THE FATAL ROOM.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume VI, Issue 1736, 6 September 1919, Page 14

THE FATAL ROOM.

I By JAMES MeELDERRY, Author of Tho Veil of Circumstance," otc.] [All Bights Reserved.} CHAPTEB XVl.—(Continued.) "HE WOMAN WITH THE BED-GOLD When we came to the wall I looked p at it, with a kind of dumb despair oming over me as I remembered that ven I could not climb it alone and rithout assistance. And I said, then, joking towards her: "It is the only way. The gates are mpossible. What shall we do? If you ould lift me But then, something light happen. If we have been folded, without our knowing it, and omeone, when I' am on the top of the rail, attacks you, I should not dare to She laughed a little at that, and a loment afterward she said —smiling all Le time, I knew, though I could not. see "If you were to bend down, so that 1 could reach your shoulders! And if, Ei, you did not mind catching hold ny shoes and lifting me a little, I ht be able to do the rest I" laughed tremblingly. And then!" I asked. "You do not lain what becomes of you once you on top. It is true that the motor in ch I intended to escape has not e, and will not be here for hours; still, if I could get over as well, which I cannot, I might be able to do something. As it is " < I broke off suddenly. As I had been speaking, the whole house behind ug.had flared into sudden and we Beard voices calling one to another across the park. There was no time to lose. I stopped at once, and a second later, leaning against the wall, she had hoisted herself so that she stood upon my shoulders, the hem of her dress clinging'about my head. Then I caught her feet, and presently she called to me to release her. Before I could recover my breath, * she was laughing on the wall's top, and, leaning down, had reached out till she touched my hands. And she said: #' Quick 1 If you stick your toes in—. -' and if I pull very hard, it will be oyer in a minute! Quick! There is one man about a hundred yards' behind you, and there is a motor coming down.the road. BNow!" I held back. lam a heavy man, and my weight taxed Hollow more than he had cared to admit. I still had my 1 revolver. I said: ✓ , "No! It is impossible! I must " But she had caught my hands, and she would not release them, and when she began to pull I realised that I had underrated her strength and endurance, and, working one foot all the time against the wall and the other against a tree-trunk that stood a few feet away from it, I was drawn slowly up. When I had reached the top she steadied herself for some seconds, catching her breath painfully, and then she said: "If it should be your motor! You must drop first." And then she broke off, laughing, and I let myself down and called to her to lower herself so that I could reach her, and a moment later we were together outside the walls. All the time the motor had been coming nearer and nearer—though the whole adventure of climbing the wall had taken really but a'few seconds of time —ai.d the voices within the park were growing louder in our ears. The motor lights swept the road. It was some hours before the time I had given my chauffeur, and I knew he would have come without lights of any kind.

I drew back into the little shelter of 'one of the supports of the wall, pulling my companion after me. This would shield us from the motor lights, as we were on the far side. The car began to slacken, and my heart leapt into my mouth. It drew level, and stopped - before the gates. Someone got """down i and went towards them. I glanced out « hastily as he fitted a key into the lock. It was Santiago! And as he threw the gates open he heard the cries of ..- the men within the park, who were almost up to him, and began to run towards them. I made a ii , dash for the car, 'my companion ■i at my heels. With one foot on the step I saw that there was still one man seated at the whdfel, and at that moment Santiago called and he released the clutch. I lurched forward, and with a quick blow sent him sprawling in the road. Then, as I swung the car back into the roadj clutching blindly at the dress of the woman I had rescued, I saw that the man was Tocqueville, and began to laugh harshly, and at my feet the Woman with the Bed-Gold Hair began to laugh musically—a ripple of mirth that I would have gone through the shadow of death to hear. (To be Continued.)