THE HOUSE IN THE WAY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22259, 6 November 1935, Page 23

THE HOUSE IN THE WAY

By COLIN HOPE Author of the " Phantom Killer"

(COPYRIGHT)

SYNOPSIS: Guy Chichester watches a card game at The Whip, a village inn, where three expert card sharps are robbing a local youth of a few founds Later he goes for a stroll and meets the youth's sister, with whom he returns to the inn to break up the party. There is a scene, but eventually the girl and her brother t>o home together. In the early hours of the morning, Chichester sera out to investigate a house. The Wychets, which stands near the girl's house, The Oaks, in a particularly lonely .pot. Its owner is a Mr. Singster, a retired chemist. Guy cannot get inside the grounds because of a dog, and is about to return home when he hears a window opening in the girl's house, and a scream. As he rushes to the rescue, ho is knocked unconscious. The girl, Netta Fansliawo, and her brother are orphans who are endeavouring to make a living from a pmall poultry farm, and they receive many tempting offers to sell their hoiiHo, The Oaks. When Netta is attacked during the night they regard it as an attempt to frighten them out of the house. Meanwhile Chichester recovers, and, on seeing through the window that Netta is all right, returns to the inn. as he ia anxious to escape detection. The next day ho visits Netta, who tells him that she and her brother are being pestered to sell their house. CHAPTER IV.—(Continued) Chichester was interested. " That seems strange. Of course you have no idea who is the intending purchaser. All offers have come through an agent, have they not?" It was Netta's turn to surprised. " How did you know?" she asked. " I didn't know. 1 can't even guess why. they were so anxious to have you out of the way, but I am sure that whatover the reason, you would not be approached directly by the man' who wants the house. That is, of course, unless I am much mistaken in the identity of the man —and I am prepared to stake all I possess , that I am | not mistaken. But why have you refused to move ? I assume that the offer for the house has been satisfactory." i " Yes, they have been good offers. I must confess I have been very much tempted to sell, and I rather think you are mistaken when you guess at the would-be purchaser. The agents made no secret of his client's identity. It is Sir Douglas Montague, an explorer. Ho spent a holid;:v in this district somo years ago, nr ! as he is retiring lie wants to settle down here, in this house." " I have never heard of Sir Douglas Montague," Guy answered, " but I ; would swear that he is not the man who is after this house. The agent may be quite honest, but it is unlikely that he knows Sir Douglas—if such a man exists —and there is no reason why ! he should bother about the bona-fides of his client providing ho is satisfied that he has the necessary money to make the purchaso. " I know I am asking a lot from you, in view of the fact that until last night we had not met. and even now you know very little about mo, but I am going to ask you to believe that although I cannot guess why your house is so desirable to this mystery tnan, I am sure that he intends to use it for no £ood purpose and that you will be doing me a great service if you refuse to move. But you have not told me why you turned down the offer." " I have been tempted to accept, and but for Frank I probably slyuld have done so." " But I should have thought that a young man like your brother appearsto be would welcome a change. The big towns are very attractive to young men." " That is just the point," Netta explained. "Frank is anxious to sell, and if Daddy had not left things so that I have the greatest say in such matters, he would .have accepted the first offer. As it is I am afraid; afraid for Frank's sake. It is difficult to talk about one's own brother, but even you—in the short time you have known him —must see how unstable, how easily led, he is. " We both know the country, and here I can keep him in check, but in town I fear he would be too much for me. If ho happened to fall in the wrong 6ort of company I don't know what would happen to him. Besides, neither of us is trained to earn a living—we believed we were well, off until Daddy died. Hero we can manage to keep afloat. Poultry farming is not a quick road to fortune, but we can just manage to live, that is if. . ." "If your brother becomes a little more helpful and does not play cards with strangers." Guv supplemented. He studied the girl admiringly. " It seems to me that Frank owes you a lot. But for the fact that he has a regular brick for a sister, he.would be ruined long before he finds his own manhood." Netta started to protest, but he would have none of it. " No, don't mistake me. The boy has no vice. He is young and unstable. A sharp lesson would make a new man of him—if it were not too sharp a lesson, otherwise it might break him. "I think I can see now the purpose of the card party. It was all part of the scheme to pet you out of the house. Frank was being cheated. I know when I watched the game, but I must confess I was not interested at the time. . ." Netta flushed suddenly. " He was being cheated. You knew and did nothing," she flung at him. ' Too late Guy saw his mistake. He could not hope to make the girl see things from his point of view. "Please," he began, "do not misunderstand me. . . ." "I think I do understand you. You saw my brother was being robbed. Bobbed is the only word, and you stood by idly and watched. Perhaps it amused you. It must have been very funny. After all, he was only a raw country youth, and the few pounds he lost were only a fortnight's profits from a little poultry farm. The fact that they were lost merely means that another little Eiece of our home has to be sold to eep us in food. Even if he had been a helpless old man, or a widow being robbed of her last few coppers, I suppose you still would not have been interested." • • As she spoke the last words her lips curled in disdain, and in spite of his misery, Guy could not help admiring her fine and sterling character. Even in her anger she was still adorable. He cursed himself a thousand times for his unfortunate lapse. The fact that he was likely to lose an ally in his great fight did not trouble him so much as the thought that he was losing the trust of this wonderful girl. He could see that to argue with her would be hopeless—even if ho had the wish to do so. Ho mumbled an apology and prepared to leave the house; obviously ho was no longer welcome. She saw him out in silence, although ho fancied he detected some softening in her manner as they reached the gate, and tried once more t<? excuse himself. " I am sincerely sorry," he said. "Perhaps somo day you will let me tell you tho whole story, and then you will understand. May I come to see you again? I should like to help you, and I believe you have it in your power to help mo to right a great wrong." She did not answer with hor lips, but Chichester thought she nodded before turning away toward tho house. Ho fancied, too, that there was a suspicion of moisture in her eyes and, strangely, that thought did not make him unhappy. When Netta reached the house, sho hurried to her room. Guy's suspicions had been justified, for as soon as she reached the room she flung herself into a chair and burst into tears. For nearly half-an-hour sho sat while the tears flowed umrestrainedly, until suddenly she rose, brisk and businesslike, as if nothing untoward had happened. Tho tears had served to refresh her, to wash away l»r worry and her anger. It was as if she had arisen from a night's refreshing sleep, or from a bath after a hard afternoon on the sports field.

A GRIPPING STORY OF INTRIGUE, LOVE AND ADVENTURE

Her brother was naturally unobservant and the fact that he was excited when ho came in helped to obscure what little powers he possessed in this direction. He failed to notice anything unusual in Nctta's appearance. "You are in the wrong this time, ola girl," lie cried, waving a paper in his hand. "Look, who is that?" he pointed to a -portrait on the centre page. Netta's thoughts were far away, but she did as she was told. Then suddenly she went pale and sat down heavily. Without any doubt, the photograph was of Chichester, the man who, in spite of the scene that had taken place between them had meant more to her than any man she had ever met.

"It's the man we saw last night," she remarked guardedly. "Yes, I think it must be." "Oh yes. that's him right enough," Frank said triumphantly, "there's no doubt about it. No wonder he goes about accusing other people of being crooked. "As a matter of fact, one of the men I played cards with last night gave me the paper. He said lie remembered seeing the face somewhere, and when he got to his lodgings he hunted round and found that paper in his suitcase. He has used it for some teaching and it had been in his case ever since. Extraordinary coincidence, I call it.' "Extraordinary." The girl's interest quickened. "Yes, it is very strange. She looked at the photograph again. It was certainly Chichester —or his double. Above the picture were the words: FLYING OFFICER CONVICTED and underneath: "Wing-Commandor Playdon, who was yesterday sentenced to twelve months imprisonment for attempted blackmail of a brother officer, wliosG name was not revealed." CHAPTER V THE GANG LEADER'S RIVAL For a long time Nctta stood staring at the newspaper, while .Frank beean to enlarge upon the iniquities of blackmailers in general and Chichester in particular. "Chichester!" he sneered. "His name wasn't Chichester then. course, a man who has committed a crime like that has put himself outside the pale. . " I wish you would put yourself outr side the door—or else keep quiet, Nctta answered. " I want to think and your small talk doesn't inspire mo. Go and watch the hens, or something but don't take any money with .you, or some other pockets will soon bo outside your pile. Frank was very disappointed. He had hoped that his' news would stagger Netta. It certainly had staggered her, but she was by no means so impressed as ho had expected. There was no doubt that she, was deeply interested in this stranger, and, curiously, the news ho had expected to turn her definitely against him had, in fact, made her anxious to defend him. He made one or two further efforts to draw her into a discussion of the case, but at last gave up and went out, slamming the door behind him. Left alone, Netta spread the newspaper in front of her and studied it closely. She read and re-read the few words beneath the picture, and then went carefully through the whole or the paper. What she found —or did not find —evidently satisfied her, for when she had finished she was smiling and she hummed a tune as she went to a bureau which stood near the window. She wrote a short letter and then went out of the house to the village. Here she bought a small postal order and enclosed this with the letter she had written and posted it. • Netta and Frank were not "the only people interested in Guy Chichester. In the big drawing room at Ihe Wycliets five men sat around a tnhle, while the sixth, Sinister, the owner of the house, stood with his back to a bright fire and addressed the others. " We have got to go very carefully, ' he was saying. " I know it would be easy enough to p«t this man —Chichester, he calls himself —out of the way, and I for one should be very glad him go; but if he is found with a bullet through his head or a knife in his back anywhere within ton miles of here things are likely to get very uncomfortable. " We shall have big-footed country policemen nosing all over the place and asking a lot of questions that we shall not want to answer, and after they have spent a fortnight deciding the case as too big for them, they are just as likely to call in Scotland Yard for help—and if anybody ■ thinks I want Scotland Yard in this .district, he is wrong." " Aw." The man nearest to Singster spat with disgust. He was the one man in the room who seemed completely at ease. Small and slight, immaculately clothed, he lolled nonchalantly in his chair and gazed at the ceiling. He was easily the most dangerous man in the room and all of them save one, Singster, were men with "records." He was absolutely fearless, and he had not the imagination with which the others were cursed, for imagination is hi deed a curse to every criminal who is unfortunate enough to piwsscss it to any marked degree. They could visualise the horror of the punishment which they knew would follow detection and capture. "Chick" Churchill never thought of such things, he could concentrate on the job in hand. He could do a little robbery with violence without a thought to the " cat," or even commit a murder and then read without a tremor a lurid story of an execution. He was a man of finest tempered eteel; cool, efficient, deadly. " Seems that the bost thing we can do is to sit still and let him do just as he pleasps," he said at last. " After all, it doesn't matter much if he smashes us all and ruins all our hard work. Whatever we do we mustn't hurt him, his mother might come down and speak very severely to us." There was an awkward silence. The other men,knew that their leader was right when he said they could not afford the risk of police investigation in ,the district and at the same time they dare not allow Chichester to go his way unhindered. "What can he do? What does he know?" The man who was addressed as George asked the question. "We know he. was wandering about the grounds last night, and we know tha.t he was outside the girl's house; Chick had to quieten him, didn't vou, Chick P" There was a general smile at this and it served to relieve the tension. Singster left tho fire and came over to the table.

" It isn't only a question of what he knows. Yon all know as well as I do that wo don't want him or anybody like him right on our front doorstop. That nouplo next door is quito worry enough, at least the girl is. If Chichester gets to know wo are after that house, he is sure to try to stop us, and that won't bo helpful. He has got to bo silenced somehow, and I am ready to listen to any suggestion except murdering him. Murder is too dangerous. I'm not squeamish, but I don't believe in asking for trouble." "Can't we get him out of the district before wo settle him?" The speaker was the man Guy had seen in the garden, and whose name was Briggs. " Surely we can think of some way of getting him up to London, and once he is there ho can be stopped from coming back. We have done harder things than that. 1 agree with you, Singster, we can't have him hanging about here. (To be continued daily)