THE CLUE

Sun (Christchurch), Volume III, Issue 829, 6 October 1916, Page 3

THE CLUE

§3 [All rights reserved.] S3

iSSSfi By OLIVE WADSLEY S^Sll Author of " The Flame " " Burnt Wings, " fi-.c.

CHAPTER XXll.—(Continued.) WITHIN AN INCH OF DEATH. lie lean forward and stared at Val, and Val saw that his face hail lost it's jolly inconsequence, it's usual air of

bonhomie, and looked dogged. lie, too, leant forward. "Tickey," he said, "word of honour, did you or didn't you send Doris the note? Do you know anything whatever about it"?"

"No, I don't," Tickey said shortly, "and it seems to me you might have known me better than to suspect me of doing a dirty trick like that, after all you'd said this morning." "I apologise," Val said instantly. "I'm most awfully sorry. 1 ask your pardon."

"That's all right," Tickey said gruffly, his face clearing as if by magic. "You see," Val said perplexedly, "it was like this. I added up who knew about Doris's and my engagement, and then I eliminated the ones who could not send notes, and only you and Lulu romained, and so, being rather angry about the whole thing, in a moment of liot-headedness I fixed on you." "Lulu—Miss Conway'd never send it," Tickey said he smiled a little sheepishly at Val. "Sweet, little soul, she is," he added ingenuously. "Who? Oh, Lulu, you mean. Yes, she's as straight as they make 'em," A r al said absently. "She'd never send a letter like that, I know." "It's rum, this sort of thing —T mean in our day. Seems bo sort of mediieval to send these blood-curdling messages suddenly. What d'vou make of it, Val?" ' "I don't know," Val said rather wearily. "I don't know what to think." "Know anyone who's got a down on you for anything?" Tickey continued. "Have you got an enemy who would like to do you down?" "Can't think of a single person, man or woman, whom I could call an enemy,' Val said. " It's such a dirty trick to try and get your gir! away from you," Tickey said. "And it is so cleverly put. Sort of thing that'll really make a nervous girl likely to give you up." "Doris isn't that sort, thank God," Val said, quickly. "But she was pretty upset," he added. "Don't wonder," Tickey said. He seemod very much impressed by the note; he looked shyly at Val. "LEI were you," he said, "I'd consult Miss Conway. She seemed awfully smart and clever to me, and you say she's the only other person who counts who knows about the engagement." "I don't see how she could help," Yal said, moodily. "But I'll tell her,

CHAPTER XXIII. WAS IT AN ACCIDENT? Val was conscious that the feeling of (sickness which means faintness was iipon him. He walked unsteadily to the pavement, and caught hold of some area railings. All the while, whilst the I queer black wave seemed to dance ami recede before his eyes he was trying to laugh at himself. "You silly idiot," he heard his own voice whisper. "Buck up, pull yourself together, you aren't hurt." Someone was speaking to him, he realised; he recognised Lulu's voice. "It did hurt you, knock you, didn't it?" she said. Her cool, (inn hand caught his in a friendly, comforting clasp. "Come up with me for an instant, Val," she said. "Come into the hall anyway, and let me rush up and get my brandy flask." He walked up the stone steps into the hall. It was rather dark and smelt of paraffin, but. it was warm, and it gave because of its warmth, a sense of comfort. He sat down in one of the chairs that stood stiffly against the wall. Lulu had vanished, but she seemed to re-ap-pear in a miraculously short time. She had fetched her travelling flask and a small glass.

"But, you know, I'm all right!" Yal said. "In fact, I am a fraud, I feel so fit now, I don't need any brandy at all." He took a very little, because she had gone to the trouble of fetching it, and he was grateful for her sympathy and did not want to appear churlish. "It's an extraordinary thing," he said thoughtfully. "I never ever heard that car. It must have been an awfully silent one. Odd that it didn't hoot; nearly every car hoots turning that corner."

"The oddest thing about that car," Lulu said quietly "was that it came round the corner slowly, and only when you crossed seemed to gather speed." "That was queer," Val agreed. "It was so queer that it looked as if a signal had been given to it when to put on pace," Lulu said meditatively. Her meaning did not dawn on Val. She looked at him .sharply to see if he was at all conscious of her remark in any special way, but he appeared not to be. He was lighting a cigarette. He put his case back into his pocket, and, as he did so, he touched his notebook, and when he did that he remembered the note and Tickey's advice. "I saw a friend of yours this evening," he said, smiling a little at the remembrance of Tickey's interest and earnest discussion. "Guess whom."

She lives in the house next door to where I have my rooms, you know." "I took her home," Tickey volunteered.

"Val laughed, trying to throw off his depression. "Did you, indeed! Quick work, you young Don Juan!'' "She's a jolly nice girl," Tickey said, smiling seraphically at nothing. "And she promised to let me take her out in my car next Sundav. Mow's that, eh? "

Very rapid," Val answered. "But I spy, Tiekey, slow back. I don't suppose your people would lie very keen on a newspaper girl, and, as you've seen and know, Lulu isn't the sort of girl you ean make conspicuous by your attentions—and your attentions do have tliat effect rather often, don't they?" Tiekey was still smiling. "She is different," he said, straightening up, suddenly, and becoming serious. "Lulu Convay's not that sort, you're quite right, and I don't moan to make her so conspicuous. You needn't worry, Val." * "1 won't," Val said. "I can trust yon, Tiekey.'' "Hullo, there's Rindo," Tiekey said, suddenly. "Ruin beggar he always seems to me. Valerie—my revered stepmother, I mean—is great pals with him, or was. I don't like him much, but then I'm sure he simply loathes me -—favours me with silence, and a good thing, too. Come to me at the Court for Christmas, will you, old chap?" "Thanks awfully," Val said. "I'd like to just for a day, if I may. I'm going to stay in town, of course, for the rest of the time, because Doris will be here. But on Boxing Day she's off to the Loehairns', and as I'm not asked, I can't very well go. TMI motor down to Warren. 1 ought to be there, if T start early, well by noon. Forty's offered me his car; lie's staying in town with his girl, too.'' Tiekey gave him back the note, as he rose and yawned, suggesting departure. Val folded it up, put it in his poeketliook, then he rose, too, and they strolled away together. Rinde was reading an evening paper; ho looked up and nodded, and they nodded back, carelessly. Always looks like an actor to me," Tiekey said to Val, "so beastly extra smart, and so (lossy about the hair. Queer combination his hair and eyes; ever noticed 'em t'' Val said ho had not. "Old Aunty Ran, Lady Handle, you know, calls liiin the tiger. Jolly good name, 1 think. lie's got those sort of eyes, like topazes, as much as anything, und that black hair. They say the women fairly worship the beast. I can's see what they see in him." Val and lie went out into the streets together. " I think I'll walk," Val said. "I'm a bit bothered, and I can think better walking ''

"How can I? Tell me, was it anyone specially interesting?" That adjective, applied to Tickey, seemed a little incongruous, but Val knew that a person, without being even moderately clever, may yet possess a vital interest in one other person's eyes. "That depends on what interest means to you," he said, hedging cautiously. "He was a hew friend, anyway; he's that grand novelty." "So it was a man, and a new man of my acquaintance. Why, it must have been Lord Wyckham." "Well guessed," Val said. "It was, and he talked a great deal about you; and more than that, he ardently advised me to go to you for counsel about a matter that's rather puzzling me." "What is it? Tell me," Lulu said with quick sympathy. For answer he handed her the note. "Doris got that this evening," he said. "And at first I thought Tickey sent, it, as a practical joke. I went for him about it; met him by appointment at the Empire, and he denied it pointblank. I was sorry I'd ssupeeted him, because he is a friend of mine." Lulu did not answer; she was studying the. note in every way. "You left Lord Wyckham at 2..T0," she said. "At least that was the time when we all met. in Pall Mall, and yon didn't see him afterwards, did you, till to-night, I mean?" Val shook his head. "And this letter was posted at 2 oVlo'ck» and that should have proved to you that Lord Wyckham didn't write it, because you were with him at that time."

"That note?" Tiekey questioned, " Don 't worry about it. Heaps of chaps gel these anonymous letters. Blackmail as like as not, T shouldn't wonder. It'll all come right. You wait and see.''

(fin cheery face disappeared from view as lie got into a taxi, and Val walked away down the empty, echoing street.

He saw, as he turned into Rod Lion Square, a friendly gleam of light from Lulu's sitting-room window, and he thought he saw her leaning out, Ifo waved and called up a cheery good-night. She called back, and then her voice rose to a shriek.

"I never remembered that," Val said. He looked up at her and laughed. "You are a born detective, Lulu!" "I mean to become a practised one," she said quietly. "And practice in the act of detection means linking up all the, tiniest bits of evidence, however trivial they seem." She held the note up to the light as Val had done. "No help in the water-mark," she said. "This paper is turned out by the ton, and the typewriter was a Roneo, probably; no help there again." She looked at Val. "Leave this note here with me, will you?" she said. "I'll take great care of it." "Of course, I'll leave it. But why do you want it?" "I want to compare it," she said slowly, "with an —with some other paper, that's all. Perhaps, some day, I'll bo able to tell you why." Val took up his hat. "I'd trust, you with anything," he said. lie smiled at her mischievously. "So would Tickev; at least, so he said." He believed actually that a faint rose colour touched her cheeks. He shut the door behind him, with a low whistle. Quick work, indeed, if really Lulu and Tiekey had fallen in love; and rather distressing work, too, for he couldn't, imagine Lord Stevenage approving of his only son's marriage with a girl journalist. "Though Lulu is a girl in a thousand," he said to himself, as he turned up the light in his bedroom. It struck him, as ho got into bed, that the day had been rather full of unpleasantly exciting events. He meditated on them for a few moments, and he was just going to sleep when a new thought came to him which effectually banished all comfortable drowsiness. Was there any connection between the noto and that narrow shave from the motor car? Could there be?

"Right!" sho screamed, and Yal involuntarily sprang to the right. As he did so, a car passed within an inch of him.

Had he stayed in his own course, he would have been killed for a certainty,

The car was out of sight in a mo ment.

A furious anger filled him as he thought about it, the sheer primeval anger of a man who has been set upon by an unseen enemy, by a force with which he cannot grapple thoroughly. Then the calm common-sense of the day claimed him again. Attempted murder does not take place in the open road in London in our age; the idea was absurd. (To be continued.)