THE RABBIT'S PAW

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22030, 9 February 1935, Page 14 (Supplement)

THE RABBIT'S PAW

By SELWYN JEPSON ~.. „ - Author of "The Qualified Adventurer," " Snaggletooth. Tiger Dawn. "I Met Murder," "The Death Gong, etc., etc.

CHAPTER Yin.—(Continued) Then I set °ff quietly in his wake, hoping for a glimpse of him before he reached the slope which took the path down into the more frequent trees. The sky was still luminous, and for a brief moment I saw the outline of him against it, and the bulky thing he carried across his shoulders. This was when he came to the edge of the little plateau where the gardens ended and the park began. He was no more than a black, undeterminate figure with a burden. B,ut it was sufficient to convince me that once again Peter had guessed right. My heart leaped and left me breathless;' I realised that if I lost track of that body so would I lose the evidence which could shake their belief in Bethmay's guilt. So I had to keep as close to my man as I dared without his hearing me, for if once I lost him there would be no finding him again—-nor that which he carried.

My chief danger lay in over-anxiety. He went slowly, of necessity, and I unimpeded, was in constant likelihood of going too fast in the moments when the moss deadened the sound of his footsteps and I thought him farther ahead. In the three-quarters of a mile from the gardens to where the path reached the marshes the gentle fall of the hill kept him always below me and under the skyline, and I did not see him again. A hundred times I tried to decide who he was and if I had ever seen him before. I recalled his vague silhouette as I had seen it, and made every effort to fit it in to previous impressions of people I had coine across during my three months here, but without any notable success. To those whom I knew to be involved in this awful business, he seemed to have no likeness. He was inches too short for either of the Passmores, lacked the heavy-shouldered bulk of James Grantley, and must be infinitely stronger than Vance, who had sat in chairs all his life and could barely lift, one. Surmise was useless, and I relinquished it in favour of giving all my attention to the following of him. It was as well, for if I had not had all my wits about me, I might well have blundered on without realising that he had quite suddenly and unexpectedly left the path and struck off at right angles southward along the earth bank which marked the park boundary. It had a single file track along its top, and I was able to keep on it by the feel of the long grass on either side, which brushed my calves. The rain had formed long, narrow puddles in the clay, and the sound of my quarry's boots- in them gave me the clue to his distance in front of me. I remembered abruptly that this was the way (which I had never taken before) to the tiny cottage overlooking the marshes where Mac Angus and his daughter lived. Even as this came into my mind I saw a yellow square of window light, fifty yards ahead, and I decided in the next second that the figure of which I had had the momentary glimpse might easily have been that of the gardener himself. Mac Angus! Mac Angus had been pruning roses near the lily pool yesterday afternoon .... Mac Angus had said he had heard no shot, that he bad gone to the green-house or somewhere. From Mac Angus we had heard about the mysterious but dubious story of footsteps hurrying towards the Dutch garden. Mac Angus! Who in Ditcham was more devoted to the Vances? To Bethmay? He had known her all his life ... he worshipped her and hated the very name of Passmore.

Had Mac Angus . .>. done it P I nearly fell off the bank into the brambles below as this all-answering possibility came to me. I was sorry for Mac Angus, sympathised keenly with his motives, wondered why he had had to slay also the man of the yellow muffler (perhaps he had witnessed the killing of William), and at the same time i was conscious of enormous relief.

But apart from all that, here was a heaven-sent opportunity to catch the old man red-handed.

He was taking the body home, presumably in order to destroy marks and evidence of identity as much as possible before finally getting rid of it. I might contrive to come upon him at such a task . . .

We were near the cottage now, and I held back, standing still behind the bushes which fringed the tiny patch of garden. ? Mac Angu- it was .... He passed through the shaft of lamplight flung by the uncurtained window, and I saw him almost clearly, recognising him oddly enough by his trousers, which were strapped below the knees navvy-wise. The burden on his shoulders threw a great shadow, which moved across the flower-beds ominously. He turned the corner of the cottage towards the back, and I ran softly after him. I reached it, and heard him rattling at the door of what seemed to be a shed or out-house. He got it open, and a moment later a thud told me that he had dumped his burden on the floor inside.

He came out immediately, latching the shed after him, and crossed the cobbled yard to the cottage. The back door opened with a rush of light and closed again. I heard his daughter's voice, followed by his deeper tones, and then silence.

So far I had kept faithfully to Peter's instructions. 1 had guarded the cypress tree, and trailed the body to its next resting-place. Now there were two courses open to me; either to return as quickly as possiblo to report to Peter, who would be back by this time, or on my own initiative bring back matters to a head.

Bethmay's plight decided me in favour of the second, with but little pause for debate. I was sick and tired of being cunning. I went round to the front door, took a breath and tapped it sharply with my knuckles. If I expected it to be opened reluctantly, I was disappointed. Mac Angus himself came, and blinked at me with surprise. " Mister Holland, sirr?" L reflected that he must have considerable cunning. His manner gave no hint of his secret mind. " Nothing—no more —no worse has happened, sirr?" His voice was anxious. " They've taken Miss Bethmay . . . " " Arr," he agreed. "Greene* told me." He ushered me into a minute parlour, made all the smaller by the complex wallpaper of giant but impossible roses. Mac Angus and roses were inseparable. " Ye wanted to see me about something, sirr? This is my daughter Margaret." A thin-faced- girl with sandy hair and rather colourless eyes got up from a chair. It struck me that she had been weeping—a sudden impression. "Make us some tea, Maggie. Mebbe Mr. Holland could do with a cup." She retired into the kitchen. MacAngus offered me her chair, sat down on the other side of the round table, and looked at me expectantly.

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I had not prepared myself; mv object had been to observe rather than to talk. But I said:

" We've been wondering about those footsteps you heard before you left the rose pergola. 'Are you absolutely sure you did not recognise them?" He rubbed his chin. The old-fashioned oil lamp stood between us, and shielded by it 1 was able to watch his face closely; he was composed, apparently occupied only with the _ effort of memory, and showed no Bign of the nervous tension he must have felt. I reflected that men who spend all their days in close contact with nature acquire a greater subtlety of mind than do their more gregarious fellows, and that the extermination of them therefore must often bo difficult.

He shook his head. " Of course it may have been that it was yon Billy English." As he spoke the daughter came into the room, and I saw her face change in an odd wav. Intent, a little desperate, she almost forgot that she carried a tray.

"Billy?" she said, and Mac Angus turned to look at. her. " Aye. But the sound of one pan runnin' is nigh like to another's, isn't that , so, Mr. Holland?" "Billy English?" I tried to remember where I had heard the name before.

" Billy couldn't have done that awfu' thing!" cried the girl in a choked voice. " An' him not showin' up since —re know what he's like —contrary • come to-day an' out o' sight to-mor-row —iik e a wild thing in the woods. It doesn't signify, Father, it doesn't! I won't have ye think that of him!" She put the tray of cups on the table with a little crash,', and glared at us with haunted animal eyes. It was out of my depth; the little room was ablaze with emotions I did not understand. I forgot Mac Angus for a moment in my attention to the girl. I was sure now that she had been weeping recently. What did all this mean? Had it anything to do with us? W T ho was Billy English? " Billy, ye'll understand," Mac Angus explained, is a-courting my gir-rl. He should have come to see her last evening, and didna. To-night neither, it seems."

" He's with Joe. I tell you, it's like him to go to Joe, with Joe in the hospital," she said quickly. "Oh, sir! You doan' believe he'd murder a gentleman ?" " I'm sure he wouldn't," I reassured her hastily. "There now!"

I saw light. Brooks had told me. Billy English was the friend of the " Joe " who had nearly lost an eye as the result of William Passmore's activity with a dog-whip. The two of them had been employed by tie R.S.P. C. A. inspector to collect evidence concerning the vivisection rumour, the local theory that the Passmores used animals in their experiments.

And as this ran through my head, I saw even more light. . . .

" Billj* English —he's a gamekeeper or something, isn't he? " " Aye. Over at Mr. John Arden's . . . Billy and Joe, they work together there. Eight men he employs on that job . . His fingers against his chin ■were steady. 1 dropped my words casually into the pause. " I've seen him about 1 think. Doesn't he wear a yellow scarf? " The rheumy eyes stirred a little and rested on my face. " Yon's the lad,' he agreed. It was the first moment he had betrayed himself since my confronting him, and even then it was so little that I might have missed it had I been watching him less closely. The room seemed very stuffy, or else my suppressed excitement made breathing difficult. " You knew him, sir? " the girl asked quickly. " He wouldn't do murder? " " I think I've only seen him once." Her desDerate face worried me terribly. Wb.i.t could 1 say? I knew her lover had met death, and foully. I thought it more than likely her father had brought him to it . . . Had madness or policy guided the old man's hand? God alone knew. I visualised the crumpled body on the shed floor . . . and feared the knowledge in my consciousness lest the girl see it. She was in an agony of anxiety, wondering what had become of her man. She was a drab without pretence of prettiness, to whom love would come seldom and preciously, and heart-break all the more poignantly. A longing seized me to got out into the fresh air, to find Peter and tell him what I had discovered and put an end to suspense. I was ready with words of departure when Mac Angus came to sudden conversational life. " Have ye thocht, sirr, that Mrs. Passmore hersel', puir lady, maj' have done the shootin' ? We saw her with our own eyes go, down by the mon and cry out why was he dead, but mayhap that sorrow blinded us. Ye see, she had no likin' for him, and suppose she couldna persuade him to let her free? An' why indeed was she at Ditcham at all? Nobody asked that, did they, sirr? Wimin are all of 'em actresses, they say. A cup of tea, sirr? Maggie, don't sit starin' so. Are ye clean daft? What will Mr. Holland think o' ye? " " No tea for me," I said hastily: " Then, too, there's the maister," Mac Angus ambled on. " He's a quiet gentleman, no given to scurryin' aboot. But it's strange how a mon will act when he's hard driven. No like liissel' at all. I've to tell ye, sirr, I've heard stories about money changin' hands — servants' gossip na doot, but there's mostly fire whore there's smoke, I've found. Who would be startin' sich, without some sort o' truth to work on? They say the maister borrowed a tidy bit fra Mister William, and couldna pay it back. Jess, she's parlourmaid at the Passmores', can tell o' high wor-rds one nicht between the twa of them and Jess is a clever lassie with a lid id on her shoulders. She could tell ye a lot ye might do worse na pay attention to." " I'll have a talk with her.''

" Aye. An' I tell ye this, sirr, there's more —a great deal more in this killin' than anyone knows. 1 feel it deep, sirr. Just as deep as I ken that Miss Bethmay had no hand in it. The po-lice are fules, sirr—great fules that see no farther than the ends of their silly noses." I appreciated the motive for his garrulous exposition of possibilities; I had to listen to it or lie would guess I suspected, more than suspected him. " Then again, sirr, sorry as 1 am for my Maggie, 1 eanna help but wonder where that Billy English has hidden hissel' these twa days. Him an' Joe were as close as peas in a pod. When Billy saw what Mister William had done to Joe with that whip he didna say anvthin', but he went down to the Knife an' Whistle an' drank a " " Father! " " Ye cain't hush mo, child. The truth must be got to, and the young maistress set free of them dirty po-lice. He drank a whole bottle of whisky in an hour —an' paid for it across the bar. Thirteen shiler;. He knew what he was a boot. That was the day before XI i. William was shot . . , (To be continued daily)