The Room Under the Stairs

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 842, 10 December 1929, Page 5

The Room Under the Stairs

The Baffling Story of a Man Who Read of His Own Murder. By Herman Landon Copyright by G. Howard Watt. Serialised by Ledger Syndicate.

CHAPTER ll.—Continued. He decided that Paul Forrester might as well remain forgotten. To all practical purposes that misguided youth existed only in the sturdy memories of a few Broadwayites and in the files of the metropolitan newspapers. On a promontory overlooking the Hudson River, a short distance back of the Palisades, he found a small roadhouse to-ttering on the brink of decay. “Toy o’ the Hill 1 ’ it was called, and at one time it had enjoyed a widespread if somewhat shady reputation. Dean bought it for a song, made a few necessary ' repairs and improvements that did not impair the musty atmosphere of the place or disturb the ghosts slumbering in the dark corners, engaged a crabbed but efficient housekeeper, and relished keenly the success that gradually came his way. His former acquaintances did not recognise him on his rare trips across the river, and Dean neither sought nor avoided them. The course of his life ran along smoothly until the morning, when he plowed up his newspaper and read Martin Lament's astounding confession. ENTER THE WOMAN “A lady?’’ stammered Dean. A feminine caller at Top O’ the l-lill was something of a rarity. Mrs. Blossom nodded. Though reddish of face and built on copious lines, she gave a curious semblance of fragility. Dean often found himself staring at her as if she were the embodiment of a contradiction. He had an odd felling that she was likely to burst into tears at the most unexpected moment and without the slightest provocation. “Who is she?” he inquired. The housekeeper handed him a card. “Miss Viola Gray,” it read, but the name meant nothing to him. From the card he glanced out of the window and down the sloping hillside to where the Hudson glimmered in the June sunshine. In the distance was the checkered skyline of Manhattan, with here and there a stately minaret thrusting a slender spire into blue ozone. The outlook seemed to give him a fresh grasp on reality, banishing the goblin world into which the article in "The Era” had precipitated Him. ... “All right, I’ll see her,” he declared. “Will you show her into the library, Mrs. Blossom?” With a hint of asperity in her manner, the housekeeper withdrew. Dean, vaguely anticipating an ordeal and instinctively coupling Miss Gray’s call with Martin Lamont’s confession, inspected himself in the mirror. The face reflected in the glass'looked normal and sane with no hint that he had just perused a flabbergasting account of his own demise at the hand of a murderer. From force of habit he tau his fingers along the edge of the upstanding collar to make sure that it concealed the scar. A moment later he entered the library. “Mr. Dean?” spoke a voice out of the dimness of the room, pronouncing the name with a faint, elusive emphasis. He might have only imagined it, but he thought he detected a slight trace of mockery, perhaps even scepticism, implying a doubt as to whether he were really Mr. Dean. With a murmured response he stepped to the window and raised the shades, a detail which the usually thoughtful Mrs. Blossom appeared to have neglected. Theif he turned and saw a slight, kittenish creature seated in the large rustic chair, his own handiwork, which stood beside the typewriter. Her hair, very abundant and of a lustrous flaxen colour, seemed to corral all the sunshine that was flooding the room. A pair of great amber eyes regarded him in frank curiosity. “So that's you,” she said after an interval of silent inspection. “The celebrated Thomas Dean! Do you know, I’ve imagined all along that you would look just as you do?” She had au adorable little mouth,

and it was spraying him with smiles of sentimental admiration. Dean could not quite repress a frown. He thought he knew the type to which Viola Gray belonged, the romantic unsophisticated, ecstatically gushing kind, with a penchant for hero worship and a morbid yearning for adventure. Now and then a letter from one of these distant admirers crept into his mail, only to be dropped into tho wastebasket or answered with a formal note. “Hope- you don’t mind my trespassing,” she went on. “I’ve read every one of your novels, and I think they are simply woifderful. Your characters are splendid, especially the masculine ones —so strong and masterful! I have been wondering if you draw them from life or if you dig them out of your imagination. Sure you don’t mind my intruding like this? You see, 1 found your address in Who’s Who, and I just couldn’t resist the temptation to drop in and look you over.” Dean essayed a smile, but inwardly he cursed the publishers of a certain obese, red-covered volume that stood among other reference books on his library shelves. He studied Miss

Gray with a professional eye, appraising her as character material for his new novel. At any rate, the morning would not be entirely wasted. Perhaps she would fit in as the heroine of a love episode. He noted the effect of the trim navy-blue suit that covered her slight, vivacious figure and of the jaunty, close-fitting turban with its black-and-white satin folds formed an inverted V over the centre of the forehead, giving her face something of an Oriental look. “Do you work in this room?” she asked, glancing at tho hooded typewriter as if it were an object of sublimity. “Yes, this is the scene of my crimes,” Dean dryly admitted. “I just knew it! The room- is chock full of inspiration. And this darling old house! I can imagine hearing all kinds of queer noises "at night. No wonder you get so many creeps into your stories. Do tell me about your characters. Do you take them from life?” “Only in part. Some of them require a lot of brushing up and disguising. People as a rule would not be flattered if they should recognise the resemblance.” “Do you think so? I should think they would be delighted. I think it would be perfectly thrilling to see myself tripping across the pages of a book written by you.” Her big amber eyes shone with enthusiasm, but suddenly Dean became conscious of a contradiction, something similar to what he occasionally felt in Mrs. Blossom’s presence. All at once it came to him that she would not do as the simple and adorable heroine of a love story. There was a complexity, even a suggestion of a duality, in her nature that had eluded him at first, but which gradually insinuated itself into his senses with a light and vaguely disturbing touch. If he used her at all, it would be in a different role, perhaps as a sly and artful adventuress whose apparent naivette and youthful allure were merely a mask concealing heaven only knew what dark and sinister designs. “Would you really?” he asked, more

interested now, but also correspondingly vigilant. Then, in a playful humour, he decided to put her to a little test. “And what kind of role would you prefer to play?” “I don’t know,” she confessed; then considered gravely. “Something like Sheila Sand in ‘Crossroads,’ maybe. 1 think ‘Crossroads’is the best of your novels, and Sheila is a perfectly adorable character.” Dean nodded absently. It was odd that her judgment should coincide with his in regard to “Crossroads.” He had always thought it was the best of his products, notwithstanding the fact that he had expended the least amount of time and labour on it. “Why do you prefer ‘Crossroads’ to the others?” he asked. “Oh, I hardly know. Not so'much because of Sheila’s part in it as on account of the hero, Jimmie Ferguson. I think a man is always more interesting than a woman, anyway. Don’t you ? T could just love a man like Jimmie Ferguson. That scene in the lonely cabin in the woods is the most thrilling thing I ever read. I sat up most of the night to finish it.” Dean gave her a long, intent look. A flickering shadow of uneasiness crossed his face. He had a curious feeling that the mask was slowly slipping away from her. It was odd that she should have singled out that particular scene. Not until the book was off the presses had Dean realised how closely it paralleled his own terrific experience in the icy hills of Colorado. The ashen face of the dead trapper must have drifted in and out of his subconscious mind while he wrote it. For weeks after the publication of the book he had lived in fear that some one might recognise the author in the hero. But as time passed and nothing happened, he saw the absurdity of his misgivings. It was extremely unlikely, after all, that any one of his readers would have heard of the episode iii the trapper’s cabin, much less associated it with the author of "Crossroads.” Paul Forrester was dead, to all practical purposes, and the tragic fate of the trapper had accompanied him into oblivion. CHAPTER 111 MISS GRAY, THE MYSTERIOUS “It made such an impression on me I could think of nothing else for days,” Miss Gray went on in enraptured tones. “I could picture Jimmie Ferguson as he rushed out of the cabin to find a doctor. And that blizzard! It was so real it positively made me cold all over. And there was Jimmie Ferguson lost in it for days, not knowing whether he had left the man in the cabin dead or alive. How perfectly splendid he was through it all! I cried in sympathy with him. Honestly Mr. Dean, didn’t you take that scene from life?” Dean gave her another keen look, then smiled. “That question doesn’t leave much credit to my imagination, Miss Gray.” “But it was so real I don’t see how you could have taken it out of your imagination.” “An author’s chief task is to make the unreal seem real.” She pondered this for a moment. “It sounds dreadfully difficult, but I suppose that’s so. . Anyhow, Jimmie Ferguson is real to me. I shan't ever forget how he felt about the scar on his cheek, always trying to hide it, and always imagining that everybody was looking at it. I suppose a man in his position would feel just that way about it.” “Doubtless,” said Dean noncommittally, almost certain now that there was a deeper purpose behind her questions. He was fervently wishing that he had consigned the manuscript of “Crossroads” to the flames. What au ass he had been to expose Paul Forrester's secret with such a reckless fidelity to facts! He thought he had disguised the truth but the disguise was too thin. He had merely shifted the scar from Paul Forrester’s neck to Jimmie Ferguson’s cheek, and the rest was little more than a juggling with names and places. Strange that no one had seen through such shallow dissimulation before. He was almost sure now that this trifling

chit of a girl, as she appeared to be at first glance, had seen through it. “I'm afraid I am boring you with all these silly questions,” she answered contritely, then rose and came closer to where he sat. “You have destroyed an illusion of mine, Mr. Dean,” she added with a pout. “I had been imagining that Jimmie Ferguson was you.”

“Indeed?” His eyes narrowed a trifle as he saw her at close range. The child receded into the background as the woman came forward. She seemed more mature now, and there was a furtive glint of shrewdness in the depths of her eyes. "I can’t believe it,” he added. “Illusions don’t die so easily. They generally survive us — some of them do, at least. If you have taken a fancy to Jimmie Ferguson, you ought to be thankful that he is made of sturdier stuff than flesh and bones.” “That's a charming way of putting

it.” She smiled brightly and the candour of her smile clashed .oddly with his new conception of her. “Let me come again, won't you? And do call me up when you are in town and take me out for tea somewhere. I’ll teach you the latest steps and bore you to death with a lot of foolish questions. That’s a threat and a promise in one.” She laughed gayly, and in a moment she was on her way. Dean, standing at the front door, saw her drive off in a racy little roadster she had parked just outside the gate. He shook his head bewilderedly as he re-entered the house. He did not know which was the more puzzling—Martin Lamont's confession or the personality of little Miss Gray. Why had she come, and what had she accomplished? Did she suspect that he was Paul Forrester and, if so, what did she propose to do about it? What did Paul Forrester mean to her? Dean didn't know what to think of her. The mind inside her

pretty little head seemed to work in strange ways, a veritable Pandora's box of surprises. But the dominant impression she had left with him was that of an adventuress treading dark and mysterious paths.

Late in the afternoon he instructed Mrs. Blossom to pack his bag, announcing that he was going to New York and might not be back that night. (To be continued tomorrow.)