THE LOVE FLIGHT

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXIV, Issue 11866, 5 November 1935, Page 4

THE LOVE FLIGHT

Anne Austin pulled her hat to a smart , angle and slipped on her last pair of white gloves. Where would she lunch? When she paid her bills less than half ,of the three hundred dollars retrieved from the, wreck of her fprtune would remain. This hotel—she must find something less expensive. Where did one lunch, outside' the beaten Mayfair track? She hadn’t the remotest idea. - “The Colony,” she said aloud. "Just this last once. I'm sure - to meet some one.” She was very much alone, hungry for her own kind. She was at the door of her room when the telephone tinkled a recall. “Craig,". she breathed, her heart in a. panic. “Perhaps it’s; not too late, even now!” Her voice in answer was vibrant with hope. “Hello, Anne. Wherever have yon been?” Maida Suydam. Why did ■blood relatives assume the right to he querulous and demanding? Anne’s and Maida’s mothers were sisters, but the daughters might have been born on antipodal spheres in widely separated ages. ‘Tve been to Glen Arden. The Bruno Beasleys' house party.” Anne answered shortly. “But that’s a week ago. Did you stop on?” “No.” “You might ring us.” “I’ve been terribly busy. Some tag ends of father’s affairs.”

Anne could sense Maida’s collecting herself for a plunge. Something unpleasant, of course. Maida never loked one up otherwise. . “What’s this I hear about you and Craig Braden?” ■ tfl nibble,” Anne said, affecting indifference. “WHat do you hear?” “That he’s let you down. Everybody knows. Even the newspapers are commenting." “How flattering! I didn’t know I was important enough to rate a press; notice." ‘‘ See here, Anne, don’t flippant.” When Maida wns pompous' Anne didn t know whether to laugh at her or to rage. “Craig Braden was completely gone on you. If you let him slip from under your fingers-—but of corse you wouldn’t do anything so stupid.!’ - r

Maida was waiting for an answer, for assurance that her trust In family astuteness was well founded. Anne thought: I’ll be cautious 1 and find out what she knows. She said““Maida, surely you’re not one of those simple souls who believe everything In' the papers.” “Scarcely. I’ve been hearing It from all sides—how Craig has suddenly dropped you. To-day in the mail I received a clipping. Some one cut it from ’ one of those gossip columns. It says—wait—l have it here—l’ll read it. It says: ‘The Craig, Braden-Anne Austin conflagration has gone pffft! and. Linden Larue, chief lure for Hot-Chico, in a new ermine coat, is helping Craig carry the torch.’” ■ s

Anne laughed. The laugh was not-convincing. “I haven’t the remotest idea what it means, ’ Maida went on, “except 1 know it’s something dreadful. You should be able to command enough respect from Craig to keep him from flaunting chorus girls, when every one s .expecting you to announce your engagement any minute.” “Sorry, Maida,”. was Anne’s cold Braden Ve D 0 control over Craig “Then get some control over him. You re the envy of every girl you know, in spite of what’s happened —the accident to your father and everything. . You’ve simply got to make ago of it. Don’t expect help from me. Jock is absolutely cleaned out and we’re living on the income of my trust. Running the house with three maids and a gardener—even the butler’s gone. Get Craig and make it up, whatever’s happened. „One would think after the mess.your father made.of it—” “Good-bye,” Anne cut it. “I have a luncheon engagement. * And don’t ring me up again, Maida; until you can behave like a human being.” Anne put down the receiver. • she was trembling so that the receiver fell off the hook. She let it remain. Maida might take a notion to ring back and start all over again. ‘‘Don’t expect help from me.” As if she, Anne, ever had expected such a miracle. Down to three maids, and a. gardener. Three cars, a country house, a town house, two children, a pampering father, an adoring husband. Poor Jock! If he was living on Maida’s money he was paying in humble breads ■ - - At the hotel desk Anne paused; Were there any messages for Miss Austin?

No, none. Did she expect a message? If so the,clerk would instruct the operators.

No need. It was not important. ..Then Miss Austin would please to receive this—the clerk handed her an envelope. He was -watching her to , note any expression of chagrin, any tiny worry line that , might enable him to relay her status to the manager. ... ...

. Her hotel bill. “The management would- appreciate prompt remittance.” That gossip Item in the tabloid had travelled far and fast. The Colony. Anne lingered In the foyer. Someone would surely come along. She disliked lunching alone. A tall girl with a monocle ' and a swagger entered.’ Anne hurried forward.

“Babs,” she greeted, "back In town so early?” “Darling!” The tall girl’s voice was pitched to a husky baritone. “How jolly to see you again.” Even as she spoke,- her eyes were o-’er and beyond Anne. "Rattled In yesterday. Got to be stumbling along. Nave a hostess about. Hours late as usual. -S’iong,” . Anne watched the tall girl Join a table near the entrance. - She was certain the party at that table had not been arranged. , She knew every member of it. She often had lunched at that very table with the same party, casually, as the tall girl was now. lunching. Surely they saw her to-day, would beckon to her. Gradually it came to Anne that their failure to notice her standing there was more than circumstance. They were studiously avoiding her eye. - Laughing and prattling and pretending. Anne turned found her way unseeing to the street. "Taxi?” “No thanks.”

She would walk to her hotel. Walk and think. Pay the bill she' had slipped into her bag. Pay, pack and leave. Leave for where? There were dozens of places, A New York version of a ’plantstion near Charleston whore gho re J* lv{ # acclaim, despite her social eclipse. • • , peasant. Long Island, Un*£*3™' but a haven, a friend aod US Wlte - *bO owa Preserves and to bed !a their 'aireat on the shore, lw4 Ualßted the latchstrlng always

By JANE DIXON

■would be out for her. California. Los Angpies. Too many women there now. Drifters, Jike herself. Looking for anchorage. Willing to earn or to accept. Better go where earners were in the minority. yiprida Miami, Palm Beach, Havana. Palm Beach would be best, Earners ran one to the hundred on the shores of Lake Worth. Palm Beach, leaving to-morrow. It would be deadly. Two months before the season came’ into swing. She’d find a job to tide her over. Anything.’ Change her name. Then, when the season opened, she'd be on the spot, primed for something really worth i while. She’d find a way to be In ■the -money. What was the surest ! way. to make money quickly? I Money. How did women she j knew spend their money? Clothes, beauty, pleasure. Cupidity for attention, for satiety. A gown shop, Salon de Beaute. Bridge club. Anne found herself at the desk of her hotel. "A message for Miss Austin.” The clerk handed her a note. ■ Anne was leisurely about the envelope, nonchalant about her perusuar of its content. Conscios of , the sharp eyes of the clerk. "Anne: j- “Craig. Braden sailed to-day for Vichy. Prepare to follow at once. He’s hurt, but still crazy about you. He told me so himself. I rang him up. Call me the minute you come in. Mai da.” Anne forced a smile. Inwardly she was seething. Maida muddling in other people’s affairs! Anne was at the cashier’s window. “My bill, please. Austin—-Anne : Austin. I’ll be leaving to-morrow.” The cashier was unctious. "We hope our service has been satisfactory, Miss Austin.” “Quite.”

Anne wrote a cheque for the amount designated. Passing the desk again she stopped to address the sharp-eyed clerk. Now she despised his servility more than she had resented his, suspicion. Insect! Maida had neglected to seal her note. The clerk had read it. She flicked off his bow as though it were a grain of dust.

. l‘l prefer not to be disturbed tonight,” she said. “I shall be leaving early to-morrow. If there are any calls, say I have gone, please.” Yes, Miss Austin. Any forwarding address?” “None.”

In her room, Anne started packing. Not in the careless fashion that was her wont. Now she was emptying drawers.’ Emptying closets. Stowing things in trunk and bags. She was almost gay. She forgot her slender purse. She disdained the conduct of her fair weather friends who turned cool shoulders on misfortune. She was not going abroad -—to Vichy, but she was going to sea —in a ship of adventure, and she would be the captain, the pilot and the crew.

.. Packing nowadays was a comparatively simple task. Nothing remained pf the fulsome days of the Austin fortune except her clothes. Even her wardrobe had been reduced to fit a scale of necessity. Everything ■— home, paintings, furnishings bric-a-brac had gone into the melting vot A, the beneflt of her father’s creditors. Anne had been tempted to hold out a rug, which was priceless before* bread lines formed in streets that only -a few weeks before spewed golden streams. The rug Was the gift of a'pasha during thp visit of her father to Egypt She was glad now she had resisted the temptation to keep the rug as a souvenir of happier days. It would mean storage, and storage came high. She had been unable to resist a small string of pearls that had been her mothers. Relatively the pearls were of small intrinsic value, but precious in memory. , Midnight. Anne finished packing, cosed her trunk. She'd slip into her pyjamas and stand at the window for a last long look at the Aladdin city of her youth.

A scuffling outside her door/ in the hall. Voices excited, now raised now muffled. The thud of a body. She must do what she ’ could to help. A dressing gown over her shoulders. Open the door ever so little- - . “Stay where you are, please,” a voice commanded. “This fellow is dangerous. We’be got him, but we don’t want him to cut loose again. The police will be here shortly." “Who is he and what does he wantf't Anne, disregarding the command stood, squarely in the doorway. Two huskies, in the livery of the hotel, were holding another man between them.; The man was struglashing out with his feet, butting -his : head against hls : captors shoulders. At sight of Anne, the guttural sounds In his throat became frenzied shrieks:

“Who am I? Ask your father. Ask Ed Austin, the banker. Ask him whose money he used to buy bonds—fancy pieces' of paper! Blood money! He bought them with blood, my blood! Rich?. He said we’d be rich! Ha,'ha, ha! Two baskets a week from charity. Minna’s eating charity. She feeds it to our children—three of them. Give me tlie money. Give it to me, Austin. No more tricks. I came here to kill you—to Squeeze your throat between my fingers—so—”

* The huskier of the two hotel attendants caught the man about the shoulders, pulling his head forward and down, cutting off his wind. His thin body seemed endowed with superhuman strength. It was all the two huskies could do to hold him. “Don’t hurt him if you can help,” Anne pleaded. "Can’t you ease the pressure on his throat?”

"Sure an’ I can not,” the captor protested, “It’s crazy as a loon he is. I caught him, snakin’ up the stairs an’ ’twas your room he was wantin’, though how he got the number the divil knows. Whist. Here’s the cops. at last. Better close your door, lady, and have no truck wid this muss nohow. The cops’ll cool Tilm off quicker’n you can say Molly O’Dee," .

Anne, disregarding the advice, stepped into the hall. "Officershe said to the policeman In charge, "I am Anne Austin. This poor-fellow has come in search of my father, Edvard Austin. Father is not here. He—there was an accident—father is dead. This man must have - bought f bonds and he thinks father took his money. He didn't,- of course. It was swept away, lost, like millions and mil-* lions more.” “Too. bad, miss.” The officer was respectful, sympathetic. “Plenty of 'em’s gone that way, and more going evei-y day. The crazy house is full of We’ll look out for the poor' beggar, - and no cause for you to worry/' “Will you wait a minute, please?" Anne retired into her , r00m.,. At once sh.e wns back, approaching the officer, soitbat she could address him in confidence. ■ “I have very little* money lett,” she - said, seeking his hand and thrusting into it some* -crumpled

bills. ‘‘l want you to see that this man or his family get what I’ve ■ given you-r-half of what I have. I’d give more but I’m going away to look for a job and I’ll haye to have money for food and for railroad fare. And thanks so much for your trouble.” Swiftly she turned and closed the door of - her, room behind her. ■, ■■ "Well, wbadda you think of that?’’ the officer In charge asked his partner. “Half of all she’s got! I’ll be blessed if the wimmin’ ain’t got mure , nerve than the men in this here depression.” Anne dressed and sat by the window awaiting the dawn. w«mld' the dark skies ever torn to pearl and wear their rosy, flush again?' it seemed not. Hours stretched into infinity. She would take the- first train south in the morning. (To be continued.;.