THE FULHUM MYSTERY

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 114, 17 May 1927, Page 18

THE FULHUM MYSTERY

BY HILDA HINE

CHAPTER XXI. The Murder of Giuseppe. When he came to that part of his story which described the death of his son, Bainbridge was overcome by emotion. He paused for a moment shaken by sobs, and his daughter gave herself up to almost unrestrained weeping. Blond had been more moved by the recital than by anything he had ever heard. After a time the narrator regained his self-control. "I cannot tell you," he said, "how the news affected me. I had been buoyed up with the idea that the bitter past was to be wiped out. I knew my son would find it hard to forgive me. but I believed that there was some magic in the relation of father and son which would perform the miracle. And now my son was dead, with nothing but hatred for me in hiu heart. The simple southern folk around me were mourning the loss of a great Italian, but my loss was something deeper and more bitter than they could understand. All round me men and women wer ? . talking about him, exchanging reminiscences of his looks, his manners, his little local triumphs, and a thousand and one little acts of charity. I heard it all with a melancholv pride and strained my neck so that I should not miss one of the tributes that were paid to my son—mf poor dead son who had died with a just hatred for his unhappv father."

saw Adela dressed 111 deep black walking towards the west end of the town, and I made my way up to the village to see my wife. The change in her staggered me. She seemed to have aged twenty years in a few days. I asked her what we were to do, but she seemed unable to arrive at any decision. Oh, it was pitiful. There were two emotions tearing her. I could see it though I am no psychologist, but only a very ordinary man. On the one side there was her reawakened love for me, which had never really perished through it all; on the other there was some obscure feeling that to forgive me now was to fail in loyalty to her dead boy. She loved and hated me at once, and with all the intensity with which Italians can entertain those emotions. I walked out of the house a broken man. The undeserved cup of happiness that had been held to my lips had been thrown to the ground and shattered into a thousand pieces. For the first and only time in my strangely mixed life I entertained the idea of self-murder. "The next day," again Bainbridge's voice was broken, and it was evident he was making a great struggle not to give way to his emotions. "The next day I heard in the street that the Marchesa di Romani was dead." Ho paused and none of the three people in the room had dry eyes. With a qtiick impulsive movement, the first Blond had ever seen in her which seemed to be wholly Italian, Adela stepped over to her father, touched him on the shoulder and gently kisged his cheek. Ho smiled bravely through his tears and resumed his story. "That evening Adela came to my hotel with a note from her mother. It was a simple message, saying that she had loved once and once only, and her love had never changed. 'I have thought it best,' she concluded, 'that Adela should know nothing, but if ever you should think it wise to enlighten her you will do so. I have told her now that she might safely commit herself to a very old friend of mine, and I have named you in my will aa her guardian and the custodian of her estate. All the love I know! yon bear me can find expression in your care for her.'"

Bain bridge paused once or twice in his quotation of the letter. It was evident that he had committed to memory the Italian words of Maria di Roniani, and was translating them for the benefit of Blond as he went along. "Most of this as I have told you," he proceeded, "is a revelation to Adela. She knows what followed, but"—turning to Blond—"I must explain it to vou because it throws a light on all "the bewildering experiences which you have had. Adela came to me and the first request she made was that we should go to Rome together to find out what we could about her brother's end, and to see to his grave. I willingly consented, all the more readily for reasons which she has not been able to appreciate until now, " "In Rome every possible difficulty was thrown in our way. In this peaceful and constitutional country you can iiave no

conception of wha. political feeling was like there at that time. On all hands we wero met with suspicion. No sooner did .1 mention the name of Giuseppe di Romani than the people to whom I spoke became uneasy and showed a disposition to walk away. "I called on a man of influence in the banking world, who, I thought, would do anything for me. He had been under material obligation to me in the past. He received me effusively, asked ine what I wanted, and assured me with luxuriant Italian eloquence that it would be the supreme pleasure of his life to do it. No sooner did I mention the name of Giuseppe than his manner changed as everyone else's had done." "'Oh, not politics, my friend. Anything else, but one must leave politics alone.'

" 'But this is not politics to me' I protested. 'It is a solemn personal obligation. Giuseppe di Romani was the brother of a young lady for whom I am responsible. I promised her dying mother that I would look after her. I have a sacred duty.' "'I would most willingly help you, but in this matter I can do nothing. Indeed I must ask you not to mention names in so high a voice. Walls have ears in Rome.' "I was horrified beyond words at what seemed to me the cold brutality of it aH, but then I noticed that my, friend was genuinely in terror himself. I bade him good-bye as politely as I could and he sighed o|»enly with relief. 'Let me give you a word of caution.' he said furtively, and he added in little more than a whisper, 'Leave Rome at once.' "The. advice was well meant and perhaps it was good advice, but it was useless to give it to me for I was quite incapable of taking it. I declared fiercely that I would never leave Rome until I had foqnd.out how Giuseppe met his death and had brought to justice the villain who had killed him. Alas! I did not know that there was no longer any justice in Italy. "There is no reason why I should weary you with a detailed account of how we tried, to And but what happened. 7he official story I ought to have' told /ou was that . Giuseppe had taken part in a stabbed to death. That was not a story that anybody who knew him could possibly have believed for a moment! Here and there we came across a little information about his activities before the end. One young woman, with flashing eyes, told ilk/ J. L ha /' d8 1 ( ? mc .Voung man who luLfi ~ ! ,tl [ UlI . y and *> unwise, m told us. to build a beautiful city on

love and compassion,' she said, and she shrugged her shoulders as a commentary on all who would cherish such beautiful dreams.

"At last we found out the cafe where Giuseppe was sitting a little while before he was stabbed in the back and we questioned the girl who attended him. She told us at first the conventional story about the young man having had more to drink than was good for him and going away with companions whom she had never seen before nor since. It was a long time before we could persuade her to abandon that tale. I offered her very large sums of money and at last we wore down her resistance. I believe, though, that her motives were not purely mercenary though she took the money. She had teen as little able as anyone elsu who came in contact with him to escape the charm of Giuseppe di Romani. She ttld us he sat in the tare sipping a I.itle wine raJ writing, \v.-icing, writing. He used to do that. It-was very sad, she thoi.ybt, to as-i a young man throwing away his youth in writing. "'What did he write I asl:ed her, but she could not tell me. She had asked him if he was writing poems to some young lady, but be smiled sadly, and told her that what he was writing was very important and must be carefully guarded. It was not long after he had left the cafe that his body was found in a side street. She added in a whisper that he was stabbed in the back and there were no papers found on him.

'"Why did they kill him?' I asked. She IcoKed at me wonderingly. 'But he was against the Government and against our great leader and that is death.' She added proudly, 'I am a good Fascist.' '"And those papers 2* Adela added, 'what do you think they were?' '"I think they were all about what he had done in Rome and about the attempts that were made on his life." " 'There were previous attempts then V " 'Oh yes, there were two or three.' '•'And what became of the papers?' "The girl hesitated. Then she • said: '1 will tell you all, it is fair. The day after the body was found, an Englishman came in here, a taan from America. He knew very little of our language, just a few phrases. He used to sit here after and drink wine. He showed me some papers and made me understand that he wanted to know what they were. I know a very little of the Emglish. I saw the papers were those that the young man had been writing here. The Englishman wanted me to keep them, but I was afraid. It is not good to have writing in your possession. The next day the Englishman was nearly killed. I heard two men talking afterwards and they were very angry. They said they could not find the papers and that the Englishman had given them the slip. They said the papers would do them a lot of harm, and that they must not come into the possession of the English Government. I do not know these things, but it seemed to me that the young signor had something in his papers which he had found out about our Government, and that he wanted it to get into the hands of the English Government. I believe he had given the papers to the Englishman before he was killed.' "'And where is the Englishman now?' I asked her. "'He got away with the papers. There was much anger.' '"Do you know hi 3 name?' "'I have it here,' she said, 'and she produced an old envelope. It bore a New York address and had been re-addressed to Rome. The natee was Mr. William Jefferson." (To be continued daily.) .

"YOU'LL OO ME!" "I was travelling rrom Wellington to Dunedin recently," a well-known commercial man relates, "and crossing in the ferry alwaya upsets my stomach. Shortly after the train left Chrietchurch, I couldn't sit still for the pain, and I was resigning myself to a beastly journey. "Just about tlis time a fellow-traveller reached for hie bag, and commenced to prepare a dose of Anti-Acido. I would have given a fiver for his tin. I felt so bad. Whether he read my thoughts or not, I can t say, but, much to my surprise, he offered me some, and, though he wa« a stranger, I cjuldn't help eaying: 'You'll do .ie. It's what I want more than anything else in the world just now.' "And what glorious relief! In a few minutea I brought up <1 fearful lot of vrind, and in a quarter of an hour or so 1 felt so comfortable I could have gone to sleep. You won't catch me travelling without my Anti-Acido again. Once is <*noii2li."— (Ad.)