ADVENTURE MYSTERIOUS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23008, 8 April 1938, Page 21

ADVENTURE MYSTERIOUS

( COPYRIGHT)

By FRANCIS MARLOWE World-famed author, traveller and dramatist.

SIRANGE mystery surrounds a beautiful girl and her life is w DANGER, BUT A DESPERATE AND DETERMINED LOVER APPEARS.

f CHAPTER VlE.—(Continued) "You Beem to have planned—for Wtself-jvery thoroughly," Patricia coldly, and with just a tinge of ratterneas in her voice, "but is it your that I should sit here until Mr. '"Uiead comes round to inquire for I don't think I'll do that. As I've Jfj you, I'm grateful; for what you've ste for me, but now that it's a case tf«acb for himself I think I'd better ■"fte my own plans." " J™* 8 face, as he- listened, took on expression of mingled chagrin and igfflcern. |Great Scot!" he said explosively, 9 never occurred to me that you'd Hp*, it that way. Look here, Pat — Dot divorced yet, so I may call Pat—surely you don't believe that *as thinking only of myself." Patricia's coldness thawed to his fßWtness. certainly seemed like it." she "But I can realise now that you **nV ty fOf course I wasn't," Dick exand took a gulp of coffee to Jjyt-him through an emotional *P®t. "If staying here with you jPd help matters /: any I'd stay," he two, "but what I'm trying to make Bee is that doing so would only things easier for Nailhead. If we jW together he'll run us down before Itm OUr older, whereas if I make ■Hf? 6 for London—you must remera8 toe and my car he's tracking us gtyou re safer here than you would 1 can find some way Ifi t ? J' o " nafely to London." IE'l? ■l Police are certain to search pj* lc h. for us," Patricia .urged, "and here they're bound to find me. Bgfy as I' v ® told you, it's just as Illative that 1 got to London at '°°ked at her perplexedly for and finally' shrugged his |,f er ' With an air of being resigned worst- [, yP u insist on trying to get to I suppose you must have your hoi* sa 'd- "I'll do what I can k h wa S n . vou again that [>, ave ? a chance. Stay here, and L® —l'll see to that but ... ." i .J 1 °ff as though a new thought »«Wd to him which needed conD , Then after a moment's p.', 116 looked hopefully at Patricia. ii+l absolutely essential that you London personally to-day ?" iUio £ there anything T could L *°r you—see your friends— * ni essage . N eed I tell vou that im trust me?'" ftyk+fiV '°°k e d nt him steadily, n 'hile she appeared to be iithL Ideation over in* her mind, jf ? as a ver y friendly light in | jes when she replied. Blip "

"I know J can trust you," she said softly, "and. . . . (she paused, and, her decision made she acted at once" on it; she drew from her skirt waistband the letter she had concealed -there), "there is something you can do for me. This letter (she handed it to him, and he pocketed it at once) must be delivered in London before noon to-day. I was to give it myself to the person to whom it's addressed, but, as you tell me I can't, I leave it to you to do it for me. Will you do it?" "Of course I will," Dick answered in a very satisfying matter-of-fact way. Patricia exhibited her relief in the first smile that had shown on her face since she had seated herself at the breakfast table. "Now that we've settled that, we 11 get down to business," Dick said briskly. "Lei; me have some more coffee, and while 1 get through another egg we'll make our final arrangements. We haven't much time: I must be on my way before Nailhead begins to comb the town." CHAPTER Vlli. DICK HCIIHIES TO FULFIL HIS PROMISE Without mishap or misadventure of any kind, Dick Leslie arrived in London shortly before noon and paid off and dismissed the driver of his hired car outside the Bank of England, a halfminute's walk from the building in Lombard Street, in which his office was situated. At the same time he handed the man a scrap of paper on which he had written the number of his own car. "I left a car with this number parked in Norwich Station Yard," he said; "if it's there when you get back, garage it till I claim it." The chauffeur nodded understanding and drove off. Dick took advantage of a break in the traffic to make the crossing to Lombard Street. The building in Lombard Street which Dick entered was something in the nature of a hive of offices. He took the lift to its third floor, and in the corridor into which he stepped ho turned the handle of the door of his <own office on which was the blank paint inscription: "Richard Leslie, Consulting Engineer." The room he entered was of moderate size; a section of it, his own particular sanctum, was enclosed by a wood and glass partition. In the outer office a smart-looking young woman, his typist-secretarv. looked up from her work on his entrance.

"Good morning, Miss Jonas," he said brightly. "Any callers this morning?" "No one but the postman, Mr. Leslie," she answered, and handed him a couple of letters which she took from her desk. "Im expecting a Mr: Colter at one o'clock," Dick said. "I'll be ready for him directly he arrives."

The girl made a note of the name, and Dick passed into his private office.

Seated at his desk, he looked hurriedly at the superscriptions of the letters he found there, and of the two

he had brought from the outer office. One he selected for opening, but after a hasty glance through it he stretched an arm to his telephone. Before his hand reached the instrument, however, he withdrew it, thrust it into the breast pocket of his coat, and took out the letter Patricia Langley had entrusted to him for delivery. The next moment, with a, muttered exclamation of annoyance, he looked at his watch. Two minutes past twelve, it marked. He frowned heavily. He remembered, ruefully, thai; he had promised to deliver Patricia's letter before noon, and recalled, too, her emphatic concern lest it should not roach London by that hour. A moment before lie had been on the point of putting through a telephone call to tho Antlers Hotel to inform Patricia of his safe arrival in London. Now ho must postpone doing that. Keenly desirous as ho was of hearing her .voice, anxious to put an end to her suspense, lie decided that ho would not call her until ho could tell her that the letter had reached its destination. Ho was certain that if, and when, ho got through to her she would inevitably ask him about the letter, and ho felt that ho could not bear to tell her that ho had bungled her business,, failed like a nincompoop in the trust she had placed in him. Probably, it occurred to him, if he had remembered her letter earlier he could have driven straight to the address that was on it and reached it in time to fulfil his promise. For the first time ho looked at the address on tho letter. He saw: "Mr. Edward Tuscan, 83a London Wall." Little more than five minutes from his own office! He shrugged his shoulders impatiently as ho thought how comfortably he could have reached London Wall before noon. Well, the damage —if there were damage—was already done. All he could do to attempt to repair it was to delay no longer in delivering the letter. A taxi-cab would get him to London Wall and back very quickly—he would be back in ample time to meet Colter. Thinking thus, he looked again at the letter to memorise the street number. Ho noticed that the handwriting on it was stiff and augular, and decided that it Avas certainly not Patricia's, The letter, too, it occurred to him, was not an ordinary letter, or else it was an exceedingly long onfe. The envelope was just one of the averago square variety, but it enclosed a packet at least a quarter of an inch thick. Dick wrinkled his brows troublotisly. He hoped that tho packet, whatever it contained, was not, in the matter of the time of its delivery, of such urgent importance as Patricia's anxiety about'it would suggest. As ho rose to his feet ito leave his office he looked hesitatingly at his telephone. Then abruptly he sat down again and pressed his desk "buz/.cr." Miss Jonas appeared at the floor.

"Let inn have the telephone directory, Miss Jonas," he directed. A few minutes' search in the volume showed him that Mr. Edward Tuscan had a telephone number. He put this through to the Exchange and waited. Presently he heard a voice, but—alas for his patience t —it was only Exchange speaking. "I'm trying to get it for you," the voice said: "will you please repeat the number?"'

Dick repeated it. and again waited. Exchange spoke again a little over a minute later—it seemed more like five minutes to Dick.

"Sorry, there's no reply," the voice said.

Dick crashed the receiver on the instrument, and within the instant was out of the room. I expect .to be back before Colter arrives, Miss Jonas," he flung out, as he swung past her desk; "if I'm not, ask him to wait." CHAPTER IX. DICK FALLS AND THE MYSTERY DEEPENS A taxi-cab which he picked up in Lombard .Street quickly brought Dick Leslie to London Wall. Ho found that the building that was Mr. Edward Tuscan's address was much the same as that which contained his own office. It housed a number of firms and business men of a variety of occupations. Obviously Mr. Tuscan was not one of its prominent tenants, for it was only after a careful search of the wall directory that Dick found his name figuring as the occupant of a basement room. A walk through some gloomy, stone-paved passages brought him to the door of this room, and, as far as an immediate meeting with Mr. Tuscan was concerned, to a standstill. The oflico door on which his namo was painted—"Mr. Edward Tuscan," with nothing added to disclose his profession or trade —was locked, and not by rapping on it or impatiently rattling its handle did Dick bring anyone to open it. Clearly Mr. Tuscan was out, and just as' plain it was that his office had no staff to look after his business in his absence. His customary equanimity very much ruffled. Dick ascended from the basement and searched through corridors for someone who might bo able to give him information about Mr. Tuscan. At last, in the liftman-porter he found the only representative of the owners discoverable on the premises, and the information to be extracted from him was very slight and in no way helpful. The man was not at all surprised to hear that Mr. Tuscan was not in his office. "Ho ain't often there," he commented stolidly. "Doesn't he come to his office every day?" Dick asked. "Couldn't tell you, mister." "Has he any office staff?" "Never seen or heard of any." Though not surly, the man was stiffly uncommunicative. Dick tested the efficacy of half-a-crown as a tongueloosener. To an extent it worked; it disposed tho man to be as informative as he could, but, unfortunately, all ho had to toll about Mr. Tuscan was very little, and nothing at all was there to give Dick any idea of when he might hope to rid himself of tho responsibility of Patricia's letter. "Mr. Tuscan, he's been a tenant, I should say for going on two years," tho porter said rumioatively. "I shouldn't think he's used that oflico of his much, 'cause I've not seen him, not from the start, not more than half-a-dozen times. Seen him to-day for the first time for goiwg on six months." "He was here to-dayp" Dick caught eagerly at the admission. Saw him going out not more than about fifteen minutes back—just about twelve, it was Looked pretty blaH'

about something, too, and not half in a hurry, either " In Dick's mind, as he listened, no longer was tbero any doubt as to the importance—to Mr. Tuscan, at least—of the letter* with which Patricia had entrusted him. Obvious|y Tuscan had been at his office that morning specifically to receive the letter and, unless the porter exaggerated, it was clear that its non-arrival by twelve o'clock had greatly disturbed him. Dick found himself hoping fervently that Mr. Tuscan's disappointment would not react malevolently on Patricia. "You can't say, then, whether he's likely to return to-day, and. of course, you have no idea where I'd bo likely to find him now?" The porter pursed his lips, shook his head regretfully and backed slowly to the lift to resume his duties there. With the burden of tho undelivered letter heavy on his conscience, Dick dredged his mind hastily for a suggestion as to the quickest way of getting it into Mr. Tuscan's possession. He could not hang about the basement passage waiting .for tho man's not very probable return. He had his own business to attend to, and especially important was his one o'clock appointment at his office. On an impulse he hurriedly returned to the basement. If Mr. Tuscan had a letter-box on his office door dropping tho letter into it would almost certainly ensure the earliest possible delivery of it. But this expedient, or decision on it, had to be abandoned, for there was no letter-box slot in tho door. Dick looked glumly at his watch. Already it was half-past twelve. He had barely time, even if everything favoured him, to get back to his office, put through a trunk call to Norwich, and speak to Patricia before Colter called 011 him. He had considered for a moment, but dropped, tho idea of leaving Mr. Tuscan's letter in charge of the liftman-porter. Ho felt that already he had made a sufficiently bad mess of tho matter: Patricia had asked him to deliver the letter personally, and he did not intent to risk making matters worse by departing still further from her instructions to him. The unpleasant business of telling her that ho had failed her was still ahead of him, and there was nothing left to be done, but to get it over without delay. To postpone doing this might be to add another and, perhaps a very serious blunder to his initial ono. He loft tho basement hastily, and on emerging into tho street hailed a passing taxicab for his return, to Lombard Street. (To be continued daily)