THE NEWSPAPER "AGONY"

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 29, 4 February 1939, Page 8 (Supplement)

THE NEWSPAPER "AGONY"

<$> Inspector Play fair's Notebook

M QEEN'this k.5 Dumbell?" asked Inspector Joshua Playfair of his sergeant. "Well, sir," answered Dumbell, **SPve glanced at it." He eyed his superior nervously; had he overlooked-somefhing important? "I haven't time to reaxE. all the papers," he continued deprecatingly. 'Dear me," said Playfair, "I s Won Id hope not. But I wondered if you'd/seen this agony." He pushed over a sheet of paper ori which a cutting from the "Courier" had been pasted: • AWAKE, PATRIOTS ALL! ABOMINABLE CYNICISM! SPYING PROCLIVITIE'S FOREIGN" ISCALLYWAGS RENEWED! DEPARTMENTAL IDIOTS ASSUME INNOCUOUSNESS — NOT AWARE GRAVE MENACE NATIONAL ADMINISTRATION! EYEWITNESS. Dumbell read this effusion twice. Then, - "Peculiar wording," he said tentatively. "As a patriotic appeal it seems pointless, sir. Has it something to do with crime?" "It has, Dumbell. Unquestionabty." Dumbell -rubbed his nose. "D ? you happen to know -what crime, sir? I suppose it's a code, or something of the kind; but these things always stump me." Playfair laughed. "Hence," lie said, shaking his head sadly, "the stripes, bnt not the stars. . . . Well Dumbell, <5>

fully, in a place like the /Courier' office, on the bona fides of any agony sent in. But what are } r ou proposing to do?" 9 "Me?" answered Playfair. "Why, I'm interviewing a chap named C'ing—a Mimiy name, isn't it?—who is, I'm pretty sure, a minor member of the is gang. He's been in trouble before now. e He won't, consciously, give li!s principal >. away —if I read the situation aright— >- but lie may be useful all the same. You e stay here while I talk to him." ® Sir. Cing, who appeared soon afterwards in response to the inspector's summons, was a shifty-eyed, sharpfeatured little rat of a man dressed in :I shiny l>luc serge. He began by assuring l Playfair, . with quite unnecessary em--3 phasis, that he had no connection with 3 the Walby Grange affair or with any a other recent crime. "Who said you had?" retorted Play- - fair, watching him narrowly. "What I - wanted you for was to give you this." He handed to Cing half a sheet of 3 notcpapcr on which, in block capitals, - had been printed: b SCALLYWAGS' FINE . INNINGS! ' AGAIN ABLE RENEW DASTARDLY ' ATTEMPTS — TWICE CAUGHT STUDYING DEFENCES FKTNTON, " ELABORATING TOPOGRAPHICAL ' NOTES! ENGLAND'S DTLATORI- " NESS INCREDIBLE! NESTOR. Cing pored over this mcssngc for sonic time. Then he asked suspiciously: "What's it all about? Seems to me to mean nothing." "Doesn't it?" answered Playfair, suavely. "It was addressed to you, Cing." Ho produced a grubby envelope. "It was dropped accidentally in the 'Courier' oflice, by a chap who went in with an 'agony.'" "Someone's been , having me on," answered Cing curtly. "His last remark was perfectly true,"observed Playfair to Dumbell, when their visitor had departed. "I composed the 'Nestor' message myself. Quite iit the correct- style, don't you think so?" "I get you," answered Dumbell admiringly. "Up to your tricks again." Cing was arrested at W.iterloo Station—whence he had been followed by detectives—at twenty past nine that same evening. To Sergeant Punt, who disguised as a vendor of newspapers, approached him with the ijuery: "You Bill Cing?" he replied, surprisingly: "From Holy Joe?" And Joe Conanti, a tycoon of London's underworld, was gathered in on suspicion the following morning. He, Cing, and five other persons, were ultimately convicted of complicity in the .burglary at Walby Grange. Can you read the code messages? (Solution on page 9.)

' Case No. 28 ~ you recall the Walby Grange burglarly? r About three weeks ago? A 'gang of ex--1 perts'—to quote my friend, Chief Inspee- • tor Vanquish—got away with heirlooms L worth thirty -thousand quid. Who the l thieves were, no one at the Yard knows. But this "'agony' tells me that the proL ceeds of the burglary are now, available [ for distribution. The 'fence' has done his work. It isn't, of course, the intention to tell me that; the message is meant for the gang." Dumbell surveyed his chief with lifted eyebrows. "But surely, sir, if you can read the message, you can find out who the thieves are? All you have to do is to discover who put the agony in the paper." "Oh, quite so, Dunrbell/*- said Playfair, somewhat annoyed, "quite so, Dumbell; quite so. Thanks for the suggestion. It has already been made by one Deputy Commissioner, two chief inspectors and a sta(T-sergeant. And, I might add it occurred even to ine. The trouble is that, so far, we have been unable to discover who did put the message in." "Sony," said Dumbell. "I spoke without thinking, sir. But what I meant was, I thought "they checked up care- : r <?>