned. She recognised that herself.

'Do you know of any such reason?'

'—I?' blurted Hubert with a sudden fluster. 'I shouldn't like to say— really I can't say.'

'Had father any enemies?' Violet asked. 'I mean real enemies, people who hated him, or would benefit by his death. Was there anybody, like that? Had he quarreled bitterly with anybody?'

John abruptly stood up. He thrust his hands into his pockets, took them out, thrust them in again. He seemed excited— extremely disturbed.

'Violet,' he jerked, 'you're not being sensible. Why should you ask questions like that? It's against all— all circumstances, you know. Against the verdict and all that. You must not have such ideas. It's— it's wrong, and morbid. It's all perfectly simple.'

'Was there anybody like that, asked Violet determinedly to Hubert. 'Anybody who might hate father, or have some reason for getting him out of the way?'

Hubert Gould glanced up from his knees, shot a swift, almost fearful, look at John. He stuttered confusedly. 'I don't know— I don't truly know, Violet. I'm sorry, I can't say. No, I really don't know.'

When Violet went back to the study her mood was full of uneasy perplexity. Is there some reason behind this terrible thing? Is there? Is Hubert keeping something back? And John— are not his actions strange? Or, am I merely overwrought?' she asked herself.

She sat down at the desk thinking. She wondered if it had been merely, her anxiety that had made John seem agitated— wasn't his attitude just simply natural in the circumstances— or had it been queer?

She winced with an abominable fear. He and her father hadn't hit it off well, she knew. And Hubert looked at him strangely. Why did he do that?

She sat at the desk thinking it all out logically.

Why should anyone kill her father? What possible reason could there be? He led the ordinary humdrum life of a scientist. There could not possibly be any reason— any external reason.

What private reason would there be— for a moment her mind hung suspended in a lively flutter of fear. Might the private reason she had just thought of— she ran away from the thought. It was impossible— ghastly. Deliberately she turned her mind away from it to consider the details of her father's death.

They convinced her. The logic of the chapter of the accidents pointed to one solution, and one only— there was no room in the train of circumstances for anything else but the verdict of accidental death.

She went over the simple facts several times. They were definite, irrefutable. They pointed conclusively to an accident— not murder.

'I've been stupid,' she reflected. 'Emotional, suspicious, and stupid.' She took up the pen. 'It's horrible of me to think in so morbid a manner, horrible and cruel.'

She started to write to a Royal Society. In ten seconds she was standing, trembling, weak with horror, glancing down at what she— what the pen had written—

'Murder! Murder! Murder!'

Again the awfulness of the thing was not so much in what she had written, but in the manner in which it had been written. Something had come into the room— something! Or was it—? The tremendous thing had taken hold of her. directly she had lifted the pen. She had , been dominated by a force, silent, tremendous, awful—

And she had written.

The pen had written, her hand had written. But not in her writing— not in her writing, but in the writing of the dead man:—

'Murder. Murder. Murder.'

The words stared up at her in the bold, vehement hand of the man, many days dead, and the ink was still wet from the fountain pen she had just dropped. The room was still and bright in the sunlight.

But the silence was full of power and menace, the sunlight had given place to a blackness, enormous and dominant. The blackness, the menace, they were there, washing down upon her, surrounding her— controlling her with their awful and sinister strength, but they weren't in the nom— the sunlight was unwinking through the blackness, the silence cheerful through the menace— these things were in her— within herself,

For a moment she was crushed, paralysed by this unnamable, intangible terror— for a moment only, until she had dropped the pen. Then calmness, the- singular clarified calmness that follows at times close upon a crisis, came to her.

Her courage returned, a powerful if transient resolution possessed her. She stared down at the three words:—

'MURDER. MURDER. MURDER.'

She felt, she knew, that the truth had been revealed to her. Her mind was perfectly balanced and logical, her wits were perfectly in hand. She could view the whole circumstances of her father's death, and could appreciate the irrefutable logic that led to the verdict of accidental death.

But she brushed all that aside.

The verdict was false, she decided the seeming logic had been built up on a false basis. Her father, she felt, had been murdered.

'Murder. Murder. Murder,'  said the notepaper. From that point she could build up the accident on a new system of logic. She knew instinctively that death had been no accident. The appearance of the accident then must have been cleverly built up.

WHY? She did not ask why yet. She must find out how it was that the accident which had deceived all had not been what it seemed. It had seemed so natural. It must have been made natural.

HOW?

She looked at the shelf from which the box bad fallen, frowned, and then brought the library ladder from the corner of the room to the floor just by the desk. Her mind was working without any feminine horror or anguish. It was inconceivably cool and alert. It was precise, scientific, sure— again, as it was though some power, some curious unseen power, had taken command of her faculties, was directing her intelligence with extraordinary precision.

She mounted and examined the shelf. She did not cry out in terror, but noted all that was to be seen with this strange, cool, extra-callousness which now dominated her mind. She read murder into what she saw on the shelf. These were, the things she noted:—

First, that there was a furrow in the soft deal, quite perceptible, and well back from the edge, that told her that an object had rested there, and had rested there so heavily and for such a time that it had pressed a groove, that is, had embedded itself in the wood of the shelf.

The second point was that this weighty object had been dragged forward until it projected beyond the shelf. The wood had been slightly abraded in the process of pulling the weighty thing forward, there was a more deeply marked groove where one end had floored the shelf in moving, and the small splinters had been broken from the varnished face of the shelf-board itself.

The third point was that, though the object had rested upon a jumbled pile of books and papers nearest the wall, at one time it had rested on less than those supporting it at the time of her father's death.

By removing the topmost layer of books end papers Violet found a dusty outline of the edge of an oblong box. She slipped down, and returned the ladder to its place in the corner.

The logic of the matter was quite precise in her mind. The heavy metal-filled deed box had been put there carelessly, but not dangerously on the shelf by her father. Its edge had rested so heavily in the wood of the shelf that there was no likelihood at all of its ever being shaken down by vibration.

Someone— a murderer— had pulled the box forward until its edge had rested insecurely over the edge of the shelf. To add to this insecurity, the side of the box nearer the wall had been tilted up by additional books and papers, so that it was canted in such a way that vibration was bound to make it fall.

Still in this state of awful but deliberate coldness, Violet examined the strut of the shelf. It was certainly loose. Whether it had worked loose naturally, or whether it bed been made loose, she could not say.

She did not attempt to find out. She pulled aside the rug at her father's desk, went down on her hands and knees and examined the floor boards.

She found that every board in the neighborhood of her father's desk was sound and firm— save one. She realised now— since she was giving a new and particular attention to the matter— that there was every reason why the board should be well fixed, for the room was not an old one The one loose board was in striking contrast. It was very loose and seemed a little higher than its fellow; it dipped sharply when she pressed her weight upon it, and it must have dipped violently when her father sat down, for the legs of the chair rested directly upon it.

Locking the door, and getting tools from a drawer in the desk, she wrenched up the loose hoard. What she found was the final point of evidence.

The board was loose, not through any fault of the builders or through wear and tear. It had been made so by deliberate design. A small fillet of wood had been cunningly placed upon the bearer-beam beneath. The fillet raised the board at its middle, turning it into a miniature seesaw or lever. Weight thrown on one end would— the fillet acting as a fulcrum— force up the other end— the end upon which rested the loose strut.

Thus the strut would be jerked with violence, the shelf shaken, and the deed-box, carefully and perilously poised, would be bound to do its work. It had been murder then; coldly calculated and deliberate murder.

Violet put back the board, covered it with the rug and stood up. She did not give way to an agony of horror. She was cold, deliberate, calm with a bitterness of anger. Not the murder, but the murderer occupied her mind. She must find him, she must confront him, bring home to him the crime, avenge the crime.

For father had been killed in a manner of particular calculation that meant then must be a motive.

The creature who had done this thing must have hated her father, or he must have felt that her fathers death would be an advantage to him in some way. She must find out why the murder had been done, and that would tell her who the murderer was.

For a moment she hesitated, but only for a moment. She had felt that perhaps in tracking the crime to its perpetrator she might discover the guilt of someone particularly dear. She closed her eyes firmly. Justice must be meted out to the assassin— whoever he might be.

iv

SHE HAD hesitated, because she had remembered Hubert's stumbling reticence, and yes, the look he had flung at John Adam, the moment she had mentioned her suspicions.

Did Hubert know or suspect anything? How much was he hiding? Hubert was so transparent, that he gave his thoughts away at once. Hubert, she was certain, was suspicious.

Why should he be? He had flung that glance at John Adam. Did he know anything about —about it? She herself knew that her lover and her father were not really good friends.

Her father did not approve of John as a husband for his daughter, and, so John had told her, had said so in rather unstinted terms. In fact, the two men had quarrelled— even as late as a week ago; John was poor and Leadbitter Wood had that against him, refusing to believe in his prospects and industry.

Violet knew the circumstances of hostility; in her father she thought it unfounded as well as exaggerated, but— but had he any real grounds for his animosity— and had John?

More to the point, was there any evidence Hubert knew and she did not?

Hubert might know; he had been her father's secretary; any notes or letters—

'Letters!'

Who— what had put that in her mind? Had she been prompted?. She went across, and took down the last of her father's letter-books, read backwards from the last press copy. She knew without questioning that she would find the one letter which gave her her definite damning clue.

It was a letter written to Leadbitter's lawyers and dated a week ago.

The letter was a plain statement of her father's acute antipathy to John, his reasons for it, and its effect upon him. It said frankly:—

'Please destroy my existing will immediately. This fellow Adam, as I have told you before, is nothing more or less than a fortune-hunter who has resolved to secure a future of comfort and pleasure through my daughter. I am quite confident he eagerly anticipates my early death, calculating that Violet, as my only child, will be a person very decently rich. I have just had a disgusting scene with the fellow (Violet remembered how John had come from the interview angry and distrait), in which I told him bluntly that I saw through his game, and I also told him what I intend to do. When I come up to town in sixteen days' time I will get you to draft a will that should end all his mercenary hopes.  (I have told him this.) Meanwhile destroy the present will immediately. I will take no risks with a fellow of that  kidney.'

The letter had been written by Hubert at her father's dictation, and was  signed boldly 'Leadbitter Wood.'

Violet compressed her lips tightly. It was not pain, it was Hate that rose in her heart.

'I will take no risks with a fellow of this kidney!'

Had her father foreseen it all then? Had he plumbed this John Adam's character to its depth? Had he been indubitably and terribly right? Violet thought steadily, and with cold and terrible anger.

Yes, her father had been right. He had been murdered; murder must have a motive; this letter disclosed the motive. It was poignantly clear— the whole skein of the abominable crime was unravelled! John Adam had been unmasked by her father as an adventurer, a fortune-hunter, his exposure had been flung into his face, and her father had told him plainly of the means by which his intentions were to be frustrated. He knew that her father was going to draft a new will that would cut him off from fortune.

The murderer had been roused in him. He had seen his prize slipping from his grasp, and had at once decided that at all costs he must secure the inheritance. He had made up his mind to murder her father before he altered his will. It had not occurred to him that Leadbitter Wood would have ordered the destruction of the will at once. He counted on her father waiting until he had seen his lawyers. Meanwhile he had set his clever, simple, and hideous trap; and he had succeeded. He had murdered her father in a way that looked anything but murder. He had drawn not the slightest suspicion on himself and secured absolutely, he thought, Violet and a comfortable fortune.

She stood tense and rigid with a passion of rage as she thought of the abominable crime that had so nearly succeeded in its complete intention, if it had not been for an accident. But she knew it had not been an accident; the power that had given her the clues was the force that had and was directing her. She— she was the only instrument of vengeance.

Her nature had undergone a change. She was in the throes of a tremendous and terrible reaction. All the love that she had given John was now all hate. She would show no mercy. None! She knew exactly what she was to do.

She unlocked the door and rang the bell, and had Hubert sent to her. He came in pallid, damp, excruciatingly nervous.

She pointed at once to the open letter-book.

'I know ' she said, 'I have been finding out things—'

He took a hurried step backwards, and wrung his hands silently; his hands seemed limp, pale, and damp like himself

'You know, too, Hubert,' she said coldly, harshly. 'I saw that in your eyes, in the look you gave— him.'

Hubert painfully cleared his throat.

'Violet' he croaked. 'Violet— I— that is, I'm sorry— I don't know really— that is; I don't understand —

'You do,' she insisted, you do quite well. 'You know that my father's death was not an accident.'

He put his pallid hands to his grey scared lips.

'Violet,' he whispered. 'Violet, what's that? What are you saying?'

'You knew it wasn't an accident; you knew it was murder!'

He gazed at her dumbly, a spectre of a diffident invertebrate fear.

'Violet,' he mumbled, 'what do you mean— what do you mean? I know nothing— nothing at all; nothing at all— how should I?'

Violet looked at him.

'No, perhaps I was wrong. You were only suspicious. You knew the motive here.' She touched the letter-book. 'You knew what might give him a reason. But though you were suspicious the crime itself looked like an accident. You hoped, perhaps, that it was an accident; I knew it wasn't. I have found out it wasn't. And I have found out the murderer.'

Violet pressed the bell.

'The murderer,' said Hubert whispering.  'The murderer— who?'

'Please ask Mr. Adam to come to me here,' said Violet when the servant appeared.

'John Adam,' cried Hubert, 'John Adam.'

'You'll see for yourself,' said Violet, in a hard voice. 'Sit down at the desk, Hubert. Take a pen— no, father's pen, the fountain-pen, that is fitting, and paper When I tell you to write, write down all I dictate. It will be a confession. The— the murderer will sign it.'

John Adam came in, big, anxious, and puzzled.

'Did you want me, Violet?'

'I do,' said Violet, hating him, hating his calmness; hating him more for the touch of anguish the sight of him gave her. 'I have found out everything.'

John Adam, she considered, was a well-versed rogue; his affectation of bewilderment was admirable done— but then, so had been the affectation of naturalness in the details of the murder.

'I have found out why it was necessary, or rather, thought necessary, to kill my father— the motive.'

John Adam frowned. 'There is no motive in an accident Violet,' he said with an obvious effort to be calm and reasonable. 'Why have you got this idea into your head? The verdict was unmistakably sound, my dear girl, you are upsetting yourself—'

'There was a motive,' cried Violet passionately. 'This was no accident, John Adam, this was murder. Shall I tell you how it was done? And why it was done? Shall I?'

'My dear girl— please don't. You're only—'

'Shall I? I shall. Hubert! write down every word as I say it: every word. If there are any interruptions from anyone— don't pay attention to them. Begin:

'That is how I did the murder. My plan was to kill Leadbitter Wood in such a way that nobody could dream of his death being anything but an accident. Leadbitter Wood's untidiness helped me in this. I saw that he had placed on the shelf above his head, where he sat at his desk, a heavy deed box. I found, upon examination, that this deed box was full of metal ingots and specimens of terrible weight. If that deed box fell on his head he was bound to be killed—'

Hubert writhed; sat back, rigid in his chair. His face was ghostly pale. Horror was written in every feature.

'Violet,' he gasped, 'Violet. I can't —I mustn't—'

'Write,' cried Violet. 'Write every word. After "bound to be killed" write: "I made a plan that would cause the heavy deed box to fall upon Leadbitter Wood's head." '

Violet fixed her eyes passionately on John Adam's face. 'I made a plan that would make the heavy deed box fall down upon Leadbitter Wood's head,' she cried, staring at him.

He looked at her with anxiety, solicitude his eyes, but he did not move, nor did he speak.

Violent went on:—  'I saw how this could be done. I loosened the shelf and strut. I took up he board under Leadbitter Wood's chair and placing a piece of wood on the floor beam beneath the board, which I replaced, so caused the board to jerk up under the strut and shake the shelf— shake the shelf— have you got all that, Hubert?'

'Yes,' muttered Hubert. 'I've got it. My God. I've got it. But I shouldn't— I mustn't — I can't—'

'Go on,' cried Violet, her eyes still on John Adam's face. 'Write:— 'Having done this I pulled the deed box forward. It was quite secure before, but I caused it to project over the edge of the shelf, and I propped it up further, so that it must fall when shaken. The violence with which Leadbitter Wood sat in his chair was bound to shake the deed box down.

'My plan worked out perfectly. Leadbitter Wood was killed as I meant him to be killed.'

Hubert half started up from the chair. His face was filmed with a wet dew of horror and terror. He cried out:—

'Go away! Go away! Leave me alone: I won't write— I won't!'

He was afraid of something above him, about him. He was cowering under it. Violet did not look at him. She cried out,

'Write! Write! Go on:—

'My motive for doing this was to kill Leadbitter Wood before he went to his lawyer and altered his will as he threatened he would. I murdered Leadbitter Wood to prevent his changing his will. And my reason for doing so—'

John Adam interrupted sharply. 'Violet, this is terrible,' he said. 'Why are you doing it? What is the idea behind it all?'

'Don't you know?' she said. 'Don't you really know? Haven't you yet realised what I am doing, what Hubert is writing at my dictation?'

'Yes, I understand that. It is a sort of confession, I suppose, or, rather, a horrible—'

'Ah,' said Violet, 'you see that it is a confession. A confession has been written down, John, a full confession—'

'But, Violet— why?'

'To be signed,' cried Violet; 'the murderer is going to sign it, going to sign it now.'

'The murderer!' gasped John Adam. 'Who?'

Hubert Gould jumped up with a choking scream.

'I have signed it,' shrilled the voice of Hubert Gould. 'My God, I have signed! Leave me alone! Leave me alone! I've done what you want, I have signed.'

Violet and John Adam swung round upon Hubert. He had sprung back, over-setting the chair, and was standing in an attitude of cringing terror. His arm was thrown out, protecting himself from something— from somebody, something nobody could see, no human eye could see; his right arm was flung out, and in the hand he held Leadbitter Wood's fountain-pen.

And he was calling out— 'I have signed! My God, I have signed! What have I written? You made me write— you and the pen,— the pen. I didn't want to write— I didn't write it. The pen wrote it, and it'll hang me. It'll hang me!'

He put his hands, before his lace, dropping the pen, which fell, breaking and spilling ink upon the floor.

'It'll hang me,' he screamed. 'It would have been all hidden— but the pen wrote— the cursed pen!'

He took two steps towards the door and fell in a fit on the floor.

What the pen had written hanged Hubert Gould. This is what the pen had written after Violet's dictated description of the killing of Leadbitter-Wood:—

'My motive for doing this was to kill Leadbitter Wood before he went to his lawyers and made a fresh will to replace the one he had had destroyed, as I knew by the letter he had dictated to me, I am the next male heir. If Leadbitter Wood died without a will his fortune would come to me. I have always wanted to be rich. I have hated to be humbled by people who were rich; particularly I hated Leadbitter Wood and the service he ground out of me. He has treated me with brutality always. I was glad to kill him for that, as well as for the money that must come to me. I murdered Leadbitter Wood to prevent his making a new will, so that I should succeed to all his money. I, Hubert Gould, hereby confess that all that is written here is true, as I testify by my signature.

'Hubert Gould.'

___________________

22: Take Your Choice

Australian Women's Weekly 17 Sep 1938

THE Aurelian, carrying four hundred and fifty gilt-edged passengers on a deluxe cruise In South American waters, struck a mean and barnacled hulk that had once beeen a Cayenne timber drogher. Seventeen minutes later her 35,000 tons of scientific luxury, her two captains, most of her six hundred deck, engine-room, and steward ratings, her phone and shop girls, electricians, sanitary engineers, musicians, liftmen and bell-hops had vanished from existence.

The night was just black and dirty enough to give rise to confusion; but Third-Officer Gatrie was not confused. He had wits enough to snatch at Carol Milton as, bewildered, she passed him on the arm of a lank steward. Carol Milton was not assigned to his boat, but Gatrie knew by the feel of the ship under him that this was no time to be particular. Also he recognised that in such crises as this a man got his chance— and Carol Milton was his.

He was right. He and the gawky steward had only just helped the tall, fair girl to a seat when frantic orders heralded the end of the Aurelian. Gatrie dropped his boat down the side of the liner with perfect craftsmanship, and, in spite of the tricky sea, made a safe getaway. By the way the girl gripped his arm and gasped as the long, lit bulk of the Aurelian up-ended and plunged to eternal darkness, he knew she recognised that he had saved her life— he and the cub steward; only stewards don't count.

Even though he heard Lyman B. Troy comforting her and the stream-lined clubman, Rawson, scrambled from his seat to do the same at the sound of her voice, Gatrie only smiled. They and their wealth and position might mean more than a nobody of a third officer on a promenade deck, but here— here he was their master.

HE let them know it. The curt snap of his voice drove Rawson back to his thwart; at his command even the millionaire Troy moved over to the weather side of the stern bench to give the women— there was a Mrs. Shrady with Carol— the sheltered position. This was where a real man, strong in training, sense of command as well as body, taught even the great of cities how little they mattered. And Carol, who had found his big, rugged strength worth her smiles even on the Aurelian, was beside him all night, realising that it was he alone who fought the boat through danger to life.

Dawn showed them an entirely empty sea, stark with a tropic sun, yet evil with squalls. It also revealed a boatload of trouble. Gatrie had with him five roughnecks of the "black gang," led by the husky Brooker and the scarcely less dangerous Devilin. They were a mutinous lot, whose temper was not sweetened by the way the seven male passengers, including such hefty sportsmen as Rawson and Kearne, still took it for granted that they could lounge aloof in idleness while the lower orders sweated to save their hides. Bunt, the quartermaster, and two deck hands were all he could depend on— and his own dominating spirit.

The first trouble came quickly. Rawson, with old Tim Milton's heiress to play up to, was very much the cabin-class Sir Lancelot. Watching the cub steward breaking out their stores under Gatrie's eye, he tried largely:

"A bottle of brandy? Good! Well have a shot all round. We need lt after last night."

They needed nothing of the sort, for the sun had already restored them. Gatrie said evenly:

"Half a pannikin of water and one biscuit each, three times a day, will be the ration. Serve now, steward, ladies and workers first."

"First and most!" Brooker snarled, sure that the situation meant emancipation from discipline and the rule of the strong arm. "An' the workers'll have the brandy, too."

"You heard my order, steward. Carry on," Gatrie said, and thrilled as he felt Carol stiffen beside him.

Devilln, the sea lawyer, snapped waspishly: "There's no need for any rationing. Everybody knows we're near the mainland."

That was true enough. By dead reckoning Brazil was no farther than a day or so's rowing, but Gatrie knew how easily the vagaries of the Brazilian current might mean danger. Not that he attempted to explain. This was the moment for a show-down if his word were to be law. He made the most of it.

He hit Brooker full and sweet on the jaw, dropping him over a thwart, when that brute's snarl turned to action. He heard Mrs. Shrady screech as Devilln and the three stokers rose as one man, but Carol sat quiet, her eyes alight as she watched him.

That put extra power into the punch that stretched Devilin cold; made him absolutely godlike as the others came at him with knives. But Bunt and the deck hands were in it by then; yes, and Rawson and Kearne, anxious to figure as late flowering heroes. In a minute it was all over, the "black gang" sullen and back at their oars, with Gatrie's order to the cub steward to frisk them and throw any weapons overboard as a crowning contempt.

He, Gatrie had come out on top as a real man had to, and the looks Carol gave him as she bound his cracked knuckles showed him what that meant to her.

Rawson, who had come on this trip solely to win Tim Milton's heiress and pay his debts, did not like it. Neither did Lyman B. Troy, who had decided that Carol was to be the figurehead of his financial career, though his small, thin figure showed it more quietly. They weren't going to take this so easily. Gatrie guessed, yet he did not mind. In a situation where only manhood counted, he was supreme.

Besides, these passengers had already played into his hands. Brooker and his toughs would never forgive Rawson and Co. for siding against them; Gatrie had only to choose his moment and his triumph over Rawson would be as complete as his mastery of the stokers.

Rawson and Kearne and the rest steadily helped to their own undoing.

Big and meaty men though they were, they never offered to take a spell at the oars, and though Gatrie split the crew into watches the ceaseless rowing under a torrid sun and through squall-chopped seas exhausted and soured the men.

Before the day was done they were muttering and shooting evil glances at the idlers. Gatrie knew that if he chose his crisis well he'd have them on his side.

His chance came when an extra sharp flurry struck them. At the worst of it Gatrie left the boat yaw and the wave thus brought aboard flooded them to the thwarts. As all shouted and shifted in fear, Gatrie bawled:

"Get the balers some of you. Look lively, if you don't want to be shark meat."

Rawson snatched up a floating pannikin: Brooker dived his arms to the bilge for the baling bowls, bringing up three. He handed one to Devilin and Kearne snatched another.

"Not you," Gatrie roared. "I need beef at the oars to keep her head on. Back to your thwarts. Brooker, Devilin. Kearne, take Bunt's oar. Rawson, take over from the steward."

"Darn you, I'm a passenger," Rawson began, but Gatrie was ready for that. He jibed sharply, and the kicking of the boat in the cross seas and the slapping of wave heads inboard reawakened panic. Gatrie drove it home: "Fools! How can I hold her if you don't give me steerage way?"

Brooker and Devilin were seamen enough to grab their oars; Rawson and Kearne followed, through contagion of fear. Bunt began to dip and swing the baler at once, as did the boy steward. But they weren't enough— also there was Troy to bring to heel. Gatrie shouted: "Hey, steward! Hey! what's your name?"

"Proctor, sir. David Proctor," said the steward, in so cultivated a voice that Gatrie sneered:

"Hell! A college boy. Well. Mister Proctor, grab those spare balers and bring 'em aft. Mr. Troy, here, will maybe help to save his own life."

"I'm a sick man," Troy said, as Proctor sloshed towards him.

Gatrie bawled: "Get the balers some of you. Look lively if you don't want to be shark meat."

"That's better than being a dead one. Get busy, Troy."

The contempt in Gatrie's voice stung the millionaire.

"You forget who I am," he snapped, "and what you are. I don't take impudence from underlings.''

"I don't care who you or anybody is," Gatrie said. "I'm in command here and my word goes. Get to it, Troy."

For a moment the cold eyes that had browbeaten so many financial giants warred with Gatrie's hard grey glance, but before either could drop Carol took one of the balers from David Proctor's hand.

As she swung to her work, the line of her long limbs and fine body showing a splendid fluency under her wet clothes, her smile met Gatrie's. She understood him, she exulted in the man in him and he, too, exulted. His sense of power grew as Troy, shamed by her action, took a dipper and began to bail.

He, Gatrie, had mastered the last and most powerful element in the boat. Crew, passengers, and now this arrogant symbol of worldly importance had had to knuckle under to him. In a situation where only manhood counted, he had proved himself the natural leader. No wonder Carol's eyes warmed him with their admiration.

His was no chancy supremacy either. He demonstrated that to her and the others, when the boat was free of water. Rawson and Kearne expected to be relieved of their oars. Gatrie merely ordered Bunt and Proctor to take a rest. Rawson, his soft hands blistering, the sweat of an indulged body pickling him under the tropic sun, flared out, insisting again on his rights as a passenger.

"There aren't any passengers any more," Gatrie said tersely. "Only men to do men's jobs. It's time you and the others grasped that. I'll re-scheme watches now, taking in all men— keep your stroke, Rawson."

"Darn you, I'm not taking this," Rawson shouted, starting from his seat, but Brooker's great hand grasped him from behind and slammed him back on the thwart.

"Take your orders." Brooker snarled, "or I'll swipe your head off."

Rawson and Kearne, all the passengers, saw the ferocious anger in the eyes of the stokers. They knew the game was up. Rawson bent sullently to his oar, the rest submitted to Gatrie's will; even Troy accepted a pointedly contemptible position as the cub steward's helper without a murmur. Gatrie had clinched his position. He was top dog by sheer force of character. And Carol saw it. She whispered:

"You're stronger than them all you're terribly strong. Mr. Gatrie."

"Isn't it the sign of a real man?" he smiled at her, "and, anyhow, my name's Bill."

"William," she laughed softly, "is better suited to conquerors."

Perhaps he was too exultant. He drove himself and the rest of them hard all day and most of the night to stamp his power on them, though possibly he was also eager to make the mainland before the weather got worse. Anyhow, he  forgot that even dictators must sleep.

HE WAS jerked out of a doze by the crash of the boat not on to the rocks, but into mangroves. They were a low growth, and Bunt, who was at the tiller, had not seen them against the blackness before the false dawn.

It was an absurd wreck; a clumsy smashing among slimy tree roots on a mere mud lhla, but wind and a steep sea made the disaster complete. The boat was ripped wide open by the roots and sank like a stone. Gatrie, starting out of sleep, instinctively grabbed the nearest female form, sure he was saving Carol. It proved to be Mrs. Shrady; the cub steward, Proctor, had got Carol clear at the first impact.

As he swam Gatrie heard Brooker screaming. That made him lose his grip and flounder frantically through slimy roots that felt like the clutching hands of devils. Incidentally, he dropped Mrs. Shrady, whose screaming advertised the fact. He heard Rawson's voice shouting: "All right! All right! We're looking after you." Also heard a stoker guffaw at seeing that he, Gatrie, was the draggled and Incompetent life-saver.

That so took Gatrie aback that he stood about sheepishly while Rawson continued his role of a big man rising to the situation. By the time Gatrie had pulled himself together and thrust into the rescue work to reassert himself, nobody paid him any attention. And when Rawson growled: "Not a sign of the boat; not even a floating water cask! A pretty punk seaman aren't you, Gatrie?" they all turned snarling on him.

"An' Brooker taken be the sharks, an' Jenkins, the big greaser, too." Devilin spat venomously. "All because of your bully-driving."

They stood glaring at Gatrie with bitter and hostile faces. Grey dawn was now on them and showed them every reason to hate him. This was no enchanted coral strand, but a huge, low whaleback of foul mud, over which the unseemly mangroves sprawled, backed farther off by a matted tangle of even more ugly jungle. Foul brown water slid by like thick soup, and there was nothing to raise human hope in sight. A mile away was a clutter of glistening mud banks, then another mangrove islet, with more showing farther on in the dank air. Beyond even those there was a hint of low, swampy land, backed by more man-groves and a thicker jungle. A thin and beastly rain was falling.

"He's landed us on hell's delight," someone said sourly. "I knew he was just a big mouth, with nothing in him."

"Looks as if we've struck the delta of some big river," Gatrie muttered to re-impress them with his seaman's capacity. "That's the Brazilian mainland over there, and safety."

"And the nearest town or village is where?" Rawson asked pointedly, but Gatrie shifted uneasily. He did not know exactly where the Brazilian current had dumped them, but he feared and the cub steward put his fear into words:

"This is a practically empty stretch of swamp coast, isn't it?"

"You bet. That's all he could find," Devilin jeered. "An' anyhow, I'm not risking joining Brooker in a shark's belly by trying to swim to land. Perhaps as you chucked the boat away you'll be the hero."

Gatrie shivered as remembered Brooker's scream, and they saw it and Rawson sneered: "Well, there's nothing to be gained by depending on him. Come on, we'd better get busy finding out how the land lies, yes, and in getting up some sort of shelter for the ladles."

He smiled at Carol as he said that and she and all of them moved off with him, leaving Gatrie alone. He had simply ceased to count with them. It was not only that the loss of the boat had destroyed his authority; the mere fact that solid earth and not a kicking boat was under his feet had given Rawson back his self-assurance. He became at once the natural leader he had always been in social and sporting life. He took complete charge, sending some of them off to explore the islet and to find food, water, and firewood, while he set others to build the shelters.

He did it without argument or effort, like a man who had inherited the instinct through generations accustomed to command. And there was no mistaking his power or mastery. Even the great Lyman B. Troy's attempt to hold himself aloof was swept aside by a calm order to tack himself on to the cub steward and the other weaklings of the foraging party.

With the tougher elements, Rawson was even more effective. He did not even have to throw his weight. Sensing rebellion in Gatrie's eyes as the men watched Carol Milton laughing with him, he gave Devilin command of the shelter building squad. He knew that Devilin's animus would do the trick and it did. Devilin's snarl of relish, as he ordered Gatrie to get busy, brought the sailor whipping round in fury. Devilin merely grinned wolfishly and showed Gatrie the knobby-headed mangrove root he carried as a club; then the seaman, with no desire to be beaten up before Carol, turned and went to work. He did not even protest when Devilin found him the particularly filthy job of fishing straight poles out of smelly slime. He knew his moment was finished. Rawson was master.

Rawson knew it, too. Quietly and without fuss, he adopted the role of a true leader, doing nothing himself but directing and giving orders with a calm finality. He kept Carol by him all the time, pretending the need of her suggestions for the building of the women's shelter, but actually so that she should miss nothing of his gift of power. It was a perfect exhibition of the ruling caste's right to command, and he felt she was immensely impressed.

Anyhow she must have been at first, yet as the drizzling day drew on, fatigue, cold, thirst, and hunger grew strong enough to dim all appreciation of anyone's supremacy. The only foods they found were a few dubious berries. The wood they gathered was too wet to make a fire, even li the few matches they had among them had not been too sodden to kindle. And thirst was a growing torment. There were no springs or streams on this mud islet, so that the only way to assuage their thirst was to squeeze their drizzle-soaked clothes into their mouths, which was unpleasant to the taste as well as hopelessly inadequate.

Darkness came to them as the culmination of shivering misery, for even their amateur shelters had been saturated with the drizzle. So wretched were they that the fact that Troy, the steward, and three of the passengers had failed to return, being presumably lost in the jungle, failed to stir them.

But somewhere about half-past nine they were stirred. The rain had stopped and in the still darkness of the islet an incredible smell was borne to them— the smell of cooking meat. They came out of their shelters into the pitch darkness and stood sniffing hungrily. It was true! Somewhere, and not so far away, meat was being roasted.

A deck hand going to the water's edge shouted that he could see the fire. They joined him in a rush and there, on the edge of their own Islet, not half a mlle away, they saw the glimmer of red flames reflected on the water. They turned as one into the Jungle, making for the fire.

RAWSON tried to steady them. It might be Indians, he said, and he fancied he'd heard ugly tales about the isolated savages of these parts. Famished and thirsty, they paid no attention to him. Cooked meat, real food, after starved days, was near; the very instincts of their bodies drove out fear and spurred them towards lt.

They pushed through the mangroves, through the vine-matted Jungle beyond, the ever-growing glow of the flames increasing their desire. It promised such glories of heat and hot food that Rawson's cautionary orders became a weak bleat even to himself and, anyhow, Rawson ceased to matter when they broke through the last vines into the glade where the fire burned.

Lyman B Troy stood beside the fire with the three weakling passengers, while David Proctor, the steward, tended the roasting meat. Troy's cold voice cut short the cheer they raised, even as their rush towards the fire was cut short by a waist-high barricade of Interlaced tree branches.

"Stand where you are," the thin voice said with an acid precision "We knew you'd come and we're ready for you. We're willing to share, but before we do it must be definitely understood that we do so only on our own terms."

"Terms! What do you mean— terms?" Rawson cried, in a last effort in leadership.

"They are that you, and that other bully, Gatrie, in fact, all of you, agree to obey my orders absolutely," Troy said grimly. "There's to be no more of this brainless boss rule. We— I have had enough of this he-man dictatorship— lt's got us nowhere save to wreck and violence. From now on things are going to be managed with businesslike Intelligence. That means my word alone goes. If you object, you can all go back the way you came— now! All except the ladies, of course."

Gatrie, stung by the millionaire's contempt, by the promise of his triumph over Carol Milton, shouted:

"Rush the scrimshanks!"

As he lunged forward Troy's hand came up, a small revolver glinted in the firelight and spat once. Gatrie cried out and went down with a bullet in his leg. At the same moment the three passengers grabbed up sharp-pointed poles and workman-like tree-clubs, and at the sight of that military display the others halted.

"You see, we know whom we're dealing with and we don't intend to take risks," Troy said coldly. "We're just as ready to fight you as share our food and water, but, again, only on our own terms."

"You've got water, Lyman?" Carol cried eagerly.

"Yes, my dear," Troy smirked. "If your companions had any brains they'd have recognised that being in the delta of a big river— especially in the flood season like this— means that there is actually drinking water all round us."

"We knew, but you can't drink it," Gatrie snarled. "It's thick with vegetable matter— poisonous."

"You can't," Troy drove his supremacy home with relish, "but we can. One of us is a chemist. He has constructed a filter. It ls, naturally, rough and slow-working, but if we're content to drink intelligently it will serve. The same is to be said about the food. It is scarce, but judiciously rationed it will suffice. These are among the reasons why somebody with real brains and responsibility must be in control, and my companions have elected me to that position. Well, do you agree to my terms?"

"If we agree— what?" Rawson growled.

"You, Hearne, Gatrie, and the stokers will remain on that side of the barrier, to make sure you are out of harm's way. The ladies, of course, will join us, and Bunt and the two deck hands as well, since we can rely on their discipline. While you do nothing to jeopardise our position and perform such work as we demand for our safety and escape, we will pass over to you such rations of food and water as the supplies allow."

"I see, having cornered those supplies, you make your usual market monopoly of them, Troy," Rawson sneered.

"High finance gives one at least a clear-headed way of dealing with a difficult situation," Troy smirked. "Are you agreed?"

"We have no alternative," Rawson growled, amid assenting grunts from his companions.

"No, you haven't. You never have when brains have the whip hand," Troy said, for Carol's benefit. "Steward, help the ladies over the barrier while we cover you."

Carol sat by Troy's side, warm and glowing in the fire; watching David Proctor tending the food, she asked what it was.

"Jaboty, a sort of turtle, I believe, and some kind of local bush fowl," Troy smirked at her. "I hope they'll eat as good as they smell."

"Don't you know? Haven't you eaten them before?" she asked "Didn't you catch them?"

"My dear, am I the catching sort?" he laughed. "I leave that sort of thing to underlings. Fortunately, this steward boy is just the man— he has a first-class knowledge of South America."

"Did he even tell you about the water?" she asked sharply.

"Oh, yes," Troy shrugged. "Though he, like those others, thought it dangerous to drink. That's where I came In. I knew Maule, here, was a chemist, and so got him to construct a filter. You can thank your stars, my dear, that I am here. My gift of finding out and making use of other people's abilities has saved the day for us."

"But the fire and— and the revolver," she asked. "They're yours?"

"Not a bit of it," he laughed. "Only the brain that saw their value. The revolver belonged to that fat little passenger over there, only he was too scared to use lt. The fire came from the steward's petrol-lighter."

"David Proctor again," she said slowly.

"Is that the fellow's name? He's quite an acquisition, anyhow; full of book knowledge, but no sense of its value as a practical asset."

"As you have."

"As I have," he smiled. "That's the secret of power, my dear. I haven't half his knowledge, or half Rawson's or Gatrie's brute strength, yet I have the wits to beat them in the end. I saw that their strongarm rivalries would disgust these others, antagonise the party into groups and leave the way open to me. I only had to plan and walt my moment— that's the way to real supremacy. That's the way to mastery in the end."

The thin, coldly calculating millionaire was right. He had come out on top in tile end. He had beaten the natural strength of Gatrie and the social force of Rawson by letting them vitiate their powers against each other. By a more subtle and cunning strength, Troy had proved himself the real man among them.

Somehow his triumph troubled Carol Milton. She brooded over it during the night and all next morning when sile sat alone in the camp while the rest explored and foraged, in the afternoon she joined David Proctor when he left the others at siesta in the now tropic sun to search for food.

"Why," she asked, "did you side with Troy?"

"He found out that I knew a lot about South America— he's got a way of finding out things— and he made it worth my while to put my knowledge at his service in a way to give him control."

"So you sold yourself to finance like other men," she said, and there was a catch in her voice. "Somehow I thought you were different."

"No," he said huskily, "I sold my knowledge to escape— well, from what Troy and his kind stand for. When I left the university I felt I couldn't face conditions at home. I wanted a bigger, freer, less money-grubbing life. That's why I came on this trip. I've a friend who runs one of the new orange plantations near San Paulo, in Brazil. He offered to give me a job until I could learn enough and save enough to buy an orange ranch for myself. I jumped at the idea, even though I hadn't enough money to pay my passage out— but it was easy to get a Job as a steward, so I did."

"I see," she said, warming to him. And did you take Troy's money because it would enable you to buy your orange groves without waiting to save up?"

"You do understand quickly," he said softly. "But you would. Yes, that's it. I had a reason for wanting to make good quickly."

"What reason?" she asked, and as he remained silent. "David— am I the reason? Your being on the spot to save my life twice wasn't really accidental?"

"My dear," he said, "I never knew I would meet a woman like you on this trip, but directly I saw you— well, it changed everything."

"But not your orange groves, David?" she cried. "Not that I want them as much as you. I'm tired of the life that men like Troy and Rawson have made for the world David— It'll be our orange farm?"

Presently she stepped out of his arms to sigh, "It's beautiful finding you— and oranges! But, oh, why can't we go straight to them now; escape from these others right away?"

"But we could, dear," he said, nervously. "This morning I found an old swamped canoe. I think lt might carry us safely, I mean the two of us only, no more—"

"I don't want any more," she laughed. "Only, is there anywhere it can carry us?"

"I'm sure there ls. It's only book learning, of course, but I'm practically certain that this is the delta of the Rio Castanha. If it is, there's a town on the mainland behind those islands; what is more, it is the terminus of the railway that will take us right down to San Paulo. If you were ready to risk it."

"Ready— I want to," she cried. "Take me to the canoe."

"It might take us two or three days," he warned as he began to push through the jungle."

"Does that matter?" she laughed. "You know how to find food, and you have your petrol lighter, haven't you?... Ah, but what about water?"

"The islands are full of it, look," he said, and he stretched out his hands and pulled towards him one of the great vines that tangled the trees. He broke this sharply and held it over his head, when a thin, clear stream of water spurted from its hollow centre into his mouth; it was good water, too, better than the filtered stuff, as Carol found when she tried it.

"The vine is called the cipor dargua," David smiled. "If those brainy lads behind only knew, it's all around them— only I wasn't selling all my book learning to Troy."

It was when they were paddling well out in the delta that he said:

"Good heavens, Carol, you've made me forget the others. We shouldn't have left them like this."

"We'll send back help when we reach this town of yours," she smiled.

"Yes, that'll do," he nodded, and then: "There it is, you can see it between the islands. The book learning of Gatrie's schoolboy has done the trick."

________________

23: Crying Baby

Sunday Mail (Qld.), 19 July 1942

THE passengers forgathered against the ropes on the crowded top deck as the liner entered the harbour. Inspector Send found a place where he could look them over again, as they disembarked by the gang-plank— and he was not happy.

His orders left no doubt that the 'Q Carrier,' that celebrated, if yet undetected, drug smuggler, was aboard— yet who the devil was he? Since the boat entered home waters Send had made a systematic and careful study of every passenger she carried, and he was still utterly in the dark.

He swore under his breath as the woman with the crying baby came up from below. The child had been screeching most of the way across, and in his present state of anxiety, its perpetual wail got on his nerves. The mother was a young lipsticked blonde, who might have been a bright young thing, only she was so harassed and helpless over her offspring. She plainly hadn't much maternal aptitude or instinct.

Send had noted that. So had several of the other passengers. Some lifted plucked eyebrows at the idea of such a flashy creature ever having a child, others gave advice. one elderly woman, exasperated by such incompetence and the child's noise, even persuaded the mother to let her try to quiten the infant.

She was an oldish, sweet-faced old darling, who looked as though she had had many children of her own, if not grandchildren. Certainly she had the right technique: the wailing died to whimpering once the child was in her arms. He was quieter still by the time they reached the Customs shed, cooing and doing his best to swallow whole one of the big bright buttons on the old woman's dress. Quite a pretty picture of charming grand-maternity, only Send had no mind for pretty pictures.

Carmichael, the chief searching officer, who had held up the examination until Send reached the long room, said to him: 'You're after the 'Q' again, eh? I wish you luck. I don't think you, or anybody else will catch him in a hurry: he's too infernally clever.'

Carmichael also gave him a list of those passengers known to him. Most of them were commercials and old-stagers above suspicion, but Send's heart missed a beat when Carmichael mentioned that the woman with the baby was one of them. The incompatabllity of lipstick and baby at once become more significant. That child might be only a blind, after all— a clever trick to distract their attention from her criminality. Who would think of linking opium smuggling with nursing motherhood? Or with that yelling infant?

The young woman protested wildly when told she must be searched. She wrecked her eyeblack beyond repair on hearing that her child was to be included. The old woman protested that it was really a great shame; but under Send's firmness became rather horrified, realising that her kindness might have mixed her in some unsavoury business. Fearful that her name might be linked with it, she readily handed the baby over to one of the female searchers, and with a flutter of relief gladly made her escape to the waiting train.

The baby made no objection. The magic of experienced nursing had mastered him. He was solidly and blissfully asleep. He slept even though his robes and wrappings were stripped from him. and restored. He slept all through his mother's bitter protests at having to remove her clothes— and her promises that someone would have to pay for this outrage. The woman searchers reported all this to Inspector Send. It was all they could report. They had found nothing even dutiable on the mother or child, though they had left nothing to chance. Send had missed his guess.

The lip-sticked mother was not the clever 'Q' after all.

Then with an odd look at the woman, demanded : 'What have you been giving him?'

HALF-WAY to town, after the train had bumped violently over some junction points, screaming broke out again. But now it was not the baby, but the mother. And now she was screaming because her baby wouldn't scream.

'He was thrown off the seat to the floor when the train bumped just now.' she cried, as Send went to see what was the matter. 'Flung right to the floor, do you understand— and yet he did not wake up. Look, you can see for yourself— sleeping like the dead in spite of that fall. I tell you there must be something the matter with him.'

After a minute Send thought there must be, too. Through all the mother's clamour, though he was lifted, patted, even shaken, the baby remained heavily and strangely asleep. A guard made the suggestion that he should go through the train looking for a doctor.

The doctor, when found, examined the briby carefully, even lifting the eyelids; then with an odd look at the woman, demanded:

'What have you been giving him?'

The mother began to declare vehemently that she had given her little darling nothing at all, but the doctor cut her short:

'You must have. The child's doped. I've seen too many children who have been quietened by Indian ayahs that way to be mistaken.'

The woman, on the verge of hysterics, called the doctor a beast and a liar: only Send, his wits abruptly alert, asked him what he meant.

'That child's in an opium sleep,' the doctor said. 'Indian ayahs have a trick of scraping a child's finger-nails on opium, or spreading the stuff on its dummy or anything else it has the habit of sucking—'

'Sucking,' cried Send, and whistled. 'You're right— only this lady was not responsible.' He went forward along the train.

He marked down a carriage, and when they arrived at the terminus had everything set for the arrest of the sweet old grandmother whose magic had so soothed the wailing baby protested her innocence in a gracious and quietly dignified manner.

Certain of the other passengers were even inclined to champion one so charming against the high-handed methods of the stupid police. Send set his jaw and marched her oft to the search-room. Once inside, he reached for the large, shining button he had seen the baby try to swallow. With a sharp knife he cut it off the dress— and broke it open. It was as hollow as it was large. Inside, it was packed tight with opium. So were all the other buttons on her dress, and there were many. So were the buttons on the frocks in her suit-case— she had quite a striking passion for large bright buttons on everything.

EACH button contained only a few grammes, but there were so many of them that their contents mounted up to well over a pound of fine, prepared opium. Also, when Send realised that Carmichael had really meant her when he spoke of the 'woman with the baby' as one of those who crossed regularly, he knew that he had found the long-sought channel of smuggling. In fact, the celebrated 'Q Carrier' himself, even if it was a grandmotherly old her after all! The mother of the wailing baby had no sort of link with her, although, aware of Send's alertness, the clever old creature had used the child to distract suspicion from herself.

_______________

24: Too Brave to Love

Sunday Mail (Qld.), 6 April 1941

WHEN one of those natives runs amuck he is not a pleasant or a profitable article to meet. Custance, on the balcony of the Agency, heard the yelling, saw women and children scattering from the square, and knew big trouble was loose. He leant over the rail and shouted to Iris to run for cover, for at that moment he did not know from what angle or how quickly the thing was coming, and there might not be time for him to get down to her aid.

Iris, thinking it half a joke, moved over towards the Sikh policeman oh duty by the head of the square— and Song Lim came straight out that way. Song Lim was a seaman, lank and sinewy and tough. An ugly bit of work at any moment, Song Lim amuck was wholesale murder. He came on at a bent-head shuffle, his head lowered between his shoulders like the mad dog he had become, his long arms hanging, and in his right hand a stabbing-knife with blood already upon it.

Custance was not particularly brave— or the reverse— and he was horrified at Iris's peril. Even the big Sikh policeman was anything but happy. He stood very still, and his hand fluttered backward, warning Iris to remain still, too. One could not tell just what Song Lim would do in this madness. The native servant, standing behind Custance on the Agency balcony, gave a little whimper as Song Lim bunched into a crouch.

He muttered: 'Shout one-time for Ray tuan.'

Custance frowned and muttered, 'Shut up!' But he glanced across the square at Ray's office. 'Ray might do it...'

THE Sikh guessed Song Lim's spring. Suddenly he ran forward slashing with his truncheon. He was a strong and nimble fellow, the policeman, but he was no match for Song Lim with the murder madness on him. Song Lim ducked and the truncheon missed.

Custance shouted, 'Iris! Here— run for it!' just as the men came dreadfully together. But Iris took only five steps before the native servant screamed, 'Missy, look out!'

She looked round and stopped. The Sikh policeman lay in an odd, still tumble on the ground, and Song Lim was jigging away from him in a slow and horrible dance, moving towards the girl, his red glare fixed on her. Custance did shout then, 'Ray! Ray! For heaven's sake—'

But that did not' matter. Bob Ray had already heard the uproar, had come out of his office— come out at the prospect of trouble. Yes, that was the sort of thing he would naturally do. Putting his hand on the rail he vaulted off his verandah. He bent down and picked up a fistful of gravel. There was a gasp as he straightened and let Song Lim have half of it. He missed, but that didn't u-nrrv him:

Song Lim had checked a little. Walking with easy, firm steps Ray closed on the murderer, shouting calm insults all the time. Then, just as Song Lim again crouched to leap at Iris, he let the madman have the rest of the gravel full in the face.

It was pretty timing. Song Lim leapt back instead of forward, whirled, and dived straight at him. A dozen voices screamed to Iris to run, certain that Ray could only go the way of the Sikh before that insane onslaught.

They were wrong. Bob Ray remained unruffled. As Song Lim dived he dropped into a boxing crouch, side-stepped like a flash, and let Song Lim have it on the jaw with a slogging left.

A moment later half a dozen men were pinning the unconscious Song Lim to the earth, the rest were gathered about Iris and Bob Ray, thankful that the girl was safe, and trying to make their admiration for Bob Ray's coolness and pluck sound genuine.

Bob Ray had saved Iris's life by an exhibition of daring few men could have equalled. Also Bob Ray was in love with her— and yet it was only with embarrassment that she thanked him, and she did it from Custance's shoulder, against which she leant trembling. But the whole thing was even more odd than that. And it takes a little explaining. Here it is…

Iris was half in love with Bob Ray. From the moment he had come to the Settlement they had been drawn to one another. They shared youth and vividness as no other pair did. In fact, no man, not even Custance, thought he had a chance from then on, for Bob Ray 'had everything.'

There, perhaps, was the flaw— he had too much. He was the bravest person the Settlement had ever seen— far too much the bravest, in fact, for he knew it. Not that he was given to bragging. He did not outrage anybody's feelings by showing off. He just knew that he was brave— that was all. It had been so from the first.

Quite early he and another man had been caught by gang-robbers as they took the pay-box up to a teak camp. They had fought the thieves off. and the other man. Barton, an old hand, had confessed to being scared. Bob Ray had said nothing, until someone asked if he hadn't been in a blue funk. too. Then he answered quite naturally:

'Not particularly; I got rather a kick out of it.'

The Settlement, of course, got peevish about it. It was not his having such cold pluck that bothered them: it was his immodest refusal to deny the fact.

AT first the men tried to kill their prejudice against him by treating him as a joke. They found he was not a bad sort, and, normally, good company. Besides, when he fell in love with Iris, people wanted to like him. It was like that with Iris, too, only more serious than a joke. She found him good company: she found his simplicity, his decency, and his devotion really lovable. Even his courage warmed her admiration ior him.

But then his apparent immunity from the normal human emotion of fear scared her. They were almost engaged when his inhuman courage became more than she could stand. She could not face the idea of living all her life with a man who was never afraid.

The recognition of this had come to her when the cobra got into the bedroom of Mrs. Pavent, who was Custance's aunt. Mrs. Favent was trapped in there by it, and in such a way that firearms could not be Used. It meant that some man had to go in armed with only a stick and tackle blind one of the ugliest poisonous snakes in creation. Mrs. Favent herself could not tell in which of the many dark corners the beast was lurking, only that it was somewhere, and angry, and ready to strike.

A HORRIBLE situation for any man, however brave, to face. Naturally it was Bob Ray who said he would go in.

Custance said: 'If you don't know cobras, Ray, it's a devilish risk.'

Ray only answered: 'All right— who'll lend me a stick?'

'There'll probably be two of 'em, Ray,' Fawker put in, 'Cobras are generally in pairs, and the survivor is more wicked than the other...'

'So I've heard,' Ray said, taking the cane someone handed him.

'Gosh,' Barton blurted incautiously. 'Have you really the nerve—'

'Of course. Why not?' Ray said. Perhaps that was what upset the others— and especially Iris. Bob Ray was, quite genuinely, unafraid, but his ingenuous exclamation sounded like a jeer at their courage, especially Custance's, who was really the man to save his aunt.

When Bob Ray marched coolly into the room with a torch and his stick they thought that he was playing to the gallery— but they were wrong. They heard him cry,

'Ah, would you!' Then the swish of his stick and Mrs. Favent's scream. 'You've missed it!'

They heard his cool, 'That time, yes. Not this!'

Whack! Then, quite exultantly he chuckled: 'One! Now for the other...'

He got it, of course; he always did. Mrs. Favent declared that the first had missed him by only a hair when it struck, but he had not even jumped clear, just pivoted round quietly, and, without a sign of excitement, had actually teased the brute into attacking and then hit swiftly and surely as the evil, hooded head stabbed forward.

It was inhuman courage in the face of so much human hesitation, and the rest of the Settlement was abashed by it, found it difficult to meet the man on the same footing.

As for Iris, she found it scarcely bearable. As she told Mrs. Favent: 'He's wonderful, also a dear in so many ways— but he gives me the creeps.'

He had not quite lost his very considerable attraction for her. but she strove to give it less and less chance to sway her. She paired off more with Custance, who was as much in love with her as Ray. She did not turn entirely to him, just as she did not turn entirely from Ray, but both of them, no less than the Settlement, felt that her own heart was still hanging in suspense and that she was waiting for something drastic to decide it.

That had been the situation when Song Lim ran amuck. Bob Ray's astonishing bravery, the unperturbed courage with which he had snatched her life from the dapeer point, were, apoarently, decisive. The man was altogether too inhuman to be tolerable. It seemed that his extraordinary gallantry was the act that made up Iris' mind. And when she ran to the shelter of Custance's arms— not Ray's— she demonstrated it.

Or so the Settlement thought, until next day. Next day Bob Ray did not come down from his bungalow to his office. It was during tiffin that the Settlement learnt that Bob Ray was ill. A planting 'boy' had come down from his bungalow seeking the doctor, and from what could be gathered from his breathless explanation Bob Ray was in a bad way: a big sickness confining him to his bed, a terrible illness smiting him down— and death in the balance.

The doctor went up at a rush. Somehow Iris went with him. At this threat to Ray all she had felt for him flooded back to her. It might not be love, but there was a bond that drew her to him. They found him on his bed, pale with an emotion they had never thought to see him show. He was too far gone even to answer the doctor's question. His left hand was swathed in bandages and reeking of iodine.

Iris stripped the lint off while the doctor laid out his emergency gear. After baring the hand Iris had to turn it this way and that and peer through the iodine stains to locate the injury... She found in the end two grazed knuckles. The doctor blinked down at them, gasped.

'Say— but what the blazes? Isn't that from the wallop you gave that native running amuck yesterday?' the doctor demanded. 'It broke the skin?'

'Yes— that!' Ray moaned. 'The man was mad... Germs may have got into cracked skin…'

The doctor stared, gulped, sat down hard on the bed: 'What!' he roared. 'You— you who went for that chap in spite of his knife— you're— you're scared stiff at a little grazed skin...?'

'Frightened out of my life.' Bob Ray shuddered. 'I've had a terrible night of it... These things, any illness terrifies me...'

The doctor just flung himself back on the bed and howled and howled with laughter. Well, it was funny— Bob Ray, the bravest man on earth, livid with funk over a scratch on his hand. It was the greatest joke he had struck. But Iris stared at Ray wide-eyed and amazed for a minute, then the amazed look melted into a shaky smile:

'Oh, you baby,' she whispered, putting her arm round his shoulder... 'You— you— you're only a baby after all, and need looking after... Now, darling, don't worry any more. I'll see you have nothing to fear...'

_________________

25: Mr Cuckoo, Home from Home

World's News (Sydney) 25 July 1942

AS the little missionary had said, Mr. Cuckoo's case was as sad as it was extraordinary.

Mr. Cuckoo was an Englishman of middle age and medium Height, rendered slightly more imposing by a considerable fleshiness and a resonant dignity rather suggestive of a Victorian actor.

But, as Mr. Cuckoo was the first to tell you, his looks "did not pity him."

Certainly as he loomed amid the swarming family of his hosts he seemed more like some huge, inert parasite who had sucked all sustenance from them; for the Desveradas, although innumerable, had a meagre and hungry look.

Yet to think of him like that was wrong. For, as the little missionary had pointed out to Griffiths, as Mr. Cuckoo lost no time in pointing out, as the Desveradas themselves agreed with many sympathetic groans, Mr. Cuckoo's presence there was through no desire of his own.

Mr. Cuckoo's position was. indeed, unequalled in the annals of human misfortune. He was the most extraordinarily tragic man in the world.

"Look," Mr. Cuckoo sighed gustily to Griffiths. "You see before your eyes a lost man, an outcast, homeless "

"Never! Never!" cried the Desveradas with Spanish fervor. "You are our good friend and brother. Our house and all it has is yours."

"You're wonderful," Mr. Cuckoo said huskily.... "They really are, Mr. Griffiths. What I would do— what would have become of me but for them, I really dare not think. For without their generosity I have nothing. I am penniless and homeless. And yet, Mr. Griffiths, would you believe it— I am also a rich man. I have a fortune waiting for me at home— if I could only get home."

Griffiths believed it. That, in fact, was why he was there. He had been so taken by the little missionary's account of the really amazing situation of the unfortunate Mr. Cuckoo, that he had motored fifty quite excruciating miles across the South American uplands to see the tragic fellow for himself.

Mr. Cuckoo, reading the sympathy in his face, felt in his pocket and produced what was now a rather worn envelope.

"A letter from mv family lawyer," Mr. Cuckoo said with emotion, as he spread the frayed papers. "A letter bidding me return home at once and call on them, taking my birth certificate and so forth, in order to claim Inheritance under my Aunt Martha Cuckoo's will. That letter, Mr Griffiths, arrived 14 years ago:"

"Sixteen," said the eldest Desveradas daughter.

"Seventeen years,  four months and two days," said the Desveradas grandma from the-dark corner of the patio.

She said it a little tartly, and perhaps for that reason the others did. not argue with her, or comment on it, though Mr. Cuckoo said sadly:

"There, you see, I even lose count of time now... my misfortune and also my generous friends have made me forget the years: But the tragedy remains all the same. Fourteen— six— well, say, fifteen years ago I inherited my fortune. The possession of Aunt Martha's estate should have at once freed me from all material anxieties, made me, in fact, a rich man without a care in the world. Indeed, I have for those fourteen years been a rich man; yet you see me here penniless, dependent on these dear friends for the very roof over my head, for the. very bread of my existence. Rich— yet unable to touch my riches. Never able to claim them. Never!"

Grandma Desveradas said sharply: "All because his stomach is a poor thing, and succumbs him to the siroctre (mountain sickness)."

"No, Mama," Señor Desveradas put in nervously. "You know it is the terciana (malaria). It gets him whenever he ascends to higher altitudes, as it does me and many men."

"It is perhaps something of each," Mr. Cuckoo said with the swift tact of a man who knows how to stave off an impending and familiar quarrel.

"It is the mountain sickness. I think, that lets in the fever. But whatever the cause, it dooms me to stay in the Valleys of Catamara for the rest of my days— cuts me off from home and the fortune that awaits me there. That, I think you'll admit, Mr. Griffiths, is tragedy enough for any man."

Griffiths agreed that it was.

In his young days, Mr. Cuckoo had been a wandering prospector for gold and  anything else he could find in the Andean Cordilleras. The last of his journeys had taken him to the Republic of Catamara.

As everyone knows, Catamara is the highest republic in the world. It is set right in the heart of the Andes, and is made up of a series of mountain plains whose general mean level is from eight to twelve thousand feet above the sea.

But that is nothing. Those high plateaux are entirely surrounded by a giant ring of mountains rising from a minimum height of eighteen thousand feet to over twenty-two thousand.

The chain is so complete that there is no getting into Catamara except over those mountains. No getting out of it any other way, either.

There was Mr. Cuckoo's tragedy.

A bad attack of mountain sickness or malaria, or a bit of both, had so paralysed him on the heights that he had collapsed.

His bearers had had to carry him for the rest of the journey; and since the Republic of Catamara was nearer than Chile, they had carried him there.

They had carried him, in fact, to perpetual imprisonment. He was never able to escape over those deadly heights again.

He had been left at the Desveradas estancia, the first after the mountains. and though they had welcomed him with true Spanish hospitality, and had made him free of their house and all that was in it, he, as a decent man, naturally could not impose upon their hospitality too long— or at first he thought he could not.

When he was sufficiently recovered he had made an attempt to get back across the passes to Chile, the eldest sons of his host guiding him, since Señor. Desveradas himself could not face heights.

They had not reached three, thousand feet above their valley when the mountain sickness attacked and rendered him helpless again. He had to be carried back to the estancia in a litter.

From that day it became plainer and plainer that he was doomed never to get out. Again and again he screwed his will ana his courage to dare the heights; every time he was beaten.

"It's no good trying to fight it, Mr. Griffiths," he woefully told the young man. "I simply haven't the physical means. It conquers me in spite of myself. "Directly I rise above the level of this valley I feel the fever beginning to rise in me. I become weak, semidelirious. I stumble and scramble on and up, determined to vanquish my weakness, determined to, win my way to the freedom of my own world.

"It is no good. At a certain height the fell thing has me mastered. I cannot stand, I cannot even rise from my back. Even if I am carried further in a litter, as several times these good, brave Desveradas have tried to carry me over, I lose consciousness and it becomes plain that my life is in danger. So, once more I have to be brought back to the valley level to recover slowly."

THE tragedy of all this had, of course, most poignantly increased when he got the lawyer's letter relating to his inheritance, He had made half-a-dozen really desperate attempts to win his way over the Sierras. All had failed. Each time he was carried back a man more dead than alive.

"So that, in time, even I had to face the inevitability of my miserable destiny," he said, thickly. "Fortune or not, it is written that I cannot, shall not, may not cross those mountains alive. I am pinned here for the rest of my life. I accept my fate now. It is kismet. I know I cannot escape."

It was there Griffiths laughed. It was there the young man imparted his good news.

"But I think you can, Mr. Cuckoo," he said. "I think, in fact, I'm the man to get you out."

"Eh?" Mr. Cuckoo gaped at him. "Mr. Griffiths, please— don't raise false hopes in a heart where hope is dead..."

"I'm not. I'm sure it can be done," Griffiths said boyishly. "That's why I came over with Mr. Gaskin, here, after he told me your story. I was only passing through, but he so interested me..."

"Please! Please!" Mr. Cuckoo wailed. "I don't think I'm strong enough to endure false dreams."

"Oh, but it's not false," the missionary said in his simple way. "Mr. Griffiths can do it, I'm sure. You see, he's an aviator."

"A what?" Mr. Cuckoo gulped.

"A pilot— a flying man," Griffiths put in cheerfully. "I'm flying from Lima to the Argentine. Testing for mountain airways, you know. I came down on the high pampas just near Mr. Gaskin's station... slight defect to my feed, that's all; my mechanic is putting it right now.

"Mr. Gaskin lodged us, and the sight of my plane gave him the idea about you. And when he talked to me about it, why, I saw it was the one way to get you free."

"SI! Si! Si!" the Desveradas said with splendid unison. "An aeroplane! Of course! The one way of escape for the Senor Cuckoo! It is sent from heaven.... It is, at last, his chance of getting free."

"An aeroplane!" Mr. Cuckoo gulped at them. "Are you mean— are you saying you mean me to fly in an aeroplane!"

"Of course," Griffiths beamed. "It's your way out. The one sure way of getting you over the mountains at last."

"Of course!" cried the Desveradas. "It is the way. It solves everything. You are as good as at home with your fortune now."

"But— but," Mr. Cuckoo mumbled limply. "Don't you understand— 'over the mountains,' you say. You fly higher than the mountains— but already, when I am but half-way up the mountains, I am overcome, I am as good as dead."

"That is through slow climbing," Griffiths said. "I'll have you over them before you realise you've even started."

"Of course, of course," said the Desveradas. "One swift swoop, you are over; you are on the other side. You are free and rich."

"Swoop!" groaned Mr. Cuckoo. "Don't you realise it is height that kills me? Lift me above 12,000 feet and my body collapses. It is the altitude that is dangerous to me. My heart won't stand it."

"You won't feel it," Griffiths said. "I can even give you oxygen....'

"Oxygen," Mr. Cuckoo shuddered, and sprang up in his agitation. "No, don't tempt me! Don't! I know my nature too well. I want to go. I. more than any man, feel the pull of freedom. I value my riches.... But of what avail? I know myself too well. It would kill me..."

"But, I assure you, we could—"

"No, don't put vain allurements before a sorely tried man," Mr. Cuckoo protested. "I dare not— all my experience warns me it would mean death."

He ran away from them, sought an inner room in the estancia for fear of yielding to his yearning. The Desveradas stared with melancholy faces at Griffiths.

Señor Desveradas even sighed: "For a moment I thought it would be hope. Is it so fatal then?"

"No," Griffiths laughed. "Most of his fear is only psychological.... Imagination, you know. He's got such a dread of heights that he's ready to cave in at the mere thought of them.

"My own opinion is that if we could make him forget that, if we could, say, dope him, in a kindly way, of course, I could whisk him over before he realised what had happened. I mean while he slept "

"Dope," Grandma put it.... "Does that mean something in his night drink to make him sleep long, a day, two days?"

"That's what I mean," Griffiths said. "Something harmless, of course, but that would keep him unconscious while I ran him to the plane in Mr. Gaskin's car, and then got him over into Argentina, Mr. Gaskin thought you had such herbs...."

"Providence has blessed me," said Grandma Desveradas. "He shall certainly sleep."

MR. CUCKOO certainly slept. He slept so well that, when he awoke, he simply, could not take in the highly civilised furnishings of the Argentine hotel bedroom.  Griffiths had to tell him.

"You're free, Mr. Cuckoo." He grinned. "I did the trick. You're outside the mountains, escaped from Catamara at last. You're in your own world, on your way home to wealth."

"Free!" gulped Mr. Cuckoo. "No I longer in Catamara? Torn away from the Desveradas!"

"Torn?" cried Griffiths.

"Yes, you adjectival young fool! Torn! Torn away from the one permanent and unstinted haven of hospitality I'm ever likely to know. My life ruined by an interfering young busybody."

"Ruined!" cried Griffiths. "But your inheritance?"

"An overmortgaged villa in a back street, probably sold-up for rates these sixteen years," Mr. Cuckoo snarled. "Not worth taking a tuppenny tram ride for. And you— you claw me out of a home where I had comfort and plenty for a life time. You— you—"

But the tragic Mr. Cuckoo had no words left to describe his freedom. He rose violently from his bed and knocked his rescuer cold with one wicked blow of his outraged fist.

________________

26: A Bird Limey

Illustrated Dec 2 1939

Sunday Times (Perth, WA) 16 May 1943

YOUNG Cobnor was a combination of a pain in the neck and a loud laugh. How he got into the navy at all is a puzzle, except that in war one naturally expects the worst. That, anyhow, was how Batsford felt when Cobnor was drafted to the S.S. Jane Anna as a gunnery rating.

Botsford was never tired of declaring that Cobnor Wasn't so much a seaman as a deliberate bit of German sabotage

He was the oddest little runt by any scale of measurement, human or divine. He was big-headed, shuffling, and with one of those filleted figures that are always on the slouch. He was the most unhappy lubber ever wished upon a gun crew in a moment of desperation.

Even at shadow-practice he stumbled and fumbled and got so under everybody's feet, that Batsford, the gun layer, was generally rather more explosive than his own three-inch shells before he was half way through the exercise.

It wasn't that Cobnor didn't mean well, but that he simply couldn't. Nature had given him foot instinct where most people wear their hands-and duck feet at that Batsford, trying to be fair in spite of high pressure murder bursting his hairy chest, roared:

"Why the double-barrelled hang-all are you here, anyway? What enemy of mankind got you to join the navy? Why the sea, when Nature made you for a  tank? Come on, let's have the answer to that bad joke, pronto, me lad! Why?"

"Ornithology," said young Cobnor.

"No back answers now," Batsford rapped.

"But that's it. The reason; my hobby's ornithology. Birds," Cobnor explained, uncomfortably. "Bird habits, you know. Bird life, bird lore— that sort of thing. I wanted to study the ways of sea birds."

"Birds!" Batsford almost yelped. "Birds in the navy? Did you think they'd ship you on a hen coop? Did you mistake us for the Egg Board? Strike me addled, what's the service come to!"

Cobnor took it meek, as he took everything— even the fun that the rest of the ratings squeezed out of it. All the same, he'd spoken true. He was nuts on birds.

Queer that before the war he had really been a clerk in some darn big city warehouse, where he couldn't see much sky, let alone passing feathers, yet all he ever thought about was birds. He read nothing else. He'd spent most of his weekends panting his way through the suburbs on a bicycle in the hope of reaching hedges and trees and the habitat of the wry-necked beetle bolter and other branch hoppers.*

_____________

* As the author knows nothing about birds he felt he had better use the names— wild if interesting— given him by the A.B. who passed on this strange nar-rative.

THE gun crew got a lot of fun out of him, of course. There's nothing like a little lunacy in somebody else to relieve the monotony of long voyages under strain, and the Jane Anna provided the monotony and strain all right.

She was a fairly big freighter of low knottage and about the same of comforts. She plied a regular route like a bus, only buses can be exciting. But she was as reliable as a bus, anyhow, and quite a hog for cargo carrying. The amount of stuff she could cram into her holds— munitions or food— would have stocked an army. That's why she had been given her gun.

It was a defensive gun, of course, mounted on her after-deck, in what space was left over by donkey-engines and derricks. The gun crew's quarters were just as cramped. These chaps were special ratings, R.N.R. and R.N.V.B. mainly, and although they did train some of the deck hands as a supplementary crew, they formed, mainly, a little world of their own.

On that after-deck they were so cramped and cut off that almost any relaxation was a tonic for their long and empty days between practices at imaginary U-boats, and waiting for word of a real periscope.

Cobnor took it quite well, if seriously. He wasn't a bad sort, though inclined to think that others were just as loopy about our feathered friends as himself. He would say heavily:

"No, that's the spavine-toed glaucous kittiwake, with raptorial instincts and connubial wing adjustments. ..."

And then he'd go on for half an hour telling its modes of life, personal habits, number of scales on the hock, methods of divorce, tastes in eating and so forth until the men who'd tried to pull htt leg were either sick with laughter or sorry they'd spoken.

He knew all there was to know about birds, though; why they flew in bunches or didn't; bow some fed floating and others on the wing; why we picked up certain birds on certain courses at certain seasons; how they protected themselves, nested, mated; would fly or fight in companies, and a heap of things like that.

Sometimes he would be terribly interesting, other times he was a yawn..

Each voyage Batsford was more and more active in darning the Admiralty for wishing such a fellow on him. In time the tension grew so bad that it became a real hate that gave the whole of the gun crew the jitters.

It got so bad on one particular voyage that Batsford swore that if he didn't get Cobnor transferred once they made the home port he'd darn well mutiny.

The voyage itself was mainly responsible for the excessive feeling. Word had been radioed to the Jane Anna, a day after she sailed, that a U-boat was known to be operating somewhere in her track. That was bad enough, but the Jane Anna's cargo made it worse. She was packed so tight with explosives that one shell would have blown her sky high with not a hope for any man aboard; and, if that wasn't enough, she was also carrying £500,000 of specie in her strong room that had to be got home at all costs.

Of course, all that was supposed to be a secret, but those on board were confident that the Nazis knew, and that they were after it. It was a sullen, jumpy sort of voyage, with everybody hanging over the rail watching the sea until their eyes cracked, so afraid that sudden death might start out of it at any moment. Everybody's nerves seemed to be worn outside their duffle suits, so that there was constant scrapping and snarling, and life was merry hell all round.

THINGS were just about as squibby as they could be when Dobbie saw the patch of gulls. There was a whole mob of them, hundreds far away to leeward, squatting on the water and riding up and down like round-about horses in the easy-swell.

"Birds in them numbers mean land," Dobbie spat. "They don't flock out like that far from shore."

"These do then," Woolege said. "T'quartermaster tole me only 'smorn we're still days from nearest landfall."

"He's pulling your leg," Dobbie insisted, "for I tell yer that'd be far too far out for a mob o' gulls like that"

"That's right," young Nortfull put in. "They just don't never come so far from a safe perch. We're in sight o' home all right boys."

"You know we ain't" Peckham declared. "With the swing we've taken we're 'undreds an' 'undreds o' miles from anywhere."

The men argued as seamen wilI until someone said: "Well, you ask young Cobnor. He'll know for sure."

They dragged Cobnor to the rail. He was even scared of mentioning birds, for Batsford was drawing near.

But in time the nonsense that other chaps talked made him blurt:

"You're all wrong! We're within 50 miles of land. They're pinch-backed barnacle gannets (or words to that effect), an' they're never known to fly more than fifty miles from shore."

"Is that so," Batsford puts in nasty like. "Then you ain't as clever as you think, even in birds. We're two hundred and twenty miles from the nearest land. Now what about you and your superior knowledge?"

But if young Cobnor was meek under discipline he wasn't taking anything about birds, even from Batsford. He mumbled, sulky but firm:

"It can't be. It's a sure, scientific fact about that kind of gannet— they've never been seen more than fifty miles from land."

"But I'm telling you. We're two-twenty miles from the nearest beach," Batsford said grimly.

"I don't care," Cobnor said defiantly. "You can't get behind science. The habits of these gannets are too well known. They just never leave the coast, unless following some sure source of food, an' that's rare."

"What d'ya mean, sure' source o' food?" Woolege jeered.

"A ship throwing out scraps, that sort o' thing," Cobnor said. "The only known instances they've been seen farther than fifty miles to sea has been when they followed ships like that. But such cases are so exceptional—"

"Most exceptional of all now," Batsford sneered. "There ain't no ship. Not a single one in sight, an' to my knowledge none has been reported within a hundred miles of this for days. Now what about it?"

"All the same," Cobnor said, "that's the only way they could have got here if we're that far. An' what's more, they prove it They're feeding on floating stuff now. I can see 'em."

"You young Ananias!" Batsford snapped. "There isn't a ship; there couldn't be.... Why, hell, use your own eyes, where's a sign of one?"

"No, I can't see one," Cobnor says doggedly, as he looks round, "but you can't go behind scientific knowledge. They're here an' they're feeding. That means a ship somewhere. Must...." Suddenly he gave a gulp. "Yes, somewhere— and if it isn't in sight on the surface, why it must be under it!"

All the men gave a gasp then, even Batsford.

"That U-boat!" he rapped. "Action stations, men, darn sharp... and you, Cobnor, if you've mucked me up again, the Lord protect your hide."

But Cobnor hadn't made a mistake.

The men had no sooner loaded and trained the gun on the gulls when he gives a yelp.

"Look! Somethin's disturbing them!... Look, away to the south fringe. There's nothing there, but they're beginning to scare."

It was a fact. The birds floating calmly away to the south of the flock suddenly began fluttering and squawking and to get up in a hurry from the sea surface. Soon the fright had spread to the whole mass of birds until all were swooping upward in a swirling and screaming mass.

"The U-boat's surfacing!" Batford yelled. "Watch for her periscope, boys."

That U-boat surfaced quickly. She counted on the Jane Anna failing to see her until too late, and knowing the freighter carrying  explosives she hoped to scare her with the threat of her heavier gun into surrendering that specie.

She never had a chance. Batsford had all the time he wanted to sight fine on her periscope, so that, waiting until her conning tower broke water he was able to get her in one shot. The second hulled her so badly that the crew came tumbling up eager to surrender.

THEY were a crestfallen lot when they came aboard. They had been so sure of getting the Jane Anna that they han taken their time over it. They had only submerged when they had seen the freighter's smoke above the horizon, and then then waited quite comfortably until the beat of her engines had told them she was in range.

They admitted that they had travelled on the surface since they had last sighted land. They also admitted emptying their swill tubs overboard at intervals in the ordinary way, one just before they dived. It had never occurred to them that the gulls flying about them had any connection with this.

They were thoroughly taken aback when Batsford said largely:

"An' that's how you cooked your goose. You see, we English always keep a trained ornitermologist aboard to look for just such bird signs..."

Even Cobnor gulped at that barefaced bit of brag, and grinned.

He knew, then, that bird fancying and bird fanciers were going to be quite popular among that gun crew from that day on.

End

Table of Contents

- 1: Handsome Is...
- 2: A Serious Ambition
- 3: The Sportsman in Pajamas
- 4: The Sporting Finish
- 5: The Wedding Group
- 6: The Eighth Buddha
- 7: What a Guest Desires
- 8: Watch Your Step!
- 9: Just Ordinary Human
- 10: The Thing of Brass
- 11: The Novena
- 12: Sylvia is Freed
- 13: The Magic Detector
- 14: Spools of Peril
- 15: Murderer at Large
- 16: His Guiding Star
- 17: State Papers
- 18: Mr. Sugars Remembers
- 19: The Parson
- 20: Headlong
- 21: The Pen
- 22: Take Your Choice
- 23: Crying Baby
- 24: Too Brave to Love
- 25: Mr. Cuckoo, Home from Home
- 26: A Bird Limey
- Unnamed