THE GREEN-SPECK CLUE

New Zealand Times, Volume LII, Issue 12181, 4 July 1925, Page 20

THE GREEN-SPECK CLUE

•wnframauHßnintaiii’it . Thrilling § J Serial / | Story # ff liihwmk*

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Ernest Treeton

(Published by Special Arrangement.)

CHAPTER XXV—NOT DEAD, NOR | SLEEPING. | A man, unwashed, soiled and dis- . hovelled, staggered into the little countryside station, named Brambledene. He was Jack Rollingham. Wearv-eyed tliqugh he was, even he could see that he had arrived at a sleepy hour in the daily Quietness of the little place. In homely, leisurely fashion, a rustic porter was delivering to an equally rural wagoner, a consignment of farmer’s oil-cake in the .small goods yard. No one else w r as visible, 6ave a group of platelayers, who looked like mites in the distant emptiness or the iron road. . - ' Jack glanoed with a tirqd, yet vaguely inquiring eye at the clock on the wall of the tiny, empty booking office. He saw that the hour was a quarter to twelve. Then he knocked at the shutter of the ticket window. There came the sound of the moving legs of a chair.. The next moment the shutter was lifted, and the country stationmaster, with a pen between his lips, showed his face in the window frame. .“No doubt you have heard of me, Jack announced by way of self-intro-duction. “I am John Rollingham, -d Courtleigh Park, Almerhuret.’ “Heard of you, sir!’’ echoed the astonished stationmaster. “Why, there have beert inquiries for you here, at every station on the line, and all over the country 1” ~ “Well, perhaps you can help me, Jack suggested appreciatively, though his voice was weak and hoarse. ‘How do the trains run to Radleigh? I am too worn out to walk, but 1 could get s conveyance to Almerhurst from there.” , . “There’s no train till a quarter past two,’’ the stationmaster replied. “Is there an up-train 60onerr Jack isked again, reflectively. . “Yes; there’s a train to victoria at half-past one.” , , “There are some things I ought to Jo at once.” Jack considered, seriously. “If I could send a telegram, setting my people’s mind at rest, it would be better for me to go to town perhaps. There is a telegraph office at Almer-

“I could telegraph to Radleigh and *th© message could be sent on to Aimerhurst by the Radleigh Post Office,” the stationmaster offered. ’ “Thanks. Then that’s what I’ll do. Jack decided. , ~ . in* the informal, homely way of the country, the stationmaster admitted Jack to the privacy of the ticket office, and placed a telegraph* form for him on his own writing-table. But. for once, writing was for Jack a labour. His hands were tom and tender, and he could write only with the pen held between his index and second fingers But his message was clear for the stationmaster to read. “Am safe and well. Will he home in a few hours. Let Tony alone know, witb-'love. -Keep private ,and wait for

fty'Teturn before acting. —Jack,, I “It’s more than you look, sir,” said the stationmaster, alluding to Jack’s description of himself as “well,” as he read the message. . v . But there was a greater surprise in store for him. . “Can you tell me what day this is?” Jack inquired, his tone revealing his blankness. -“Thursday,” replied the stationmaster, wondering. , „ _ ' “So far in the week as that, ’ Jack • iQ«£ecL' “Then I haven’t slept' since Sunday night and have had nothing to eat, and only some spring water to drink —-just now—since Monday even“Whv, you must be half-dead!” exclaimed" the stationmaster, good-nat-uredlv. “You want a wash, some rood, and a rest. There's some cold beef, I know, and, if you don’t mind taking things as they are, you are very welcome to whatever I can offer, lou could have a sleep on my sofa and L could call you in time for the train. “It is very kind of you, Jack apAs good as his word, the stationmaster led Jack into the dwelling portion of the station. And half-an-hour later, having washed, brushed and ted, the wamlerer was sound asleep. Brief though his rest. Jack was refreshed by it when his Good bamaritan, the stationmaster, called him for the train. But, sunk in the cushions of an empty first-class carriage, the train was hardly started before he was asleep again. By the time the guard roused him from his slumber at Victoria he had recovered not a little more of his normal self. Ten minute 3 later, a hansom cab sot him down before the broad granite steps of Scotland Yard. He had drowsed in the cab, and could have slept still. But he was all .a-brace now, as : he handad a constable-messenger his card for—Chief Inspector Wedge. “Show the gentleman in—show him in,” Wedge said to the constable, as he' read the name on Jack’s card. If ever Wedge was amused, be was diverted now. Something like a whimsical smile flickered in his spare face. A little more than an hour ago Tony s i letter had been delivered to him, and he had read it with some seriousness.

And, now, here was that surprising , “prize packet,” Mr Jack Rollingbam, i himself! On the basis of popular as- ■ sumption in the case of the unfortun- , ate Anice Harden, he ought to have ; been as dead as Anice Harden herself. ‘But here he was, very much alive. He was a difficult subject to loll—evidently. No wonder Wedge “"“Well, it is you!” he said, quaintly, greeting Jack, as the retiring constable closed the door of the room behind h ”“You wouldn’t have thought so, if you had seen me three hours ago. Jack returned, humorously affecting an injured air. “If you had seen me at Brambledene station, you would have said that 1 was own brother to an Egyptian mummy. Look at my hands, he invited, holding them up .But enough of taking things, lightly, broke off, warming almost angrily. Mr Wedge, some diabolical fiend is at "Strange that he should have uttered words that Tony had already spoken. “There are plenty of them at it, ooserved Wedge. , . “I know,” Jack ran on. But this is vour own particular demon of the tribe, or I’m very much mistaken. Un Monday evening I dined at Almerhurst Rectory. There is a foot-gate into Courtleigh Park on the village hill road, and I had not taken a couple of steps from it. on my way home before I was struck down with a terrific blow. It was dark, of course, but before I entered tlie gate I saw the black lorm ot a motor-car some little way down the road.” . , ~ “Didn’t you take particular notice of it?” asked Wedge curiously. • “No ” Jack ackn oivledged. ‘ It was near tho bottom of the hill, right away from the gate, and I thought sometiiinv was being done to it —something gone" wrong with the ignition, or the gear perhaps. But it was part and parcel of the trap, that’s certain. And there must have been two men in it. The man, who knocked me down, could have run and brought it up to the gate, it’s true; but it is more likely that a second man was pretending to be doing something to it, in ease

anybody came along.” “You’ve got the wisdom of Solomon now it’s all oven—eh?” interjected Wedge drolly. , T 1 “Seems like it,” gruntled Jack. “Anywav, there must have been a conveyance," otherwise I couldn’t have been carried out of the neighbourhood, as I was. I must have had a blow hard enough to make me insensible for an hour, but I have a fancy that they must have poured something between mv teeth to prolong my unconsciousness. The proof of that is that 1 haven’t the least idea of how long 1 was oblivious. It was inky dark when I came to my senses, and my watch had. stopped. But, now, what do you make of iV Mr Wedge They ,ha 4 taken nothing from me, so it wasn t

robbery they weren’t common thieves." . “They would have emptied your pockets where they knocked you down, it they had been,” Wedge commented curiously. CHAPTER XXVI.—EVEN 3DARK- . NESS MAY HAVE ITS SIGNS. 1 ‘Voe, I suppose they would,” Jack agreed, with cold comfort, as he continued his narrative. “Not a peqhy was missing from my pocket—my cigarette and vesta cases..my card case, letters, watch, penknife, and keys; they were all left untouched. Instead of taking anything, they even made me a present. What do you think of these?” he added, producing a cheap pocketflask, and a small chemist’s bottle, from his coat-pocket, and handing them to . Wedge. ‘They evidently thought that, | being drive.n mad, and desperate at last with thirst, I should drain the flask. But I didn’t,” he confided, smiling grimly. “I shouldn’t have been pitch, ihg you this tale here, if I had. Poisonl” “I will keep these,” said Wedgo, briefly, setting down the flask and bottle on his writing-table. “As you see, the phial is only half full,” jack went on. “Their scheme is plain enough. The flask was to tempt me. Though it would have settled me,i there would have been nothing suspicious in it if I had drained it. The only poison left would have been in the bottle; and with that found on me half empty it would have looked as if I had crept into the hole, into which they had dropped me, in order to commit suicide. A nice, pleasant, ingenious trick, I must sav ! They had shut me down with a slab of stone. One night, in about a week, when I was perfectly deal, they would have stolen hack, I suppose, to remove tho lid. Then, all neat and quite natural, I should have been a suicide ‘find’ for anybody who chanced to wander that way in the course of a few weeks or a few months.”

“Very likely," Wedge interjected (To he continued.)