THE SIX-HOUR MYSTERY

Taranaki Daily News, 20 October 1930, Page 15

THE SIX-HOUR MYSTERY

By

ANTONY MARSDEN

“Yes, sir, A launch came down fullspeed ten minutes ago, just as our fellows pushed off. We hailed her—we couldn’t hardly «ec a glimpse of her in th© mist—but she took no heed. Our fellows went after her. and that’s all I can tell you.” Somewhere above them on the hill, a church clock chimed the last quarter before midnight; the sound had scarce begun when the sergeant plucked Thornton’s sleeve and leaned downstream, peering and listening. “Hear her? That’s our boat coming back, right enough. Sounds like she s making heavy work of it, what’s more —’spite of the tide being with her!” « * * *

As the launch-engine fired, Karin seized the wheel and set their course on a long slant towards the right bank of th© river. They could see twenty or thirty yards around them—-enough to let them travel at the best speed they could make against the running tide, so long as they had a faint horizon of bank to guide them. » “But where?” he muttered to ths woman who crouched at his feet. ‘fYou know the river, yes? We must land soon, before an- alarm is raised. Ho is found, already—” “Not here!” she gasped. “Too many folks along the towing-path, even so late as now. Keep on past Richmond Bridge. There’s, private gardens there —we’ll slip through to the main road. Buses. . , Ah! God, what a fool I’ve been!”

“Why did you do it?” he murmured. "You said you hadn’t found /-your box ... I never thought you would. I could think of nothing, except Nick. It seemed the only way—.” “I found it just as you lofame. But H was hardly in my hands when—he came,” /‘Ah! God—-!” "Bah, this was not to he avoided! He would have shot ma but for you, I think. He had fired first, yes’” Hi« cool topes steadied her—as, perhaps, he intended it should. She stared Up at him, trembling, dead-beat in the. reaction from the violent thing she had, done. , .>• 1 "Oh! if I had your nerve!” But he merely shrugged. Some minutes afterwards, a belated ’bus rolled northwards along Kew • Road. A stray taxi was overhauling it, the driver cruising slowly home; wards, still in hope of a fare, The ’bus stopped/* man jumped off . and hailed the taxi as it passed ... And close by Richmond Bridge, Inspector Thornton leaned out eagerly to greet the police boat, returning slowly with, the launch in tow as the clock finished chiming.the last quarter before midnight. The clock on Woolcroft’s maiitel-picee stood a few minutes short of that last quarter, when the uneasy silence of the room was broken by the sudden ringing of the telephone. Th# young constable, in whose charge Nash and Irma waited, took up the instrument. And after th© briefest colloquy: ' . ■. “I’ll have to ask you both to come with me to the station, sir. The sergeant’s sending round a taxi right away.” Nash shrugged, and they followed their chaperon downstairs; any action ■ dame as a relief from the suspense of waiting in that silent and gloomy house. As they walked towards the gate, the second constable joined them abruptly out of the darkness. “Goin’ back, Ted?” •Tell him , . ’’The man’s voice ■ dropped, and he began some whispered narrative; it was inaudible to Nash, ' till one clear sentence reached him: “. . A whickin’ great hole, somebody’s been diggin* of, in the garden here! Frenchturned earth, tell him—” “Right you are—” A horn sounded in the lane, and the taxi arrived' . . . At the station Nash tackled the sergeant promptly. “Say, are we two supposed to ho under arrest, or what ?” “Why, no, sir. But the inspector’d Ifks to speak to you. He’ll btf back any jtime.’* ' “What’s wrong with to-morrow?” But the sergeant shook his head. “I’m very sorry, sir. But I’m afraid business is a bit too serious.” Something in the man’s tone, or the Impression- nt his face, caused Nash to £ake him up sharply. “Whatfc happened? Damn it, wove • right to be told—have they caught Woolcroft?” ‘ Without speaking the sergeant ushered, them through into the inspector’s empty office. And then: ' “I understand this Mr. Woolcroft has been »ho,t sir . . . yes, dead ... No air, I don’t know any more. But I’m expecting Mr. Thornton immediately—” And with that he. left them. . ... Nash turned to Irma with a emking heart. White as paper, she leaned on the table for support, and there was horror in her eyes. “Oh, Jim, who? It’s not—?” < •Hush, dearest —* He caught her in his arms. But he could find no comfort that he dared hold out to her. Woolcroft shot . , . murdered in the act, presumably, of trying to forestall Karin! There was no putting aside the frightful infer-

♦nee ... ~ Th« door behind them was pushed •pen guddenly, and Thornton himself appeared. Nash swung round to him, haggard, horribly afraid. “Woolcroft—?’’ he gasped. ' “You’ve been told, eh?” The inspector stood staring at them. “Have you—? Oh, for God’s sake, man, who ?” Thornton nodded grimly. “We've got the murderer, yes. And after * tiny pause, in which Nashs heart stood still and the lights swam before his eyes: “Dead, too. Shot, trying to escape . . . I’l say this. It was the pluckiest attempt at a getaway that ever I heard of. Single-handed, too. But —she just (didn’t it.” “She—?” , The cry buret from Nash’s lips. Once more the detective nodded, and his eyes never left Nash’s face. “A woma ,nyes. Not yet identified. That’s where you’re maybe going to help us—Mr. John Smith!” His tone was menacing, with the old ■harp hostility and distrust. But a diversion came, unforeseen. Nash felt the girl go suddenly limp as / she clung to him. Next moment she ■lipped through his grasp and collapsed on the floor, senseles. Thorntop never moved, while Nash gathered Irma tenderly in his arms and lifted her to a couch. Then, as the girl lay still with her eyes closed, he spoke again. “I’m going to ask you a few questions, Mr. Smith. Nash blazed round at him. “You’re going to go to hell!” And, his temper completely lost: “God above, what kind of . game d’yon think you’re trying to stick up on me? Am 1 arrested? e Am I charged with this? Yes or no?”

Thornton recoiled a little. “Easy on! You’re not charged with anything, yet—” “.Then this lady comes first,” Nash cut him short. “If you want anything out of me, you can learn manners . . . Well, man?” he stormed, “you’ve got a bed somewhere in this menagerie, I o-uess? The bungalow is all turned upside down, or I’d take her there and be damned to you. Some, stir yourself! Where is she to go?” Before this passionate outburst, something of Thornton’s bluff selfconfidence had evaporated. Oil the one hand, much as he'suspected the American, he had no definite charge against him; and on the other he foresaw that, though he had found the murderer, he mio-ht need all the information he could extract from John Smith to unravel the mystery that veiled Woolcroft’s death. “I daresay the sergeant’s wife—,” he began, . , • 1 “Ask,, then!” Nash snapped. . followed Thornton to the charge-room. He picked up Irma in his arms, and “Hush, dearest—it’s all right!” he whispered low, as the girl opened hei eyes. The sergeant led him down a passage into his living-quarters, whore his wife, summoned hurriedly, put a spare bedroom at their disposal. A few drops of brandy soon helped Irma to revive. “Leave us. Hl join you presently.” Nash said surtly; and! the others withdrew; , .. , , He had sat down by her on the bed. As the door closed, she raised herself and clung to him. “Ah, Jim!” she breathed. “It wasnt — ?”

“No—thank God!” His finger .was on his lips, and he leaned close to her; nothinw seemed likelier, just then, than; th© °detective would try to overhear their talk from the other side of the door. . “You’re all right?" he whispered. “Strong enough to talk?” “Yes’ yes . , , it was just the shock . . . it’ seemed so impossible that anyone but father —” s f “I know. I was desperately afraid of it ... But you heard what Thornton said? It-was a woman—and whoever she wOSj she’s dead! ”

■ “Yes; but—” - “Listen, dearest—listen for all you re worth.;.,” \ “One. must shift for oneself. W© ay© both answerable for his death. I shall prefer to keep my neck unstretched as long as I can.”' “You should have left me and escaped," she groaned. “Not J. I have owed you too much I Somewhere ahead and to their right they heard the half-hour chiming. Karin still followed the right bank, as though instinctively he shunned the side on which, as they both knew, the woman’s deed was already discovered. But he lay out as far towards midstream as he; dared, .without risking losimr his bearings. Which was well for.fiiem; for with no more than just bare time to swerve away they came on the projecting boat-slips close above Richmond Bridge. . Their swerve carried them well, out into the centre of the river; a.bridgepier loomed up out of the mist with appalling suddenness; Karin avoided it by inches and shot under the arch. And at that instant, from somewhere dangerously close on their starboard beam, a loud hail challenged them. Karin had still a few extra revolutions in hand. And now, once through the bridge, he opened the throttle wide, careless of what chance obstacles might lie ahead.

“There’s another bridge, right here—” came the woman’s whispered warning. “We must chance that, ma mia.” Just for an instant he had hoped that sudden hail had no connection with the alarm which must have now been raised, away back at Twickenham; but at once they knew better; out of the mist astern, distinct even through the noise of their own exhaust, came the quick thudding of another launch in pursuit. Now they had shot the railway bridge ■ —by sheer’luck this time, for at their -faster speed it was on them before they were aware; and for the next few moments it seemed likely that sheer luck, with a little skill thrown in, would decide the issue of tho chase. \ Even had they the speed of the other launch, they dared not keep to the river for much longer, since tho alarm would certainly b© telephoned ahead and they would be intercepted; they must run for th© bank—for tho villa-gardens of which Marie Bressler had spoken —and take their chance of breaking through unchallenged till they reached the m a in road.

There, if tho road were not too utterly deserted, they might still manage to confuse their trail by boarding some ’bus or taxi; for, as Karin reflected swiftly, it was unlikely that their pursuers could have any clue to their . appearance or identity.

Hie. fingers closed on the throttle, and he was on the point of cutting off the engine, so as to swerve.away in silence under cover of the mist and let the other launch shoot past, when there came a fresh development. A sudden beam of hazy light sprang into being behind them. “A searchlight!” he gasped, in blank dismay. This was more than his plan had bargained for. The woman was crouched already In the well of the boat, so that the stern shielded her. He dropped beside her, hunching his head well down between his shoulders; the pursuers were still too far behind, he guessed, for their searchlight to show them much —but at all costs there must be no risk of identification.

“Keep down! Don’t look round?” he whispered urgently. “We must’ outpace them if we can —if not, run ashore.” He left the throttle wide; it was still far from certain that the other launch was overhauling them. “Keep down,” he ordered again. But the woman paid no heed. She had turned round, and scrambled to her knees to face the pursuing light; and before Karin guessed what she intended he heard the crack of her gun.

Two shots she fired in quick succession. With the second came a crash of splintering glass an ’ a shout astern. The liazy n radianco which had played on the mist around them suddenly disappeared. “I’ve got their, light!” he heard her exultant whisper. Karin tugged at her savagely. “You fool! They mayn’t shoot unless we start it! Now they’ll—”

But his muttered warning wap never finished. ' At once, e'en as she kneeled there peering astern, there cam: the crack of a revolver shot from the second launch, and the woman pitched down across his knees without.sb much as a goan. Her body knocked the steering-wheel from his grasp; ’ and in the dim . and misty light he could make out her face, upturned to him covered with blood. “Marie, Marie!” he groaned.

But no voice answered. Limp and for ever still, Marie Bressler lay huddled across his lap with a bullet in her brain, Heedless, he heard the other boat forge past his stern, ten yards away; next moment the launch grounded with a shuddering crash, and he was flung forward headlong. He rose, trembling, with the precious casket in his arms. Marie was dead, her fate brought on her with swift certainty by her own act. He needed no second glace at her to know that no help could avail. • ♦ # • Down-stream, in the dead stillness of the night, Karin heard the washing of the rudder as the police boat swept round in a wide cricle, returning. He flung his leg across the side, and found dry mud there . . . The police boat came nosing back towards the derelict launch. A man leaned from her bows. “Got away! No, by George; you’ve winged him, Moriss —” Someone switched on an electric flash, and there followed a cry. - “Looks like he’s dead. By God, if it isn’t a woman!” Three hundred yards away, a man was running with long, strides down the centre of the deserted football ground—a man with some oblong shape tucked beneath his arm, looming ghostly through the. mist—like the ghost of some dead-and-gone threequarter.

(To be continued.)