TALES OF ADVENTURE

Auckland Star, Volume 55, Issue 152, 28 June 1924, Page 24

TALES OF ADVENTURE

"Arlington! Well, I'm Mowed!" I swung round with a start, wondering who in the world was the stern-faced, grizzle-haired man who addressed mc, who stood gripping mc firmly by the arm in the middle of the Strand. Then, as his expression relaxed, as iiis lips puckered to a once familiar grin, recollection swept back over mc. "Mace, old man!" I exclaimed. "Well, of all the astonishing bits of luck!" We turned into Romano's out of the chilly dampness of the November evening, and over a couple of drinks found ourselves slipping back into the old groove of like a long-disused but perfectly-fitting bolt into its socket. "It is jolly—our running into one another like this!" I enthused, warmly. 'Must be—let's see —quite nine years ago —isn't it?—since that last week-end at Belehaise?" He nodded. "Xine years and four months, to be exact—the end of July, 1914." "By Jove, of course. 1 remember! And a few days later war broke out and we were all swept away helter-skelter. I By the way, I wonder what became of the others—Remington and Archie Wymis and—and—let's see—Stoddard and Berry Cleland —and Darracq? I've often wondered. Funny how one loses touch. Darracq was killed, of course. 11 read an account of that in the papers. Nice chap, Darracq. D'you remember the poetry he used to write? Yards and yards of it. And didn't Remington go out to Rhodesia or somewhere?" "Really? Good egg! And you've managed to keep in touch?" "Well—lately. As a matter of fact I've been hunting 'em up. I came across Remington and Archie Wymis by acci- i dent, and then the idea occurred to mc —I thought some sort of a reunion You remember the jolly times we used to have together?" "Rather! I should just think I do. And yo-.'ve succeeded in rounding up the other two?" "Yes. Cleland was easy. He's a partner in his father's firm —Cleland and Haverstock, the solicitors. Stoddard's a journalist of some sort—fearfully hard up, I believe. And now "He tapped the ash from his cigarette, took a careful sip of his Bronx c.cktail, and added: "Now 3'ate's stepped in and completed the circle." The "Circle"—that was what we had called ourselves in '. h e old diys. Before we parted company we had planned a dinner that was ti bring all six of us together again. When I arrived at Mace Conway's flat in Jermyn Street at five-and-twenty minutes past seven in the evening, it was to find Stoddard and Remington already there. Shortly afterwards Cleland joined us, and at exactly one minute past the half-hour Archie Wymis sauntered airily in. Dinner was announce a 7 r a Japanese man-servant, whom x recognised as having seen at Belcbaise, and we passed from an attractive sitting-room, between large folding oak doors, into a diningroom beyond. In spite of Mace's valiant efforts to put us at our ease, conversation flagged, j-eavily. I had come expecting to be swept back thirteen or fourteen years into the tingling atmosphere of dawning manhood, to feel precisely aa I had felt during one of those jolly evenings in Mace's sitting-room at Oxford. And as I sat waiting for the miracle to happen, a chill sense of disappointment stole over mc. For one thing, with the exception of Archie Wymis—who was precisely his old trim, durk-liaired, exquisitely groomed self—we all seemi I to have changed so amazingly. It gave mc quite a shock to discover that Remington's one-time genial plumpness had turned to uncompromising, rather vulgar fat, «nd that Stoddard—who had divided with. Wymis the honours of a dandically neat appearance—wore shabby, ill-fitting clothes that looked aa though they were never even brushed, and Uiat his lean idealistic features were marked with the stamp of chronic discontent. Cleland's once slim figure had thickened and coarsened considerably, whilst a particularly unpleasant scar—the result, no doubt of a' war wound —ran diagonally across his left cheek. It b jan at the corner of his mouth and went zigzaging upwards to the eyebrow, dragging aside the lip in a most horrible manner. And Berry Cleland had been the best-looking of us all. "Adonis" we had always called him. I shivered, wondering how I myself must look to them. At the head o<. .he table sat Mace, his smile of conventional politeness hardening again and again into that look of haunting bitterness. He, undoubtedly, was the most profoundly altered of us all. Fumblingly I sought about in my mind for some explanation of the change in him; and abruptly, like a key in the hand of a man standing before a locked door, came the memory of Philida. Why, of course —Philida! Poor old Mace! He'd thought the world of Phil. If ever a man had worshipped a woman ! It ■was to celebrate the first anniversary of their wedding that we'd all been invited down to Belchaise that last week-end. Funny that even marriage hadn't succeeded in breaking up the "Circle"! We all prophesied that it ■would. "A woman always spoils a man for friendship," we'd told one another gloomily before the event. Philida was lovely. But —somehow I never quite liked her. Underneath her charmicg exterior I fancied her character had a certain shoddiness. And Mace adored her. That look that would come into his eyes every time they rested upon her! As though something within him was eternally upon his knees! And in the end she had left him —run away ■with some other man. The meal went on, to the accompaniment of a somewhat vague stream of email-talk. And then, little by little, as the effects of the very excellent food— combined with the various even more excellent wines—got to work within us, the atmosphere of the gathering began subtly to change. Toe ice first cracked, then brJce in all directions, to be swept away upon a flood of animated loquacity. By the time the last course had been disposed of we were aL thoroughly, even a trifle hilariously, at ease. Tongues wagged. Mace's reunion was provinga success after all.

SENTENCE OF DEATH. By GLADYS ST. JOHN-LOE.

We went back through the folding i oak doors into the sitting-room. It was I a jolly s it of man's room—sprawling leather armchairs and bookelii'.tcs and well-worn rugs and tobacco jars and sporting prints on the snufT-eolouiv 1 walls, and a great blazing log fire roaring upwards from a wide terracotta hearth —the sort of fire that made you shul to remember how cold it was outside. We sat round in a careless semicircle, and Yamado, his flattV!i yellow face smiling i(« eternal smile of goodnatured obsequiousness, came in with coffee on a tray. There was a slighl lull v the conversation as he filled and handed a cup separately to each one ol us. Then ho went out again, anil we sat meditatively sipping the strong black beverage and staring at the lire. The talk went on. One by one we delved baik into the past, retrieving some priceless half-forgotten memory of i our common youth. i The pyramids of ash grew long on the ends" of Mace's fine Havana cigars, scattered themselves unheeded on the floor. A sense of blissful satisfaction, , of inestimable well-being, settled over the whole party. And then, inevitably, the talk gravitated to that last meeting at Belchaise. i that critical week-end when the fate of all Europe had hung in the balance. And someone mentioned Philida. Mace had got up from Ms chair to fetch a box of matches from the mantelpiece, and now he turned and faced us, his back to the glowing logs, a dead match in one hand, a cigarette in the other. I saw that his lips wore their faint cynical smile. '"Philida?" he said, quietly, almost pensively. "Ah, yes—Philida! I wonder someone hasn't mentioned her before. No doubt you've wanted to —and didn't like to. 'Fraid of hurting my feelings and all that. |Well, you needn't worry." He tossed the burnt match into the grate, deliberately scrutinising each member of the "Circle" in turn, and went on: "I'd rather like you to know." "But, Mace, old chap," I said, "you can't want to talk about it. We can all guess how cut up you must have been and " "But I do, I do want to talk about it!" he cried, his voice rising to a sudden passionate insistence. "In fact, I —l've brought you all here this evening—ft, the express purpose of talking about it." Some one said:— "Oh, well—if you want to. But we're not—l mean, of course, we all know it wasn't your fault." "Indeed?" "How can one judge," he said, "who is really to blame —in affairs of .that sort? Women? They're the devil! I know there are men who say tha f , all this talk about never being able to understand 'em is rot. Faugh! They've never tried —that's all. I tell you, you never can understand 'em—down to rock bottom." "As for Phil—l thought I knew her. I thought I'd given her all a woman could want—that, she was content. If loving her could make her happy " His voice broke, his lips twitched; ho stared blankly upwards after a volutin r curl of blue-grey smoke. "Damn it all, you know what a fool I v as about that woman! If cutting my heart out of my living body could have saved her a moment's pain——■ But it seems that wasn't what she wanted. No, there wasn't anything I could do. She'd just —got tired. I suppbse I bored her, I was so darned simple, such a greenhorn. And I? Oh, my God, I loved her! You remember that last week-end? Even then —and we'd only been married a year— there was someone else. And then the war came —and that s'mplified matters. I hadn't been out in France three weeks before she left Belchase fo good and all. She sent mc the usual sort of note, to the effect that ishe'd 'thought tilings over and come to the conclusion that our marriage was a mistake,' and that she'd gone away with 'the only man she'd ever really loved'— her 'soul-mate,' I think she called him. "I was in the trenches —helpless. It was eighteen months before 1 got my first leave, and by that time —well, what could I do that was any use? They'd covered their tracks very cleverly—and i don't know that I wanted, specially, to find out who the man was. I won't pretend that if I'd happened to come up against him in the beginning—that 1 wouldn't have killed him, gladly, with my two bare hands. But, after all, it was her choice—and if he'd treated her decently " "If only he'd treated her decently! But he didn't. 1 found out afterwards he'd given her hell. Hell! He took her to Paris and then smuggled her down to Barcelona —that was in the early part of 1915. And when he was tired of her. he just left her—stranded, starving—and came biick and joined up in the British I Army. She died in 1917 —without a I penny, after sinking to the lowest depths of misery and shame any woman coulu sink to. After the Armistice I spent months looking for her. You tee, I bved her." He was staring straight before him with a look I can't describe, a mad look, as though he were seeing tilings— horrible things. Then, with the ominous quiet of controlled passion, he wen. on:— -_ "As I stood by the filthy bed on wliie they had told mc she had died, as I looked at the nameless grave in which she'd been buried, I swore never to rest unt 1 I'd seen justice done to the man who had ruined her. Do you blame mc?" Wymis said:— "And the man—you - found out who the man was?" "Not yet. It was extraordinary—the pains he must have taken to hide his name, just as if But he's in the net now. He can't escape." He held up his left hand, stared at it with a sudden peculiar intentness, and went on: "Has. it ever oceured to you —what interestjn things hands are? My only hope of discovering the man who ruined my happiness and murdered Philida —ye-.' murdered her? —lies in the fact that hands can't change, that they are a more certain means of identification even than faces. Let mc explain. ]n February of 1915, my man Yamado —who is extremel devoted to me—happened to be in Paris. And one day lie was on the point of crossing the street when a block in the traffic caused a taxi to halt against the

kerb immediately in-front of him. In the taxi he caught a glimpse of a woman's face —Philida's. lie tried to see the face of the man ehe was with, but this was impossible. Suddenly the man got up to open the window. His face was still invisible, but for several moments his hands rested in full view upon the frame of the open window. Well —Yamado happens to have a peculiarly infallible memory for hands. An Oriental realises that a hand may be identified as surely as—perhaps more surely than—a face; that a hand can't be disguised as a face can. And—well, as I've told you, Yamado happens to have this gift of hand-memory supernormally developed." I think it was Remington who said:— ' "But how the deuce is that going to help you? You can't have the hands of every man in the world paraded for Yamado's inspection." "No, of course not; besides, it 'isn't necessary. You see, 1 happen to know that the hands Yamado saw in Paris belong to one of live me , :]." "One of live?" Yes; he recognised them as belonging to one of the guests he had waited upon at table during that week-end at Belchaise.'' '"But—you moan to say—" "There were six of you present on that occasion, but, as Di.rracq happened to be killed two days before Yamado say my wife in l'aris —well, that puts him out of it." For one ghastly frozen moment nobody spoke. Then: — "Good fiod! " Stoddard exclaimed. "You accuse one of Uβ? You must be crazy. You don't know what you're talking about." "1 know perfectly well what I'm talking about." continued -Mace. "I'm saying that the man who ruined my life's happiness, who took Phi! away from mc, and Anally left her to die like a dog in a Spanish hovel, is in this room at the present moment." The ring of passionate conviction in his voice left no dmibt in my mind that he believed himself to be speaking the truth. 1 felt tlie hair prickle about the edges of my scalp. The palms of my hands were clammy with sweat. "But—but. Mace, damn it all!" I blustered, "that's a pretty rotten statement to make, unless you're positive—and how can you be —on such evidence?" "I'm quite satisfied that Yamado made no mistake." "Then, for Ood's sake, man, which one of us was it? Which?" Again he drew at liis cigarette, and again the smoke swirled airily, maddeningly, upwards, lie shook his head. "I don't know." "You don't—know?" "No; before you came 1 arranged with Yamado that if, while waiting at table, he recognised the hands he saw in Paris, he was to give mc a certain sign. He gave n*e that sign the last time he came into the room. But I still don't know —which." "Then what are you going to do?" I was convinced now that he was mad. Every bit of the old Mace had vanished. "What I intended to do—l have already done. I'm merely waiting for it to take effect." ' "To—to take effect?" "Good Lord, man wh-what d'you mean?" "Mace—for Heaven's sake—" "Must be some mistake; you know perfectly well, old man —" "One of us?" "Ci*'t you explain?" We were all talking at once now, wildly, frantically, afraid without knowing what it was that we feared. And he nodded, smiled his baffling smile, as he answered: "Yes, I'll explain. It was arranged that when Yamado brought in the coffee he should hand each of you a cup separately, and that the cup that went to the man whose hands he recognised—should be poisoned." "Poisoned!" A thrill of pure horror swept round the "Circle" like the cold blade of c. scythe. "But, Conway, you must be mad!" " Mad ? — well, perhaps. Maybe you'd be mad also if you'd ioved a woman as I loved my wife, and some man had done to her—what one of you did to Phil." "But —poison ?" "Yes, a very subtle Eastern poison, one which Yamado assures mc is often used on similar occasions in China." He dropped his arm to his side. My heart seemed to stand quite still as I looked at him. The sounds of rumbling traffic in the street outside, the blare of a motor-horn, the grind of hurriedlyapplied brakes, seemed infinitely remote, irrelevant, like sounds filtering through a nightmare. Wymis was white to the lips. His mouth hung open in a stupid, surprised sort of way, as if someone had just struck him a stunning blow between his eyes. Remington's flushed face had turned a violent bruised-looking purple. His big plump hands looked like flabby lumps of clay as they clasped the ends of his chair-arms. Stoddard, a piece of lank hair straying untidily down over his high forehead, was staring at Mace with an air of fascinated absorption, for all the world like some lean and hungry bloodhound on a leash. Was he thinking, I wonder, of the excellent "story" he would be able to concoct out of the affair? And exactly opposite mc, his face clearly illumined by the glow of a crimson-shaded electricT lamp, the scar on his cheek showing up like some horrid freshly-opened wound, sat Berry Cleland. His hands were pressed tightly between his knees. His shoulders sagged forward into a crouching attitude. His mouth, unintentionally contorted into a grimace by the dragging aside of the left corner of the upper lip, seemed to twitch and gibber in a frantic effort for self-control. And his eyes! Never in my life have I seen such an expression in any human face. It was like a crazy, panic-striken look of a wild beast in a trap. He began to shiver. His body cringed lower and lower in its chair. A ghastly choking sound bubbled up out of his throat. And instantly every eye in the room was upon him. Somewhere, a long way off, I could hear a fire-bell ringing. And somewhere quite close at hand a clock was ticking—marking off the fatal moments as they slid one by one into eternity. And then, abruptly, Cleland moved. He threw up his arms and staggered wildly to his feet. He stood swaying grotesquely before us, his face convulsed with a look»of indescribable ferror. Finally, with a strangling shriek, his knees gave way beneath him. He collapsed upon the hearthrug and lay still. Nobody moved or spoke. Someone knocked over a glass. With a brusque movement, like a dog shaking a wet coat, Mace pulled himself j together .and looked down at the crumI pled thing at his ieet. I "You—Cleland?" he said. "Well, I I'm damned! Aria , yet—l don't know that I'm surprised. You took a hell of a lot of getting here this evening. So you're the man Phil loved? Her 'soul-mate/ eh? Wonder what she'd think of you now— if she could see you?

His voice was cold, indifferent, uncannily matter-of-fact." With a jerk I was on my feet, violently clutching at his arm and crying:— "Mace! Mace! Good God, man, what have you done?" He stared at mc stupidly, his eyes blinking a little through the smoke. "Done?" "Yes—Clcland ! Heavens, man, don't you realise " In a flash my professional instincts asserted themselves. thrusting him hurriedly aside, 1 dropped to my knee« beside Cleland's body. A few moments' examination was sufficient to convince mc that he was beyond all human aid. ""I don't know if you realise the seriousness of this business," I went on, as I rose awkwardly to my feet again. "Of course, you—you understand that he's dead ?" Mace nodded. Someone else repeated: — i "Dead? You're quite sure? Hasn't I —cr —fainted o: —or anything of that !sort ?" ! 1 shook my head. ] "No. Quite sure." I think it was Stoddard who at last suggested: — "Hadn't we better —T mean —isn't it usual —in a case of this sort, to —cr — well, send for the police? Hang it, all —bound to come' out —simply bound to. Xo sense —messing things U]>." And Mace himself answered: — ''Certainly. Ring up the police by all moans. I believe Vine .Street's the nearest. You'll find the telephone over there—and a directory in the middle drawer." He pointed to the writing bureau standing against the wall between the two windows. "But you realise, don't you. the consequences to yourself?" I urged, anxiously. He shrugged. "Why? What have I to fear?" "But ! Listen. Mace—surely you realise that this is murder?" He shook his head. "Murder? Rubbish! Nothing of the sort. Simple justice—that's all." "You may think so. I'm not going to argue that it isn't, but I'm afraid an English jury will take a different view of the matter." "Jury? What's it got to do with a jury?" "lijit—don't you sec?—bound to be a trial?" "Why ?" "Well, hang it all, youve deliberately poisoned a man." "Poisoned 1 Nothing of the sort." "But " "There was no poison in that coffee." "No poison?" "That's what I said. Look! There's a drop still left in his cup. It can be analysed. He died of funk, sheer funk — and a guilty conscience." "And , you didn't—kill him?' His voice sounded very weary, like the voice of an old man, as he replied: "No. He killed himself. And now, if you'd like to ring for the police "