Murder At Pirate's Head

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 303, 23 December 1939, Page 11 (Supplement)

Murder At Pirate's Head

Serial Story

6KT TO KNOW THUS PEOPLE. Judy Jaaon, lovely orphaned narrator of the tale; her Aunt Nella Garry, °wn*r of tha inn at Pirata'a Head, a wild Maiaachuaetta promontory soaked In gruesome talaa of mora advanturoua day.; Unolo Wylie, a "wifa-yeaaar"; ?. Brown Cbut you can't maat mm—ha never appaara); tha Rev. Jonaa da Witt, viaiting clergyman: Lily Kendall, fet and holiday-making; Thaddeue Quincy, taciturn invalid; Albion Potter, artiet; Hugh Norcroaa, eligible bachelor; Beeaie, Hugh'e clinging-vine eleter; Victor Quade, myatery-atory trailer-dweller; and Roddy Lane, tragio owner of a ramt hackle, hideously ornate, turreted caatle on the clilftopa. After Judy had eeon Roddy'a dead hand in a trunk in the diauaed Quaker Church, which ehe later bought at auction on anonymoue in— etructione, a group of the gueata at tha inn go down and find—no body! But there are other cluea—a bloodatained golf club, for instance. Then the bridge connecting the Head, which Is an laland, to the mainland, ia blown up. And an old flail ahed burna furiously at dead of night. Next morning they And outeide the ruine Unole Wylie'e pipe, and, inside them, a charred body. Quade reveala hia true identity—he ia Victor Quinn, famoua myatery story writer, on holiday. Then it cornea out that the Rev. de Witt had served gaol, also that he 'had everything when Roddy Lane had embezzled money from hia father'e bank, wrecking the firm and oauaing hia father to commit auicide. Who elae had suffered?

♦ ♦ * ♦

CHAPTER XIII.

NOBODY spoke. Mr. Quincy was drawing imaginary circles on the porch with his nervous cane. "You can't expect us to answer a question like that, Mr. Quade. Practically admit a motive for killing Roddy Lane? You're crazy!" "Not so crazy. Why should an innocent person hesitate? A matter of record, isn't it?" Uncle Wylie removed his pipe. "If 'twas, this might not have happened. Only record is personal bankbooks, Nulla and me—we've got our'n. But tho ledgers of the Lane Bank vanished along with the funds. Nella's nuts to say they were hidden in the Lane Castle. Authorities scoured the place hlgH and low, at the time. Couldn't find a thing. That was after the old i man shot himself, which some thought, 1 as didn't know him, was tantamount to confession. Might a-been at that—for his son. But Roddy got off scot free. No proof against him. Want to see our accounts? Joint they was." "Later, Mr. Gerry. You weren't afraid to speak up." "Why should he be ?" Auntie snapped. "The savin's didn't make him half so mad as the fight over the boundary line." "There she went—making things worse for poor old uncle. The police would have a sweet time twisting hiin around in the-ir net. Not only the lost savings and the old boundary feud, but the damning evidence of his having been intoxicated, the finding of his pipe at the scene of the ruined fish shack he'd threatened over and over, quite publicly, to burn down some day. Was Victor Quade also adding up these things to make harmless Uncle Wylie Gerry into a killer? Why, he didn't dare enter the inn by the front door; nor the rear door either, without first carefully wiping his feet! But Victor struck everybody silent when he said: "Mr. Gerry, you're the only one here who knew thiß man Brown. Is that right?" That was correct, Aunt Nella only having seen him a few times at a distance. i "Of course," Victor went on, "he may be quite all right. We've nothing to prove he didn't go to Rockville last evening and stay there, or try to return to tha Head and find the bridge out. But an old man—to go off like that and leave a light burning. You're sure about the light, you two?" He looked fron» Mr. Quincy to me, and we both corroborated. "That there ear trumpet—he never went nowhere without it," Uncle Wylie •aid. "Not even fishin'. Had it tied over his shoulder some way." "Suppose you describe the man, was he tall?" "Not so very. Warn't short, neither. Kinder medium, and stooped-like. Come to think of I usually saw him settin' —either on the bench in front of the shack or over on the rocks back of the church." Old Man Brown "Well, go on. Was he light or dark? Old or young?" "Don't rush me. You know he was old —as old as the hills. So old I thought he hadn't- oughter be livin' all alone by himself and asked him why hdid. But he answered as always, sticking that ear thing into my face and turning h\p head sideways, 'Hey? I'm a little hard o' hearin'. Speak louder.' You'd think he'd stepped out of some Yankee play, 'The Old Homesteader' or 'Way Down East.' Character, he was. Old timer. Only other thing I ever heard him say was 'Fishin'.' Liked to fish off the rocks when he first come." "And when was that?" "Not so long ago. Just afore you tourista, warn't it, Nella?" "How sh'd I know? Nobody saw him come. Just saw a light there one night, and you went over and there he sat on the bench, twiddling his thumbs and blinkin' at the sea," Aunt Nella replied. "Blinking, did you say?" "That's what Wylie said —behind his thick glasses. Wylie lit his pipe—" she broke off abruptly, as if the memory of the fishhouse and her husband's pipe were too painful to go on with. "Said he was poverty struck lookin'. Old and deaf and hunch«d up and quavery sort of. I said if he made a nuisance of himself before my guests I'd have him fired out of there, but he never did. Squatter, you said, Wjrlie." "Told me he had permission to stay in that Bhack as long as he liked. Didn't ask him who from. None of my business. Old shed ain't bee used since bootleggin' days, when the police rounded up a cache of liquor— —" "Hush, Wylie. That ain't got nothin' to do with this. You only saw the poor old feller once after that, didn't you?" "Time he was fishin' off the rocks, you mean. Funny thing about that," my uncle ruminated. "Cloudy day and he was over near the Pirate's Mouth. I was afraid he might fall in. There's a path, but it's mighty dangerous. I yelled at him, and by thunder —maybe 'twas a coincidence—but he looked around and aaw me. Then he disapCared. I tore after him,, but he wasn t tho Pirate's Mouth. Climbed up the other side, I guess. Anyway, I saw his light time I got back."

ByIsabel Waitl

"Do you mean that old man got back to his shack before you did? Beat you to it?" Victor asked incredulously.

"Not exactly. It was cloudy and dark, the way it suddenly does when it's fixin' up to thunder, but I could see he wasn't in the Pirate's Mouth, nor sloshing around in the waters below. I wanted to take a look at the church, knowing about the auction and all. Nella—Mrs. Gerry's always hankered after that location. I was wonderin' if it would pay to turn the building into a bungalow and sell the inn. Nella ain't so spry as "

"Why, Wylie Gerry!" my aunt blazed at him. "This is the first time I've heard you agree with me about the bungalow. This house has been in our —your family—for generations. I thought you were so set on it you wouldn't leave it for the world."

Did she want to make things difficult for him? Did she have to fight him in every thing he said?

"I don't see " Bessie Norcross got no further. "The police will see plenty," Victor said. "Mr. Gerry, you'll certainly give them much to think about. Thank you for telling us about this mysterious Mr. Brown, who is neither short nor tall, wears thick glasses, uses an earphone, but turns when he is unexpectedly yelled at, comes from nowhere just before things begin to occur on the Head, is old and apparently feeble, yet could climb into and out of that Pirate's Mouth so rapidly that he had disappeared by the time you reached the spot, though tore after him. H'm'm'm, very interesting, don't you think, Mr. Quincy?"

"Beats the way I manage without my chair."

Lily's bracelet let f*o a lapis strand. "Oh, shucks," she cried, grabbing at the tangent beads. "I think it's real mean to talk that way about the poor feller when he's lying down there, done to a turn." A nerVous giggle escaped her as she added. "That corpse looked bigger to me. I wouldn't say it was a runt."

Everybody began to jabber again, but they didn't agree. Some said the charred torso was just Lane's size; others that it was too large and must be Old Man Blown. Some held it could be either.

I wa« having a conniption over what Uncle Wylje had said about buying the church. It was ridiculous to suppose ho had sent me the money. Where would he get the 800 dollars without his wife's knowledge, I mean! And yet I couldn't remember that he had done any bidding at the auction himself that day, while Aunt Nella had bid up to a hundred and fifty. I leaned over and whispered into Uncle Wylie'e ear: "Did you send me that mazuma?" "Huh?" I repeated the question, only substituted the word money. He acted dumb as anything, and started fishing in his pocket, and drew out some change. "How much do you want? ' Only got 73 cents." I excused myself and ran into the house. It was high time I tokl Victor about that letter. He could do 6tunts with it; make them all write their names and compare the penmanship or something. The rooms were in a moss. We would have to quit this business and clean up the inn and start lunch, pretty soon. Some of the beds had been tossed together in my hasty search for Roddy's diamond ring, but that was all. My own room didn't even have the clothes airing. I flung them back in a heap and ran to the bureau. The letter was gone! I couldn't 'believe it. Maybe it wasn't the top drawer, where I stuck it under the paper lining. I tried the others, knowing the futility. Then I went back to the top one again, tossing my belongings helter-skelter. There was no doubt about it. The mysterious letter hSd been taken. Why ? Was the writer after the rest of the bills still hidden in my stocking? ♦ ♦ * ♦ CHAPTER XIV. " j/"EEP the difference, and *•»> oblige," my mysterious friend had written. I'd read that letter so often I knew it almost by heart. Still 500 dollars is quite a lot of change. He or she may have thought there wouldn't be more than, say—fifty. I got down on my hands and knees and looked under the bureau. I even moved it from the wall. No dice. What a sap I'd been to leave it in ray room. Well, anyway, I could repea* the contents. But now there'd b> no way to get a slant on the writing. I recalled how sprawling it had been, backhanded and every which way, in the attempt to disguise it. There could no longer he doubt about that. I began suddenly to be terribly afraid. Did the person who tried to use me hava any connection with the foul deeds ■which followed? Wa3 I dealing with a killer? A murderer who, knew I still had half a thousand dollars of his in my possession? Why the. Old Harry should & perfect stranger wish to present me with a tearoom, anvv^ay? Not Aunt Nella. She'd never let anybody do her bidding, nor pass on a sum like that. Uncle Wylie I discarded. Roddy Lane? But why should he want tha old church? He did, I knewj beoauee he'd Baid-so. .also said he

was planning to bid at the auction. "Prepare for some lively bidding," he'd said that night at supper.- Would he mail me cash and then bid, too! Not likely. Not unless—could he be that subtle ? Could he have chosen this method, for reasons of his own, and be hiding around the Head ? In which case he'd blown up the bridge and killed Brown. The fire might have been an accident, but the hand I'd seen in the sea che6t wasn't. There's something about a dead hand—Ugh! I could feel little chills creeping up and down my spine. Any minute I expected to hear a voice demand back its 500 dollars. I ran into the hall, and, as the old stairs creaked behind me, I paced down, nearly losing my balance, and screaming as I went. The whole piazza rose in a mass and cama running to meet me. "Judy!" Aunt Nella cried. "What's tshe matter, Judy?" Hugh met me at the stairs and caught me to him. "Are you all right?" "Sure she's all right." Bessie got between her brother and me. "I—l'm nervous, I guess," I faltered, sitting down on the stairs. "It's nothing, really. Go—go on with your seance." "See anyone upstairs?" Lily wanted to know. "Of course not." Goodness, I mustn't give way like that. "I don't know why I screamed. Got to thinking of—of what 1 saw in the chest." "We're all pretty much keyed up," auntie said. "Judy, you come out to the kitchen and help me start the chowder." But I wouldn't. I signalled to Victor Quade, and when he came over to my side I whispered: "Just you. Come." I went on into my little office, and he scattered the rest. Didn't they all want a breathing space? Why not go in a body down to look at the Pirate's Mouth, and also at the golf club, to see if someone had borrowed Mr. Norcross'? Would they wait for him? Meet at the steps in ten minutes? They would. Unanimously. Parley With Quade. "Well, Miss Judy, what'e bothering you?" Victor sat down in the old morris chair where Uncle Wylie often retreated with his pipe when things got too warm for him in the kitchen. I closed the door;. When I turned and saw Victor Quade's glowing eyes boring darkly into mine, I was struck again by his odd resemblance to Roddy Lane. If Lane had had a brother—l But I knew better. And when he smiled at me, how different from the Lane leer. Such magnificent teeth! I sighed faintly, thinking for a moment how handsome the man was. Then I plunged into the strange incident of the letter. Victor stopped me with a gesture. "I know. We want to get going with the rest of the crew. We can investigate the minister and his prison record later. Think you could remember most of that letter? Where was it postmarked? Notice the date?" Three questions. The postmark had been Boston. The date was blurred, but I'd found it in the letter-box the day before the auction, which was, as he knew, July 3. "Good heavens! Was it only yesterday?" Victor nodded, prompting: "So the letter came in the regular mail, July 2 ? Who has come to the inn since then ?" "Nobody but you," I said. "Roddy came at supper time that night." Missing Signatures "H-m-m-m," Victor considered, his strong white hands patting noisily together. "Quite, a coincidence. You get the wherewithal to buy the church from an unknown. Roddy Lane arrives. There's rumour he's hidden bank funds somewhere on the Head. Lane disappears, though his car is still here. An old recluse is burned to death, who may have discovered Lane's secret horde, or seen him uncovering it." "But—but—you're forgetting the diamond ring!" I cried. "Roddy'd never leave that. Mr. Quincy noticed it that night and said it was a very valuable stone, remember?" / "Judy before you do anything else, jot down the letter. I'll go along out now. You might tear out the page of signatures in your inn register. Copy that, couldn't you? Maybe the writing of one of them would give you a clue." I began to shake. "You think one of our guests did it—a double murder ?" "Don't go jumping to conclusions like that. We've only one corpus delicti. There may be another in the sea. If ever we get into communication with the mainland, we may find out." "If we had some mush we'd have some mush and milk if we had some milk." "Exactly. Meanwhile, whether Lane killed Brown and swam the gut, or vie® versa; or whether one of the inn crowd did them both in and is still with us, the fact remains your letter is probably connected with it. The police will tear the church to pieces. Dig up the basement. Blast the cliff. You get that letter down, and suppose- He checked himself, staring at me in a frowning way that made me wonder where I'd failed until he said: "The rest of that money. Five hundred? Judy, he may want it back. That keep-the-change stuff might not go for so large a Bum." (My very thought). "Have you a safe here?" I laughed at the idea. "We're poor," I reminded him. "Taking boarders!" "Well, don't keep it on your person. Were they new bills? In sequence?" "In sequence? The numbers? I didn't think to look at them very closely. They weren't new. Old, I'd say. Not in order as you might get them from a bank." "They wouldn't be. Whoever sent them is far too clever. Put them back in your drawer. Might be a good idea to tell everybody about the letter you re* ceived, its losa, and that whoever took it would find the cash in the same place. I don't want you to go away by yourself after this. Keep with somebody you can trust all the time—like your aunt or your uncle." It was then I confessed Aunt Nella was really no relative cf mine, nor her husband, either. I could trust him, Victor said, and the way he glanced at me made me blush till I was afraid he'd sde it. I reached for the register to hide my confusion, and opened it at the blotter. "Mr. Quade, look! All th» ■ig—tmns have, been torn out!" (Continued Next Week.)