A Short Story.

Rodney and Otamatea Times, Waitemata and Kaipara Gazette, 21 August 1912, Page 6

A Short Story.

(All Rights Reserved.) THE BLIND ROAD.

By A. ST. JOHN ADCOCK, Author of "An Unfinished Martydom," Beyond Atonement," "In the Image of God," "Song of the War." "More than Money," &c.

A cautious, hesitating knock at the door, but Robert Tadlow, leaning over his table, writing busily, did not hear it. He did not hear it because his small office was a very hive of sound, humming with other noises; with the muffled whirr of big wheels, and the pulse and throb and thump of machinery, for above and beside and beneath him were the rooms and works of the prosperous wholesale ,cabinet- making business of which Mr. Tadlow was sole proprietor. Nobody in the neighborhood knew much about him, except that he had come from Liverpool some fourteen years ago, that he lived in a spacious old-fashioned mansion not far from his factory, that he was reserved and gloomy of manner, but eminently respectable, a sidesman of his church, and noted for his rigid religious ob-

servances and liberal benefactions. You might pass up and down the Kentish Town-road every day for a dozen years and never suspect that you were passing within less than a stones-throw of Robert Tadlow's premises. They lay just off the main toad, in a short, squalid cul-de-sac. At the end of it rose the double doors of his woodyard, and on the left, before you came to the yard, were two ancient, low-browed shops and houses knocked into one, with "Robert Tadlow, Cabinet Maker," blazoned across the fronts of them. A Robert Tadlow had carried on business there for nearly a hundred years past; it was an honoured and distinguished name in the district, and when the last of the line, fallen on evil days, sold the whole concern to* a stranger nobody was much surprised that the newcomer should quietly efface himself, and adopt the name of his predecessor in private life as well as in public. A snug, safe business, tucked away out of sight in a snug, safe corner, and yet in these latter weeks Mr. Tadlow had gone to it of morning and come from it of an evening haunted by a secret dread that some day now the one man he feared might see him in his going or coming, or might turn aside out of the long main road, and chance to discover him. And one dull, misty autumn evening, it happened as he had feared. A stooping, shabby man—hollow-eyed, grim visaged—detached himself from the passing crowd, paused to peer up and read the name on the glimmering lamp at the entrance to the cul-de-sac, then flitted into that obscure by-way with the assured air of one on a definite errand.

Outside the squat shop>-fronts of Robert Tadlow he paused again, and, glancing furtively around to satisfy himself that he was not observed, moved on to the narrow strip of pavement, and looked cautiously in at the window. The shop was crammed with skeleton furniture; chairs and couches without seats, sideboards without backs, unglazed book-cases, mirrorless overmantles. Far in the rear there were lights flaring, and he had a glimpse of men at work over benches, of wheels turning, of an endless band running at a great pace from the floor at one end up through the ceiling at the other; but the shop itself was in darkness, except for one feeble gas-jet and the light that filtered in from the workroom at the back. The shop-door was open, and, after a momentary hesitation, he walked softly in, advanced through the wilderness of furniture, without meeting anyone, saw a narrow flight of stairs opening from a shadowy corner of the shop, and, quickening his pro«rres^, went noiselessly up them to a floor above. He found himself in a dimly-lit, many-doored passage. The first door he came to was ajar, and shewed him a littered room, with half a dozen clerks in it; but the secJfe door was close shut, ar*d he read on its panels, painted in thick black lettering "Mr. Robert Tadlow—Private." With a swift, eager survey of the passage,* the stranger stepped promptly to the second door, and listening, rapped lightly with his knuckles.

This was the knock that Mr. Tadlow had not heard. Getting no reply, or hearing none through tne hum and throb of the machinery, the visitor warily turned the handle and entered; he closed and locked the door behind him, and remained for a minute staring silently on the man who was writing'at the table, and as yet had no knewledge of his presence. It was a gloomy, melancholy face that was bent above the table—greybearded, scanty-haired, the face of a man whose prosperity had brought him no happiness—but the sight of it touched the intruder with nothing of pity. As he stood and stared at it a fierce hatred and exultation so rioted in his blood that for a minute the beating of his heart was like a noise of hammers in his ears, and deafened him to the throb and beat of the machinery. Then he glided forward, and had reached the opposite side of the table before the other became aware of him, and glanced up scared, and ejaculated: "Who are you? What are you doing here?" The other remained dumb, a sinister grin distorting his haggard features. "Who are you?" Mr. Tallow re-

peated, sharply. "What do you want " "More than you will care to give" said the stranger, with a husky chuckle. "Look at me, man!" A light of madness glittered into his eyes, and a discord of anger and bitterness grated in his tone. "You've changed, but I know you. I've changed, but you've as good reason to remember me as I have to remember you. Look at me! George Howard, you scoundrel, have you forgotten John Denver?"

Mr. Tadlow had recognised him from the first, but been doubtful how to act; now, however, seeing what he saw in the man's eyes, hearing what he heard in his voice, he delayed no longer. He crashed his hand down on the bell on his table, and sprang to his feet. At the same instant a shot rang out, and he felt something sting his left arm, and in a flash he was alive only with the one thought that he was fighting for his life.

He ducked and flung the table cvei as the revolver spat a second time and' missed \h\inv, then he had his enemy by the wrist and by the throat; there was a brief, frenzied struggle, but he was" the larger, more

muscular man of the two, and when a third shot was fired the revolver was in his hand, and it was he that had fired it. He had fired in the heat of conflict, not thinking what he was doing, and all of a sudden there was blood ton the face of his assailant, the man's figure g. rew i imp and he]p . less in his grasp, and when he loosed it he sank in a tragic heap on the floor.

This and a babble of voices in the passage outside, a furious rattling at the handle of the door, thrilled and steadied him. By a desperate effort he collected himself, and strove to realise the significance of the situation. If the man was dead and his identity were known, or if he lived and could spread his story abroad, it would mean scandal and shame, and possibly ruin, or even worse. The voices without and >.he banging on his door were insistent; his-mind was all in confusion; he must have time to consider; he must not let his secret get blown, if it could by any means be helped, and acting on this blind impulse of self-preservation he dropped the revolver, raised the inert Wy, and huddling it into the only cupboard in the room, locked it in, and pocketed the key. Then swiftly, almost without a sound, he flung up the window, deliberately laid himself down beside his overturned table, and, answering the excited outcries of his clerks, bade them break the door in. The room shook with the violence of their efforts to obey him, and at length, with a crisp crackle and rending of wood, the door burst in, and clerks and workmen come tumbling over each other to his rescue.

"I've been shot," said Mr. Tadlow, feebly, lifting his left arm, from which blood was trickling. "Some rascally thief got into the place, and tried to murder me. I snatched his revolver, and I believe I hit him, but he gave me the slip. He's gone—jumped out of the window. Help me to my chair, and run for a surgeon to bind up this wound. It's nothing much. I shall be all right presently. Fetch me some brandy, one of you." -

Mr. Tadlow said nothing about calling in the police, but one of his clerks took upon himself to do so, and for half-an-hour after his office had been restored to order, and the surgeon who came to bind the trifling injury on his arm was gone, he had to sit there calmly recounting what had happened, for the information of a fussy inspector, and all the while listening apprehensively for any stir of life from the cupboard that would baffle all his precautions and bring upon him the exposure he was scheming to avert.

"I can't describe the man to you, officer," he said for the second time. "I never saw him in my life before. How he got in I do not know. He was either half drunk or half mad; he made his way up here, and was taken aback at seeing me. Robbery was his motive—no doubt of that; and directly I saw him and started up, he evidently thought he would make a fight for it—seemed to loose his head, and fired at me without a word. J closed with him and got the pistol away, and fired it, and I believe I hit him. I must have fallen faint from the shock of my wound, and he simply slipped past me, threw up the window and was gone in a moment. There is" a shed just under the window, I fancy he must have jumped on to- the roof of that, and so dropped to the ground, and scaled the gate of the woodyard. Some of my men climbod out that way and hunted for him, but found no trace anywhere. He is clean gone. You had better take the revolver, I suppose, and see what you can do. I am not vindictive, and really care very little about putting myself to the trouble of prosecuting him; but, of course, I am content to leave the matter in your hands, and do as you may advise. The poor wretch looked ill and starving, and if my shot went home he is sufficienty punished, to my thinking."

"Ah, you're too easy, Mr. Tadlow," said the inspector. "We've had two or three bad cases round here lately— shouldn't be surprised if this fellow was one of a gang, and if I can lay him by the heels I will. You can't help me with any description of him sir? You'd know him again, I take it, if you was to see him?"

"I doubt it," Mr. Tadlow reflected, and shook his head. "I might; and anyhow, I shall do my utmost to identify him if you catch any suspectbut, personally, I have neither the time nor the inclination to be mixed up in a worrying police-court affair " The inspector, however, was resolute He leant out the window to examine the roof of the outhouse below he stepped out on to it, and clambered thence into the woodyard, and spent some time poking about in the dark and shining his lantern into divers likely and unlikely hiding-places; and all the time Mr. Tadlow was quaking and hearkening for sound from the cupboard.

At length, when the inspector had examined all x h e wanted to, and gathered all"the information obtainable, he took his departure, carrying the revolver with him, and Mr Tad'ow breathed more freely. (Completion nexfc week.)

Life is a campaign, not a battle and has its defeats as well as its victories.

The first, as indeed the last, nobility in education is to rule over our thoughts; j34