THE JACKAL

Taranaki Daily News, 17 June 1932, Page 11

THE JACKAL

By

J. Lindsay Hamilton

CHAPTER XXII.— (Continued.)

But how long ago had that happened? Was it already too late? He remembered suddenly the precautions he had taken in view of just such an emergency as this. But would Scroggins succeed? He grinned to himself in sudden contentment—Scroggins most certainly would. He could safely confine his worries to his own predicament. Whether he would ever s?e the light of day again

must depend solely upon his own wits. What they intended to do with him was hardly worth a moment’s debate. It automatically resolved itself into a question of how they would murder him. Time enough for such unpleasant considerations when hope was stone dead. He eat up and stretched out a hand in the darkness. It touched nothing. He tried with the other and it encountered stone. Judging by the hardness of his couch through the thin straw-filled paliasse, that too was stone. • He clapped a hand to his pocket and * wild thrill of hope ran through him. They had left him his—no, it was his torch; the revolver was gone. Still, a torch was the next best thing, without light of some eort, he must remain as helpless as a child. By ths light of it he saw that he was in a narrow windowless cell, bare of furnishings; the walls lime-washed, a rusty iron ring in one of them, a grim reminder of mediaeval barbarity; the bed a raised stone slab. So the dungeons had not fallen in as Anna had suggested. He turned His torch towards the door, and could have laughed, in incredulous amazement. It stood very slightly ajar. A prisoner and the door of his prison- invitingly open I And what was that This time Jerry really did laugh. Let into the wall near the door was a brass switch, and there was the bulb hanging from the roof.

Electric light in a Norman dungeon! Could anything be more absurdly, incongruous? None the less his conviction was not shaken. He was incarcerated in the dungeons below the old castle. If they were equipped with electric light, that was no fault of either the Normans or contemporary historians. It gave them, in fact, a more interest- I ing significance. | He switched on the light and swung the, heavy door wide open. A stone passage lay ahead and vanished in gloom . beyond the ray of light cast . through the open door. For a moment he halted. It behoved him tn co warilv. The r.ell door

had not been left open through mere carelessness. That would be too much to expect. Another thing struck him suddenly. Dungeons and foul, damp air are usually synonymous. Yet the atmosphere was warm and dry—inconsistent with age—long decay, but decidedly consistent with modern Improvements such as electric light. Electric light and central heating! ‘We progress,” thought' Jerry. “An extension from the Manor, I suppose. How very simple and convenient.’ Jerry switched the light off and began to grope hie way cautiously along the stone-flagged passage using his own torch sparingly—he might ha.ve greater need of it later. After thirty feet or so the passage ended abruptly. Though unable to see, he was conscious of the sensation of

space around him. His torch, when he flashed It ahead, failed to penetrate the darkness. He swept it in the direction from which he had come. There was the black hole where the passage ended and the walls showing white on either side of It. He must be in the large main dungeon. Ho decided to follow the wall round. To the right or left? It mattered ■little. He turned left and groped his xvay along the wall for some little distance. Here was a deep recess. The circle of light from his torch played over the massive iron-bound door let deep into a rounded archway. Jerry gently raised the worn ring that served as a handle, and, twisting it, tried the door, but it resisted all

his efforts. As there was no sign of a key-hole, he surmised that it was barred on the outside. A lock he might have dealt with, but an inaccessible iron bar, that was a different matter.. He was turning to continue his tour of inspection when his eye caught sight of the object fixed in the wall of the recess. It was a simple switch board containing a main switch, and three ordinary insulated light switches. No doubt the light supply from the dungeons was controlled from here. From that premise, it was fairly safe to argue that the barred door formed the main entrance to the dungeons. IFe moved on again, and presently the wall ceased abruptly. It was the arch connecting the cellars. He turned into it, and almost immediately barked his shins against something hard. It proved to be a square case about the size of a tea-chest. Beyond it was another, and yet another., and at the further side of the cellar every foot of space, with the exception of an alleyway through the dungeons beyond, was completely taken up by these same square chests. What luck! Here was one with the top broken open. At first sight of the contents Jerry could not restrain a chuckle of amusement, for to outward appearances/ at least, there was a secret cache of—cigarettes, nothing more exciting than that, just cigarettes of a very popular brand. Jerry picked up one of the yellow tins, stripped off the wrapper end opened it. Yes, there they were,, all neatly arranged, and there was the packer’s ticket, all complete. “Hum! perfect down to the last detail,” murmured Jerry. “Even the maker’s name on Hie cigarette papei - '”.... -

He examined the tobacco at both | ends and could find nothing amiss with it. Still, not satisfied, he broke I the cigarette in half and immediately I his fingers were covered with a fine I white powder. The simplicity of it! Each cigarI ette a drug container——cocaine this one. These tins of a hundred would > be dispatched to agents in the tobacco ' business. From them, the small agent personally in touch with the unfortunate addicts, obtained his zupply as he required it. An apparently chance meeting in a public thoroughfare, a chat, out comes the cigarette-case, and the drug is passed without fear of suspicion, even though half Scotland Yard may be on the spot. Electric light and central heating was now explained! A dump of some sort was essential to control and maintain a level supply. What safer hid-ing-place than these old forgotten dungeons? But why no guard Why was he allowed to wander at will? Why was he given this key to the Jackals secrets? The answer was not reassuring. He was free to wander about because he would never leave his prison alive—the Jackal must feel very sure of him; there was no guard because escape was impossible. But Jerry decided he would need a lot of on that point. He had been in tight corners before, and he knew that his one hope lay in erasing the word “Impossible” from bis vocabulary. “And things are m, what they seem.” He had a habit of singing the words over and oyer * dreamily whenever - he was faced with * a reel teaser. Reasonably satisfied that caution: was unnecessary, Jerry switched on the light and proceeded to make a rapid search ,of the-remaining dungeons. For the most part they were: apparently used for the storage of those same metal-lined cases. But* one of them was very different. It was furnished and equipped as a combined office and workshop. One small machine, electrically driven, interested him greatly. Stacked upon: a long table near it was a pile of; hundred dollar American bills. Jerry: examined them with interest. Prob-' ably these had not yet been launched on the market. If they had, they must have escaped the viglance of the experts so far. “Friend .Jacques,” murmured Jerry, "I’m afraid you won’t go to heaven. : This was the machine you so nobly smashed to shield the honour of a friend.” Leading off from this workshop Jerry discovered a narrow pasage. It continued for a short distance, and ended abruptly in a wall of concrete. Another exit barred! He must retrace his steps and work quickly. At any moment his tour of inspection might be interrupted. He returned to the main dungeon and made for the switchboard. His hand was upon the centre one of the three brass switches; he was in the act of depressing the knob, when from somewhere across the dungeon came the sound of a gentle yawn. A second afterwards a thin horizontal line of light projected itself upon the darkness as xipon a screen. It was low, on a level with the floor he guessed, and some twenty paces distant. He crept silently toward It, a terrible dread hammerinc* at his heart: dread, mingled with a choking sensation of wild hope. Such is the complexity of human emotion that that sickening fear could not still the leaping exultation within him. He was right, the light came from below a closed door. He halted listening intently, but scarce able to hear for the drumming in his ears. Someone was on the other side of that door, very close to it. He could hear a rustle like the leaf of a book being turned; he could hear her breath—yes, her breath. No man ever sighed on just that gentle musical note. “Helen!” he whispered. Dead silence. Not even the faintest tremor of a breath. “Helen!” A cry. neither a laugh nor a sob, but a litle of both. It was stifled at once. Then: "Jerry.”

“Helen—you here!” It was almost a groan. “Are you locked in? Wait; there’s an iron bar across the door.” His 'hands were already groping over the door. In his fevered impatience (bought and movement translated themselves into tumbling disjointed sentences. “Won’t budge .. . it’s got to, damn it, it’s got to . . . no, not an Inch . . . where’s your wits, man . . . try the other end. Where is it? . . . ah! here we are . . . heave 1 . . . glory, glory hallelujah! . . . it’s coming. Helen, it’s moving ... up she goes . . . steady, you ass; it may be locked as well . . . ah! . . .’’ The door swung outward and the next instant Jerry was inside the little cell breathless from his feverish exertion, and the sudden surge of passionate emotion that threatened to choke him. “Helen!” He was blind to everything but the glow of unutterable joy in her eyes. “Jerry! Oh, Jerry, is it really you? When you called ! thought it was only another dream." Jerry’s exultation was suddenly quenched. She believed he had come to rescue her; she believed she was •saved. Saved! What grim irony! How could he bear to tell her the truth —• that there could only be one Intended end to her sojourn in these secret dungeons, death, lonely desolate death; that she was not saved; that he too wag a prisoner. “We are fellow-prisoners," he said with forced lightness, and looked away unable to face the sizht of hope dying so cruel a death. She was silent. Jerry dam. not look. “There’s a way in,” he urged, “so there must be a way out. All we have to do is to find it.” Still Then, very quietly:

"Jerry.’* At the sound of her voice,

so calm and resolute, he looked up, startled. “Jerry it’s no use. I know —Henri Jacques has been here. I don’t know how long ago. • I must have fallen asleep after he went. He told me" a dull flush mantled her checks —“oh, I can’t tell you all he said, but it was ghastly. 1 couldn’t believe anyone could be such a fiend." “What did he do?" Jerry could hardly recognise his own voice. “He told me where I was. and why; and in that hatefully mocking voice of his, that the last few hours of my life would be as pleasant as he could make them. With that, be flung the Doone book down beside me and mocked me with my own words: “You expressed a llesire to devour it from cover Io back. Now is your opporl unify," (To ds continued.)