TRUANT FORTUNE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21141, 26 March 1932, Page 10 (Supplement)

TRUANT FORTUNE.

CHAPTER I. The Atlantic Coast Express was already 'draining at the leash -when Jimmy Ashcroft and Tony Baring took their places -in the Pullman. The latter—" Tubby " to his intimates ■ —his short, rotund figure clad in plus fours which emphatically did not suit it, he persisted in wearing them, mopped his cherubic countenance and gazed round hopefully. "The best of a Pullman. . . ." he commenced, and then to his immense satisfaction,' caught the attendant's expectant eye. " Guessed it • in one, laddie," lie remarked. " Yes, beer, my son—a foaming tankard. Same for you, Jimmy?" Jimmy Ashcroft, lean and athletic looking as his companion was the reverse, shook his head. ... " No," he said decidedly, " not yet, at any- rate. No wonder you're fat, Tubby, the amount of you take." Tubby contrived to look aggrieved. -"My dear old -horse," he remonstrated, " it's half an hour since I had the last one, and you would make me race for this beastly train. Besides—" He broke off suddenly, his eyes like -found blue saucers in his head. " By jove," he whispered, " look, coming in, Jimmy; some girl that!" Jimmy turned his head. Even later than themselves—the great express had • actually. commenced to slip away from the Waterloo platform—two newcomers ."were making their way between the tables of the Pullman. _ One was a girl. Slim, grey-eyed, 'jaeither short nor tall, she possessed a perfection of form and feature which merited Tubby Baring's excited commendation. Just for an instant her gaze met Jimmy's, and then she passed by, directed by her companion to an unoccupied table at the end of the compartment. He was by no means so prepossessing, this companion. Burly, red-faced and clean-shaven,. there was that indefinable something about him that at first sight proclaims the bounder. Nor was it in his favour that he allowed the girl to straggle up the aisle under the weight of a suit-case which was obviously too heavy for her—his own was light enough. Jimmy found himself wondering if she had had- to carry it along the platform. Who might the fellow be ? he asked himself—her father, husband, fiance, or -just an acquaintance? His air was proprietorial as he guided her into her seat, and Jimmy glowered as he observed the scant assistance he offered when she lifted the suit-case to the rack. He would have put it there for her himself had he been nearer to them. " Nasty piece of work, isn't he ?" said Tubby. " What's making you blush like that, James, my son ?" Jimmy's glower transferred itself to his friend. Before we've gone vfery far, young fellow," he murmured, " I can see myself dropping your rotund figure on to the permanent way. I'd just love to see you bounce." " Tut, tut," rejoined the irrepressible one, " subject changed but blush deepens. Chivalrous heart touched by fair damsel in distress. Deep desire to knock off rival's block. Ah, here's the beer!" The beverage's arrival was hailed with almost as much- relief by Jimmy as by Tony himself. Nevertheless, over the rim of an enormous tankard the latter's quizzical gaze noted that "Jimmy's eyes, as if drawn by a magnet, % stiU strayed in the direction of, the girl and her escort. After a long draught he set the tankard carefully down. Who is she, Jimmy?" he asked. " How the deuce do I know?" was. the irate answer. " For goodness sake get on with your beer and let the gill alone!" For a moment after that there was silence while Tubby imbibed another draught. Then once more he placed the tankard on the table, and into his wide, . deceptively innocent eyes there came a whimsical expression. "What was it Jimmy that old Poirot babbled about—tiie little grey cells, eh ? Nothing like beer for stirring up the grey matter, old son, as you'll see in a minute. Beer for brains—l think I'll patent that slogan." _ Before Jimmy had any inkling of his intention, or could do anything to stop him, he rose to his feet and his short legs carried him in the direction of the man and the girl. He bent toward the former. " Excuse me, sir," he said gravely, *Mjut could you give me a match? I seem to have come without any." The fellow he addressed, who was talking to his companion in low tones, stared up in obvious annoyance at the interruption. If there aren't any 011 your table, why Dot call the attendant?" he snapped. Then he pulled a box from his pocket and tossed it down. " Help yourself," he said ungraciously. f and don't pinch the box." Tubby scraped a match and with deliberation lit a cigarette, those innocent, rather foolish-looking eyes of his managing to take in quite a lot during the process. Then lie handed back the box to the other with a little bow. "Thank you, sir," he concluded, as gravely as before, " I am much obliged. It is so seldom that one meets with true politeness no wad a vs." I hen, leaving his benefactor to make what he liked of this double-edged statement, he trotted back lo his place, forestalling Jimmy's remonstrance. es, a nasty pieci of work," he, reiterated. A foul person, very foul. But the girls a peach. With a sense of humour, too; she smiled quite happily when I gave that chap a back-bander on departure. Her name, by the way, is Phyllis Laleham, and his is George (,'artwr'ght. She's unmarried and not engaged, and they're both of them going to Bideford, like us." Jimmy stared. " How on earth," lie demanded, " did you find out all that?" Striking a nonchalant attitude, Tubby picked up his beer. " Label's on their suitcase; no ring on the girl's finger," was his succinct reply. "'So easy, Watson, when you know how j" Jimmy laughed. Sometimes, Tubby," he admitted. " you're, not quite such a fool as you look, and you've cheek enough for anything. Ever thought of a job at Scotland Yard ?" Never," was the modest reply, !" though I've often thought they needed me." All badinage, of course, but badinage which, unknown to them then, was vested with a prophetic ring in the light of days to come. At the moment, however, Tubby's mantle as a detective rested lightly upon him. He gazed sadly into ihis empty mug. -' Attendant," he rapped, " more beer!"

CHAPTER 11. At Bideford, that ancient town of romance, Jimmy and Tubby Baring found a car awaiting them, driven by a plump, round-faced girl, at sight of whom Tubby immediately went a vivid crimson lo the tips of his somewhat protuberant ears. Jimmy, remembering his leg-pulling in the train, regarded this phenomenon with a good deal of maiicious satisfaction. " So that's how the land lies, does it?" he soliloquised. "If only I'd known before !" Marjorie Cottle's placid countenance, on the other hand, evinced nothing more than a quiet satisfaction at their arrival. " Hello, people," she remarked cheerfully. " I'm glad you've come; I'm dying' to get home to my tea. That all your luggage ? Right, hop in, and let, me tread on the gns." Then all at once her good-humoured expression faded, and was replaced by a scowl. Twenty yards away George Cartwright was assisting his pretty companion into a car whose glittering magnificence contrasted with her own somewhat weather-beaten equipage. " Ugh." she said, sotto-voce, " there s that appalling bounder, Cartwright—with liis latest importation," she added, in a tone that jarred on Jimmy Ashcroft's sensibilities. " Who is he?" Tony asked. " Fellow who took the Manor House at Roma Cleft six months ago. He's got a wife who's supposed to be an invalid, and nobody's ever seen. He brings down a succession of companions for her—all young and pretty, by the way—but none of 'em stay long—Master George too much for them,"l fancy. Shouldn't think this one will, by the look of her. She seems much too nice to be seen with Master George. A foul person," she concluded, unconsciously repeating Tubby's words. "Tried to make Jove to me the first time we met. Everybody in the village cuts him now." The object of this somewhat pungent commentary had meanwhile driven off without deigning to lake the slightest notice of the little group, in whose direction Jimmy fancied that Phyllis Laleham threw a somewhat wistful glance. " How far's the Manor House from us, Marjorie?" lie asked abruptly. " 'Bout a mile, but you needn't worry, old thing. George Cartwrigbt's not on the map so far as we're concerned." But Jimmy wasn't thinking of George Cartwright.. He was thinking of a girl in a blue hat, a girl with wistful grey ryes, a girl who already was very much on the map so far as Jimmy Ashcroft was concerned. What sort of a time, he wondered, was in store for her with a man whom everyone cut ? A few minutes later he saw them climbing the steep ascent out of Bideford on to the main road which skirls the rocky coast of north-west Devon toward the (-ornisb border. For some miles they, ran along this, with occasional glimpses of Ihe blue Atlantic to their right, and then turned off right-handed down the subsidiary road which would lake them to their destination and the shore. A fascinating spot is Roma Cleft, almost unbelievably remote in these teeming days. Some twenty houses straggle down a combe which is beautiful even in this land of beautiful combes until they reach the beetling cliffs which, with Clovelly to the westward, look out over the whole great sweep of Bideford Bay from Hartland Point on the left to Morte Point on the right. In the middle distance of the bay rises the dark blur of Lundy Island's surf-swept shores. The most seaward of these cottages—so close to the.cliff edge that its walls formed almost one plane with the precipitous descent —Dr. Cottle had taken and enlarged. Here he lived with his niece, and here, fortunately for her, he loved to collect yourig people around him. Jimmy and Tubby he had known from their childhood, though neither had hitherto visited him in bis cliff abode. Immediately below (he house, where the calm, clear waters broke on a beach of sand and rock, stood the ruins of a tiny quay where Roman legions were said to have once landed and scaled the rocky path to the little settlement above. Tt seemed lo Jimmy, taking in the entrancing view from his window, that he had reached the land of his dreams. And (hen, unbidden, his thoughts switched off to a squat, grim bouse amidst the trees which they had passed as they came along. Marjorie had pointed it out with pursed-up lips of dislike. " fartwright's abode." she said. " Rut. thank goodness, we needn't see anything of them." Yet there was one member of that obviously oueer household whom Jimmy would willingly have, seen again. He was not given to being sentimental, but somehow it scomad to him that this beautiful setting of land and sea was a fitting background to (be girl whose name lie bad onlv learned from the label on her bag. Then Tubby Baring's voice, calling up the stairs, roused him from his ahstrrelion. ' " James Ashcroft." fame the highpitched tones. " if you don't come flown to fra .>OOll there won't be no tea." " Voil hrf there won't.'' retorted Jimmy. " not if I've given you five min 11(es' start!" CHAPTEI,' 111. A thick mist, piopbetic of a warm day, hid the beauties "f the bay when, early next morning, the younger members of Cliff Cottage, clad in bathing logs and mackintoshes, trooped down the steep pathway to the shore. Hardly thirty yards of the ciiffs were visible on either hand, and Tubby Baring was inclined to be peevish. Pity "we didn't wait for the sun lo break through after breakfast," he grumbled. Nonsense," retorted the downright Marjorie, "one bathe before breakfast is worth a dozen alter. No one is allowed to sleep after seven in our house, J can tell you. Lazy Slacker!" Whereat the abashed Tubby subsided into silence, and with no further remonstrance from him to break the almost eerie stillness they reached tbe_ shore. Seaward was a grey void, the softly, breaking line of wavelets fringing it themselves almost invisible. Somewhere along the shore a dog was yapping ceaselessly. For some reason or other it got on Tubby's nerves. " Shut up, you brute," he said crossly. " I'd buzz a stone at you if you were closer." Marjorie slipped off her wrap and pointed seawards. " Straight ahead," she said, " you can't see it now. but you probably noticed it yesterday, is Ihe remains of an old wreck, a top-hole place to dive from. I'll race you to it." A moment later all three were picking their way over the rocks and shingle, Tubby who preferred softer going, on'-e more full of lamentation. Jimmy and the girl, reaching sand and the sea together, plunged in, oblivious lo their companion in distress, who, having stubbed his toe against a rock, had sat, down bitterly to inspect the damage. Already lie had decided that the race was not for liirn. Both fine swimmers, the other two kept on, doing the " crawl," and presently •Jimmy raised bis bead to get his bearings. The wreck was about a hundred yards from the shore, and, be judged, must be getting close at hand. lie was right. Dimly he could see the dark blur of it through the mist, and was about to lower his head for a final spurt when he became aware that someone was already on it. Outlined against, the fog, poised in the act of diving, was a slim and shapely body—a girl's, he could just toll that. Then, finding Marjorie drawing alongside him, his head went down and he put in all he knew for the last twenty strokes. • Thus, with head half submerged as he cut through the water, he failed to see

BY ELLIOT BAILEY Author of "The Girl in Yellow," "The Japanese Parasol," "Jewels of Malice," etc. ENTHRALLING STORY BY POPULAR WRITER.

(COPYRIGUT.)

what was happening on the wreck—the shadowy form that crept across the deck, the oar raised above the head of the girl who was about to dive, the falling of the blow, and then the stealthy withdrawal of the second figure into a boat which, propelled with infinite care, was soon lost soundlessly in the mist beyond the stranded ship. Even the dull plunge of the falling body, which sank like a stone, was merged and lost in the noise of his own progress. / His hand sh.it out and touched the wreck's side a yard ahead of Marjorie. " Beat you !" bo gasped triumphantly. "But. by jove, you can swim, old thing!" Then he remembered, and looked upward and around. "Hullo! whore's the other girl?" he queried. " What, other girl?" Better aware of the wreck's position. Marjorie had not needed to raise her head. Therefore sbo bad seen nothing of the girl on its deck. "What other girl?" she repeated. " You're dreaming, Jimmy. As Tubby would say, there ain't no other girl!" " No," Jimmy said, " but there was," and he told her what ho had noticed. Funny," be. murmured, " she was just about to dive." He raised his voice, and hailed the deck above him. "Hi! Anybody there ? Anyone swimming near hero?" There was no response, save a croak from a gull, which, having alighted on the hulk, flew indignantly away. Jimmy frowned. " She must have dived," he muttered. " and if so . . . He carefully gauged the spot where he had seen her standing, and then turned to Marjorie. " Stick here, old thing," he told her, " I'm going down." Drawing a long breath, he swam beneath the surface. There was no revealing sunlight to pierce those dim depths, but it struck him later that fate must have guided his progress straight lo the blurred figure which lay huddled on the ocean floor. A moment later, feeling as if bis lungs must burst, he had her up in the air again, and was vaguely conscious of Marjorie's astonished cry. " Why it's that girl—the one we saw with Cartwright yesterday." Then, in la scared voice—" Jimmy, is she dead?" He shook his bead. " No, I can feel her heart still going. But we'd better get her ashore-—first aid's indicated. Thank heaven 1 saw her. She must have slipped and hurt her head, or something, or the shock of the water was 100 great. Come along." On the way back the}' met Tubby, who, having discovered that the injury to his foot was negligible, was manfully cleaving the Atlantic with a laborious breast stroke. His astonishment caused him to swallow a large portion of tfial same At lantic. " Good lord," lie spluttered. " Where d'vou find her ? By the way, I passed some clothes back yonder. Must be hers." Both Jimmy and Marjorie Cottle were expert in resuscitating the drowning, and it was not long before Phyllis Laleham, thanks to their efforts and the promptness for her rescue, opened her eyes and gave other evidence that she would soon be, to some extent at least. . herself again. Whereupon Jimmy grew suddenly shy. " Give her a good rub down, and get her into her clothes." he told Marjorie. " Sing out when you're ready, and we'll come back." " A brisk trot down the shore to keep ourselves warm is what we want," agreed Tubby. " Come on, James, old bean, we'll see what's agitating that infernal dog. It's never stopped barking all the time we've been here." Leaving Marjorie to her further ministrations, they disappeared into the mist which was already showing welcome signs of lifting. s As they approached it, the dog's barking grew more vociferous, reaching a shrill crescendo which caused Tubby to stoop and pick up a pebble with a purposeful air. " Just wait till I get to you, you brute," ho threatened. The dog must have heard their footsteps, for presently it came racing to meet them, and Tubby's stone was never thrown, for its barking changed to an urgent whine. It ran a little way before them,'and then back, and all the time it. whined as if endeavouring to tell them what was on its mind. i "P'ly you can't speak, old hound," said Tubby. "Then we'd know if it was worth while following you." 'lhe animal, a fox terrier, evidentlv had no misgivings on this point, for" once when their pace slackened it redoubled its entreaties, even going so far as to catch hold of the end of Jimmy's mackintosh with its teeth and pull. With the dog as their eager courier, they proceeded thus until there loomed np before them through the lightening mist the. outline of an upturned boat. It was an ancient craft which had long ago ceased lo serve any useful purpose on the water, and had been allowed to rot away • V'u ly on the sand above high tide mark. Propped on its side, it afforded pleasant shade for picnic parties, a shelter where courting couples could withdraw--" The world forget ling, by the world forgot." lls keel was turned toward Jimmy and J nbhy Baring, but the terrier immediately rushed round to the open side, and resumed its frenzied barking, so shrill and oar-splitting that Tubby was moved to protest once more. " For goodness sake. Jimmy, let's see wha! it is, ' he urged. " I've never beard so small a dog make so big a noise in my life before. Shut up, you idiot !" Together, they moved round Ihe derelict boat, and immediately Ihe dog ceased its clamour, as if aware that af length its mission was done. One low howl it uttered, and was still. As for the two young men il bad brought, upon the scene, I hey (no si nod stock still, even the flippant. Tubby frozen into immobility by I lie sight, that met their gaze. Half lying, half reclining against the floor-boards of the boat, was a man of middle-age, his blue reefer suit ominously stained from the chest downwards wilh what fliey knew was blood. Jimmy's breath hissed through his teeth. Apart from this tell-talo stain, Ihe glazed eyes, the. lolling head, the figure's dreadful sprawl, assured liiiri that the man was dead. CHAPTER IV. Even the griip things of life may be associated with the saving grace of humour, as Tubby Baring found when, twenty minutes after the discovery of the body, bo presented himself at the fuchsiafronted cottage which constituted the police station at Roma Cleft. In the small front garden, tying back one of these same fuchsia plants which displayed a tendency to spread, was a sloul rubicund individual in his shirt sleeves " P.C. Dodson ?" asked Tubby crisply. The shirt-sleeved figure straightened up. " That's me, zur." " Then, constable," said Tubby, still more crisply, "you'd better get into your tunic and come along with me. There's a man's body under that rotting old boat on the shore." P.C. Dodson, whose sole activities, apart from horticultural pursuits, consisted of reprimanding local reprobates for playing pitch and toss on Sunday afternoon, or, good Samaritan as ho was, guiding the homeward steps of some late denizen of the " Lobster Pot,"

passed a grimy hand across his forehead and strove to digest this startling information. " A deader under Sam Travers' old boat!" ho echoed. "That 'ud bo someone washed up by the tide, eh?" - "Sam Travers' old Boat, constable, is above high tide mark. The man's got a wound in his chest. If you ask me, lie's been murdered." "Murdered! Lor' love us! What be llio "World coming to? At Roma Cleft, 100. Wait a minute, zur, an' I'll be with yon. But I'll have to tell the missus lirst." Already bustling and important, hn hurried into the bouse and Tubby heard him shouting. "Jennie, lass, where's my tunic? Oh, here it bo. You'll have to keep back breakfast for a bit—a young man's called to say as there's a deader on the sands. A big case, maybe." " A deader on the sands," echoed a shrill voice. " There would be —just when Ihe porridge is getting burnt! You come hack quickly, John Henry, or you won't get no breakfast." If " John Henry " was constable, Tubby reflected, Jennie was evidently superintendent, but just then tho former reemerged, a trifle redder in the face arid buttoning a tunic which showed a strong disciination to meet. " Now, ziir," ho said, as he settled his helmet, " I'm all ready and ship-shape." Then his glance fell on his interrupted handiwork. " Drat that there fuchsia," lie sighed. "It be coming down again." For a moment Tubby wondered whether he was going to stop to tie it up once more, but the lure of the " deader " was after all stronger than that of the plant, and Tubby found himself in the roadway, accompanied by the entire polico force of Roma Cleft in Hie person of the worthy constable. He turned to the latter after a few yards. " You'll be wanting a hurdle, or something of the kind, and a couple of men, won't vou ?" lie suggested. " You can't leave the body where it is." P.O. Dodson threw him a glance of frank ivdmiration. " you do think of things, quick, you do indeed," be acknowledged. " Us'll get Icd and Tom Laralev and the door as they brought their old father home on from the " Lobster Pot" on Christmas night." lie turned abruptly in at u near-by cottage, and soon Tubby and himself were followed at a respectful distance by two strapping young men who carried between them (ho improvised stretcher. On the steep incline to sea-level and along the shore Tubby told how he and Jimmy had found thexcorpse. | Tlie latter was still mounting guard by j it when they arrived, and greeted their I appearance with evident relief. Dodson ! stared down at the grim figure, and scratched a ruminative chin. " 'Taint no one as I knows," he told them. " A stranger sure enough. You haven't searched or moved him, I suppose ?" Jinuny suppressed a shudder. " I haven't touched him." be declared. " He's just as we found him." Dodson nodded, and went, down on his knees. He opened the dead man's clothing at tho chest, and then rather hastily covered it again. Before he rose, his fingers strayed into all the pockets of the ! blue serge suit and came out empty. He [ jerked himself to his feet, and there was less colour than usual in his cheeks. " Shot through the heart. T should say, and at short range. No gun about—that looks like murder, as you said, young man." He signed to the Larnleys, who, manifestly disliking their task, assisted him to lay tho dead man on the stretcher. For a moment, before be was covered bv the blanket which, again at Tubby's sug : gestion, had been brought, the constable stood looking down at him. " No," he said again, no one as I knows. Not been dead too long—an hour or perhaps two. A gentleman, by the look of him, but one who's done a hit o' manual labour in his time —seo his hands." " Dangcd if I know where we'll put him," he muttered. " It'll have to be my scullery, I suppose, though Lord knows what my Jennie 'll have fo say about it. But there ain't, no other place for certain save the parish hall, and parson 'll bo main peeved if we put him there. Rieht. lads, carry on : Jennie or no Jennie, it'll have to he the police station. Then I'll have to 'phone to headquarters. Looks to me as I shan't have much time for them fuchsias o' mine for the next few days!" CHAPTER V. With the discovery of what lay beneath j the upturned boat, Jimmy Ashcroft, had j taken swift command of the situation. " Better get- back to the girls," he told Tubby Baring, " and then, if Miss Laleham is able to walk, take them back to the cottage, get into some clothes yourself, and go for the police. I shouldn't tell Marjorie and Miss Laleham about—this—if 1 were you J it might upset the latter after being half-drowned already. If they want to know where I am, say I've gone exploring along the coast or something. By the way, take the dog with you; I don't want it yapping here while you're away." So Tubby had departed, not sorry, if the truth be told, to get- out of range of that stark figure beneath the boat. He i found Phyllis Laleham dressed, and, though pale and a little shaky, obviously able to walk. Marjoric's good-humoured face was serious. " Where's Jimmy?" she asked af once. Tubby gave the rather lame excuse they had invented, and she shrugged her shoulders. Obviously, she did not think much of Jimmy's alleged behaviour under the circumstances. " Look here, Tubby," she said, " Miss Laleham says that someone struck her on ihe head just as she was about to dive, tier head is slightly cut at the back and badly bruised." j Tubby whistled. If that were so. the | g'rl's accident bore an ugly interpretai tion. I " Are you sure?" he asked her, "sure | you didn't slip and hit your head against | the deck or something?" " Quite," was the positive reply. " 1 was on my toes, and just about to take j the plunge, when I felt the blow—liko j a, hammer or mallet coming down on my ' lioad. 1 must have, gone down liko a stone, and from what Miss Cottle hero ! tells me, but for Mr. Ashcroft J should j have been there now—drowned," she I ended with a little shiver. " Was there anyone else on tho wreck —that you saw, 1 mean?" " I saw no one, but you know how foggy it is. and there may have been someone lurking about —in fact, there must have been. T swam straight out from the shore, climbed aboard, stood for a few moments looking back toward the shore —T could hear Miss Cottle and Mr. Ashcroft coming. Then I was just about to dive—when it happened. But why anyone should want to knock me out I can't imagine." (To he continued daily.)