The Half-closed Door.

Otago Witness, Issue 3522, 13 September 1921, Page 46

The Half-closed Door.

THE NOVELIST.

[Published by Special Arrangement.]

By J. B. HARRIS- B URL A N D. Author of “The Black Moon,” “The Poison League.” “The White Rook,” etc., etc. CHAPTER NYU. 1“ or a few moments Dick Felling stared at Susan (broad in -amazement. She was so briihant an apparition in that dingy little room that she hardly seemed real, lhe slatternly landlady stood in the background and there was disapproval mingled with amazement in the woman's eves. Then the door closed. “My dear Susie,” said Felling. “What oil earth brings you here?” She did not answer for a few moments. Her eyes seemed to be taking in the meanness of the little room. “I doa t like underdone eggs,” she said at last. “Do you? Oil, a man is a poor tiling when he is left to himself. May 1 sit down?” “Oh yea, please do —I'm sorry. But you rather startled me.” _ She seated herself in the most comfortable chair. She was weaving a very charming and expensive evening dress of some soft black material embroidered with silver. Her cloak was of orange silk lined with gold brocade. Her face war, flushed, and she was breathing quickly, as though she had suddenly undergone come great exertion. But slie had only walked from the taxicab, still waiting outside, to the room. ‘T thought I’d better have it straight out with you, Dick,’ ’she said after a pause. “lour wife has been to sec me. ft appears that you have told her everything.” “-My wife has been to see you! Why, she left for Folkestone this morning with her mother.” Oh, no, illy dear Dick. She called to see me this afternoon. What a pretty girl she is.” les, he answered absent-mindedly. “I suppose one would call her a pretty gRj-’’ 'And so strong minded and capable, Dick. Did you realise that when vou told her everything, you were betraying me and the others?’’ “She won’t do anything, Susie.” “She’s done a good deal already, mv dear fellow. She’s threatened me with exposure unless I can stand between vou arid the others. And you know I can’t uo that. I don’t even know where they are now. . They’ve moved—all three of them. Dick, you’ve put everyone in a very awkward position. I’m your friend and you know it. And now your wife is t-fviug to turn me into an enemy. My ears are still burning—she doesn’t mince matters. Oh, she was fine, I can tell you, from a spectacular point- of view. But when one comes down to commonsense —she’s made a fool of herself.” “I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I told her that she was not to' interfere in this matter, and I thought she’d gone safely off to Folkestone.” Susan Croad took a cigarette case from her bag, and opened it. A our wife is a very determined vo-ung woman,” she said. “1 doubt if you can manage her. And the worst of it is she has got it into her head that there is something between us—that you are in love with me, or I was in love with you, or some rubbish of that sort. Well, that’s the kind of thing that makes a woman see red. I should feel like that.” Dick Felling shrugged his shoulders. M hat can I do : he asked in a. voice of despair. “But she can’t hurt you, Susie—there is no proof.” “She can make it very unpleasant for me. Look here, Dick, 'l’ve got friends even if you're not among them. And I’ve got a husband. And he'll be dragged into this. Do you think he’ll go down v. it lie, at lighting? Hell kill you if vou betrayed him. I hate the brute, but* he is a terrible enemy. Even if he were in prison, he’d get his hands oil vou.” m not afraid of being murdered,” -said Polling with a laugh. “I can look after myself, Susie. It’s vou I’m worrying about-. 1 was a fool to have told my wife the truth.” “It is generally very foolish to tell the truth, Dick. But this is worse than folly. You have betrayed me—you have betrayed all of. us. Well you’ve just got to put things right.” She took a cigarette from her case and lit it. “What do you want me to do?” he asked after a pause. “Put your foot down,” she answered simply. “Make it absolutely plain to your wife that you will never forgive her if she drags me into this business. Threaten to leave her.” “To leave her!” he echoed. “Yes—there can be no half measures. And it is only a question of words. If tlie threat is strong enough—if she sees that you mean what you say, she will give in. Dick, for pity’s sake ! You can’t let me suffer because others threaten you with exposure. Look how I have behaved to yon all along. It was I who protected you in the Bextable affair. Surely you’re not going to—to sacrifice me now.” She covered her face with her hands. She made him feel a brute. He owed her so much, and he had repaid it by giving her away. Most certainly she should not suffer for Ids folly. He saw now —only too clearly—that his confession had been the act of n traitor. Ho need not have mentioned this woman’s name at all. But the words had come tumbling out of his lips. In his eagerness to tell tho truth, he had involved Susan Croad

in ruin. The strain of secrecy had been too "reat for him. When at last he hau confessed, it iiad been like the bursting of a darn. . “I ought not to have mentioned your name, Susie,’’ he said after a pause. I must do all I can ior you I rhad certainly insist on ntv wife taking no part in this business.” Susan Croad rose from her chair. There were no tears in her eyes, but her face was flushed. “And I,” she said, holding out her hand, “I will do what I can for you, Dick. But it’s little- enough. My husband and the others are quite beyond my control. Still I may be able to do something.” Her hand held his for a few moments, and then she hurried from the room. As she stepped into the cab, with the light of a street lamp full upon her, she did net see a man standing a few yards, away from her on the pavement. And if she had seen him, she would not have remembered his face. “I will destroy him,” she said to herself as she drove hack to Mexham Hill. The flames of her fury were burning so fiercely that they threatened to consume her. She had acted her part well enough before Dick Felling, but now that she was alone she clenched her hands and trembled from head to fcot. She hated him now as she had never hated him before. He was a traitor. He had betrayed her to his wife—to a woman who would not hesitate to put tHe police mi her track, lie should have no mercy now —even if his downfall meant her own ruin. And his wife should have no mercy. The little spitfire—the little fool! Susan Croad leant back in the corner of the taxicab and laughed. All the womanliness in her seemed to be dead. She could not believe now that she had ever loved this man—so terribly did she hate him. A few minutes after she recalled home there was a ring at the bell, and she admitted her husband. He seemed to be in the best of spirits until she told him -about Richard Polling. Then he flung himself into a chair and scowled, and stroked his beard. “This is a man’s job,” Jie said. “You’ve made a pretty mess of it —you and the other fools. The Boy’s not got the diamonds.” “That- doesn’t matter now,” she replied; “lie's given us all away—you and I, Arthur. We’re in the hands of a wretched girl.” Croad lit a cigarette, drank half a tumbler of whisky, and rose from his chair, after three minutes of silence. “A pack of fools !” he growled “and I’ve got to deal with the lot of you. You’ve got no information out of Charles Blindon, ch?” “None, Arthur. I hinted at what the insurance company might think of the matter, and he just laughed at me. He wasn’t a bit confused. I watched him carefully.” “Well, he has the diamonds. We’ll deal with him later. You can leave everything to me. I’ll have a talk with the others.” “You know where they are?” ‘“Yes, I know—or rather where they will be a week from now, if they can keep clear of the police.” “Where will they be, Arthur?” lie laughed and shrugged his great shoulders. “It’s better for you not to know,” he this job—l’ve got to shut the mouths of lools who talk too much.” “You won’t shut Mrs Felling's mouth unless you choke the life out of her.” “I don't think it will come to that, Susie. I hope not. Don’t you be afraid.” He lumbered out of the house, and Susan Croad sat alone in the silence. She feared nothing—except that she might fail in her revenge. CHAPTER XVIII. The net was closing in on Dick Polling, though he could neither see nor hear the stealthy movements of his enemies. He did not know, for instance, that he had already given Detective Inspector Sanderson a clue that might, sooner or later, connect him with the gang. He knew, of course, that Sanderson had met him in the company of Sam Felton, an accidental meeting that it had been so easy to explain. In itself, that had been nothing, but added to another trifling incident, it had formed the nucleus of a theory, as yet vage and unsupported byreal evidence, but threatening disaster in Lhe future. For Sanderson was the man who had seen Susan Croad leave the little house m Gletton street, and Sanderson had recognised her as the woman who had come forward in answer to the advertisement in The Times, and had given conclusive and apparently honest evidence that she had dropped her hag in Kensington Gardens, and that it- had been (licked up by one of the three men who had returned it to her. The chain of evidence was slight enough —no more, as yet, than a mere thread. But Sanderson, keeping the information to himself and unwilling to drag his old officer and comrade into a criminal affair before it was absolutely certain that Felling had any connection with file matter, saw infinite possibilities in that tiny thread. It was like the piece of string that draws in a length of cord— a cord that is strong enough to pull in a rope sufficiently thick for a man to come ashore from a sailing vessel. Only in this ease tho rope was not intended to save life, but to destroy it. Richard Polling, entirely ignorant of Sanderson’s suspicions, gave no thought to the police. His whole mind was occupied with the thieves who had intended to ruin him, if he did not hand them over tho diamonds. He cursed the day lie had invented the silly story in order to gain time. Tie could not possibly sub stantiate it. Sooner or later he would have their hands on his throat. Even if they discovered that he knew nothing about the diamonds, they would punish him for making fools of them.

__ On September 2nd he went do*u Ao Folkstone for a week-end ox-d had u very unpleasant interview with .Sis wife. She had, of course, put herself entirely in the wrong, but she stuck to her guns. Ha pointed out to her his owli disloyalty to the woman who had—so he believed—been always loyal to him. But lie could not move her from her purpose. And then he threatened. “It you do this. Mary,” he said, ‘ it simply means the break in of everything so far as you and 1 are concerned.’ She looked at him with horror for a moment, and then she turned on her heel and lelt the room. Veil, that was not a very pleasant incident to start with, and it was followed by several days in which iiis mind was I constantly torn between two forces —the j loss ot his wife and the absolute necesj sity of protecting Susan ( road. I And then, one morning, three days bej fore his next meeting with Sam Felton, he i read in the paper that Trilliek had recovered his memory, and given a full description of the two men who had enj tered the office. It was obvious that they I would be recognised at once and arrested if ; they could be found. They would no j longer have any time to argue with him, or ; persecute him. They would he too busy I with their own affairs. But if they were | caugnt they would certainly betray him, j and it was not unlikely that they" would | give away Susan Croad and her husband, now that the two sections of the gang had I parted company. j _ it seemed to him as he read and considered this astonishing piece of news, that j the difficulties of his position had been | accentuated, lie had never been able to see his way very clearly, hut now he was | groping in absolute darkness. This new j turn in the tide ot events might bear him to safety or to destruction. If the men could escape the search of the police he, Richard Felling, would have nothing further to fear irom them. On the other hand, if they were caught and convicted, they would not hesitate to drag him into tile matter. His own fairy story would he told against him. He would be sentenced for his share in the Bextable burglary, and suspected of complicity in the Blindon affair. He would be lucky if he got off with five years’ penal servitude. Two days later he read of the arrest of Susan Croad, and then, at last, it seemed as though no avenue of escape were left open for him. He read the account of her examination by the magistrates. There was nothing against her but the fact that she had provided the three criminals with an | alibi, when it was known that two of them j had visited Blindon and Co’s offices at the j very hour she had met them in Kensington Gardens. She never gave way an inch. She stuck to her story without flinching. She denied, on oath, that she had ever met any of the three men before or since. She had answered an advertisement in the Times, and one of the men, Sam Felton, had written to her. She had replied to his letter, and had said that she well remembered the incident. That was all. She had not”seen the man since. She could not say whether they were the identical men she had met. Photographs were handed to her, and she said “I really don’t think those were the men. But clothes make such a difference) don’t they? ” She cleared herself completely from a legal point of view—and there was even some applause in the Court. But Richard Felling could read between the lines. He knew that the police would not rest until they had ferreted out her past history. They might or might not find out that she was the wife of Arthur Croad. But, in any case, they would prove her to be a liar, if they went back far enough. The foundation of her whole position rested on the | fact that she was a widow and engaged to ! be married to Charles Blindon. It was hardly likely that a woman would be concerned in the theft of her fiance’s property. Marriage wo-uld have given her so much greater share in it than she could have obtained as a member of a gang of thieves. But Dick Felling saw the danger—the rock that lay ahead of Susan Croad. Well, at any rate, she could rely on him. If he I could silence his wife, he would do so. But that was the most horrible part of the whole business —that he and his wife sfiomd be fighting against each other. But there was worse to come. On the evening of September 9, Mr Sanderson called. . ~ “Thought I‘d just look you up, sir, he said, “and have a pipe. Things are a bit oui-et just now.” “Oh. are they?” laughed Felling. es, I’m glad to see you, Sanderson. I’m all a l one ; m v wife is'down at Folkestone with her people. 1 can't get away. A pity. It s such jolly weather. ‘Vi can't net nway either, sir, said the detective. And then he did a very gentleman! v thing. He might have easily have begun to talk about the arrest of. “Mrs Hibberd,” and have induced Felling to pretend absolute ignorance of “Mrs Hibberd.” As a detective, that would have been Mr Sanderson’s duty, for it would at imC e have shown him that Felling had something to conceal. But Mr Sanderson, loathe t-o play such tricks on a gallant officer, juet said : “I’m busy over this Blindon case, sir, and I want vou to help me. 1 believe you know Mrs Hibberd” “Yes.” Felling replied with a snnle, “ \nd I don’t think any the better of you, Sanderson, for persecuting a good woman like that.” “Well. sir. if you read the report of the proceedings you will see we had good ! Mrs Hibberd is going to marry Charles Blindon. She dropped her hag, and these men came up to her —one of the men with the bag in his hand. She saw an advertisement in the Times, and she' answered it.” “But how could they have worked the job, without squaring her, sir?” “Well, I look at it like this,” said Polling. “Only two men are concerned in the burglary so far as you know. The third was in Kensington Cardens, with two friends, and he picked up tho bag.

He saw a possible chance of proving an alibi for Sam. Felton and Peter Woolf. He thought it very unlikely that tne unknown lady would remember the faces of the men. He drew a bow at a venture and hit the mark. That’s how 1 look at it, Sanderson. But Mrs Hibberd needs no champion. She is well known at Alcxham Hill.’’ “And you, sir?” queried the detective. “When did you first meet Mrs Hibberd?” “Oh, soon" after 1 came back from the front,” Belling replied without hesitation. “We were very great friends at one time.” “I see,” said Mr Sanderson. And he really thought that he did see. There had been some sort of a love affair between Pelling and Mrs Hibberd. And then Pelling had married another woman. And Mrs Hibberd had called to see him while his wile was away. It was all very simple. 'Then Sanderson —and it was so unlike Mr Sanderson —laid all his cards oil the table. “I saw her coming out of this house, sir, he said, “not very long ago. Of course I did not know she had been to see YOU. But I suppose that was the case. ’ Pelling said to hmicelf, “By jove, chat was a lucky escape, ’ and then aloud Yes —I remember. She was on her way to some reception, I think, and she looked me up to ask my advice on a certain private matter. Sanderson, I can t say you’ve treated poor Mrs Hibberd very well. The people at Mexham Mill are very particular, and I've no doubt you ve ruined her reputation there, though you couldn't prove her an accomplice of those scoundrels. And I ask you, Sanderson, is she the sort of woman who could have anything to do with a gang of criminals?” Mr Sanderson laughed. “I’m afraid we did make a mistake, sir,” he said, “but outward appearances don't count for very much. One of the pleasantest and most refined tnen I ever met was a murderer.” For a few moments there was silence, and then Polling said “I wonder you haven’t ,had your eye on me—a clerk in Blindon's office.” “Well, sir, I think if you d been in the game, you’d have stayed on as clerk. It would have made it so much easier for them.” “There's something in that,” laughed Telling. “And then again, sir,” the detective continued. “We’ve fought together, and I know the stuff you’re made off. Still ling’s face. “You think there’s a chance of my guilt, eh?” No, sir. I wasn’t thinking that. But. I've known more than one innocent man get mixed up in a queer iob —get drawn into it against his will, so to speak. And then he’s got a scare, and the others have kept a tight hold on him.” Mr Sanderson paused and refilled his pipe. It almost seemed as though he were waiting for Pelling to make some confession. But Pelling only said, “A fellow like that would be a weak fool, and would deserve all he got.” “Well, sir, if ever you get info a scrape don’t give way an inch. Just go to the police, and. if you’re innocent, no harm will come to you.” Ah, you gave me that advice before — about blackmail.” “It’s a good motto, sir—for life. ‘Don't give way an inch.’ It applies in most things.” He turned the conversation to other matters, and half an hour later he rose fiom his chair and held cut his hand to Pelling. “Good night, sir,” he said, “and don’t forget that I'm your friend if ever you want one.” Pelling made some jesting reply about r. policeman being the best friend in the world for a criminal. But he gripped Sanderson's hand hard, and it was not until the detective had departed that Pelling realised that it was just possible that Sanderson might make a good deal out of that earnest grip of the band. “The dear old chap,” be said to him self. “He suspects I can heln him, and yet he doesn’t want to hurt me.” And, rembering bis conversation with Sanderson, he saw how very gently the detective had dealt with him. So many traps might have been set, and lie would have blundered into one of them. But he knew that Sanderson could not save him, if Susan Croacl’s past history were ever dragged out into the light. Nor would there be a chance of escape if either of the three criminals were captured. CHAPTER XIX. At half-past eleven Dick Pelling wont into his bedroom. It was a very warm night, with thunder in the air, and he opened his window wide before he got into bed. For a little while he made no attempt to sleep. The sounds of London had died away into silence. His thoughts were active, and he found that he could think very clearly in the quietude of the night. Then he heard the distant rattling of thunder, and a fierce wind stirred the leaves of the stunted trees in the garden. And then there came the pattering of rain on the Virginia creeper that covered the back of the house. “I suppose 1 ought to close the window,” he said to himself. But he shrank from shutting out the little air that came in from the garden. And, after all, there was nothing that the rain could spoil. He closed his eves, anti though of his wife. He wondered if the storm was raging at Folkestone, or whether it was a calm, clear starlight night. Then he beard a faint sound that was neither the wind nor the pattering of rain. The room was in darkness, and, as he sat up sharply in lied, he culd see nothing. The window was just visible as a square of grey that was almost as dark as the walls. He listened, and stretched out liis band for the matchbox which lay on the chair bv the side of the hed. As his fingers closed upon it a band gripped his wrist. (To be Continued.)