THE DUPLICATE DUSE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12529, 16 January 1919, Page 8

THE DUPLICATE DUSE.

(By HEADON HILL.)

CHAPTER XXIX. (Continued). Hands were duly shaken and the talk became general resolving itself into surmise as to tlie whereabouts of the truants. The only sensible suggestion came from Rupert, who, however, only, put it. forward tentatively. It was that the Duke had picked up Miss Maidment somewhere after he parted from Miss Urnnston, and that the car had broken down at, a. lonely spot remote from help. Tho theory was accepted gratefully by Mr Maidment, and it was endorsed by Tom. Bub Senator Alabaster, who had been observing Kitty ever since her entrance, said nothing, and ho noticed that tho girl’s face betokened disagreement. The American, legislator, an adept at the art of manoeuvring for position, was quietly edging towards tho object of hi» interest, when tho scene was changed Avifcii the rapidity of a kinema. Lady Arthur Combpyue, in the black decolleteo evening gown with which she had startled them all at dinner, shot herself into tho picture. Her line eyes were fiercely sombre and her-handsome features showed pale uutlor their load of chemicals as she surveyed the scene from the doorway.' < “Mr Maidment! Kitty!” she exclaimed. “What dobs a.- visitation ar« this hour portend? You both look very tragic.” The Vicar, already distressed by his fruitless invasion, was moved by the implied rebuke into a halting explanation, “Frightfully rude of me,- Lady Arthur, isn’t it?” he stammered. “Quite inexcusable te intrude so late in the evening. Bub I am searching for my i daughter. She has—ha"! ha !—gone; and herself mislaid somehoiv. I “Not unnaturally expected to find her at Axe Castle,” Lady Arthur’s 1 hard metallic voice interrupted tho clerical apology. “But, Air Vicar, though your instinct-was true iu tho main, it has gone astray in detailsYour daughter’s admirer has not brought her te tlie ancestral homo which will be too hot to hold him when Inspector Greenaway has finished his work. You will find that they have run away together, and,that they won’t stop running till they have got beyond the extradition laws.” ; The tirade, induced, an awkward silence, during which nil eyes were fixed on the boldly handsome woman ,in the doorway. But the silence was shortlived, broken by a still small voire coming from behind the imposing apparition : “Taking my name in vain, Your Ladyship? Rather a rash thing to do without the very best of grounds.” Lady -Arthur, with a swish of her, skirts, wheeled round upon the man from Scotland Yard who had,. so to speak, taken her in the rear. And while she and most of the others watched-in. numbed fascination tlie detective’s futile efforts to bite Ms right ear, Senator Alahasler completed his manceuvre of edging close to Kitty Cranston. “Say, little, girl,” he whispered, “ there’s more to all this, isn’t there, than His Reverence has imparted, and vnu possess tho key to it?” Kitty looked at her interrogator up and down with tlie frank insolence of her youth and ignorance. But the shrewd benignity in the wise old countenance prevailed, She yielded prettily to its sway. • “ Yes,” ! she whispered in reply-.-“There is more to it than I’ve told the Vicar. Ho is such an old silly he wouldn’t have understood, and I didn’t like to scare Him.” • The Senator beamed down on the pert little face. “ Well, I am not silly or easily scared,” he said. “ Won't you tell_mc?”. Kitty favoured her questioner with one final appraising glance and decided to trust him. “Tlie Duke and I found a lassoo thing, though he called it a lariat, uuder the side wall of the Prior’s house,” she said- “ The Duke thought it was a queer sort of toy to find in a Devonshire land.” “ And so indeed it Was,” replied the Senator gravely. “It was a discovery, tote which T fear will call for prompt action, and thereby upset; my plans-” “ Plans for removing that absurd suspicion from the Dike?” Kitty scarcely breathed, for she was'conscious that Inspector Greenaway’s roving eyes were assimilating their detached conference. ,“ Partly for that purpose,” was the Senator’s* reserved answer. “I wish-I could help—at least 1 Tom and I together,” sighed Kitty. “I am sure Ave should do better than that horrid detective, who is hand and glove with Lady Arthur. Tom and I have been -Sherlocking a hit already. We know quite, well who murdered Lord Arthur, only we can’t prove it—worse luck. It’s that Kinvcr lot at the Prior’s house. They are frauds. Tom and I can prove at a.ny rate that they arc not philanthropists, except to themselves.” _ J “ Little,.lady, T am inclined to agree with you., And I have no doubt that the researches of yourself and that nice hoy will he invaluable. You have already given me a. strong line.” ’'■‘Senator Alabaster’’—Kitty’s mouth quivered—“you do not think that Adela'Maidment and the Duke are in danger, do'you ?” “Keep a stiff upper'lip-” The Senator burked the question. “ Just for the moment it is you and I who apneav to he in danger, Miss Cranston. Here comes your bete noir. tlie crime expert, apparently seeking to devour us.” ■For Inspector. Greenaway had disenI gaged from a, heated dialogue with Lady Arthur and was coming towards them so brisk!v that he might well intend to embark ou a new one. CHAPTER XXX. i ' RfcTECTED OVERTWHES. ' The place whore Wallace Raynham sat and pondered over his coming fate Avas a bosroom on the upper floor of the Prior’s House, te which he had been conducted after writing the letter, suggested by himself, to Adda. His prison was windowlcss, save for a ouc-paitc skylight in the root. His letter had been necessarily brief. As he himself intended it to mislead, ancl.it aa ms to bo road by Ludwig Bauer before dispatch, he bad been precluded from adding one touch of sentiment. Mo Avouid go te his gmve—he wondered where it Avon Id be—without haring written or spoken a single, aa-oit! of love to the woman for Aihom lie Avas offering his life. Nor would he ever he able to explain to her that he had netfled hi craven fear of exposure or of the gunmen. He would live in her memory. If she -deigned- to give him a moment’s thought, as a poltroon to whom she had-accorded all the seal of abrave comradeship in vain. To his plea that before bring “done in ” he should have the satisfaction of heaving of Miss Maidmcnt' s release, Intel wig had contemptuously agreed. On being thrust into his black hole under the roof he had been informed that “the sal” couldn’t, be set at liberty till the letter had been delivered at the Vicarage, and that, that would not he done till after dark, when the messenger could not be identified. Noav. when he had been many hours in confinement and the light had long rdne© failed entirely, foot-stops ;) p, proached and the door was opened. The sham chaplain and the miscreant dubbed “the Coyote “ were, bis visitors. Conran of the. ascetic face and the evil eye was the spokesman. The chief'?', compliments and you are to say your prayers if you’ve any use for such things.” he. announced. , “ The contract bad been strictly ol>- ( served on onr part., and we. are now going to gamble on who’s to have the unpleasant duty of banding you up to Paradise. Say. lint you’re a real sport. Raynliam. It must luwe needed sand lu come th* duke all over those hightoned Riitislmr?. Jf I bossed this outfit I’d reckon to spare you, provided 1 you’d quit Avriting and join us.”

R-aynham’s laugh of unaffected amusement, rang out clear and vibrant. “ If • snob., an offer vrere mad© to me,' T fear I should have to decline the honour,” he replied, ‘‘llcing no hand with a pistol, I should do you no credit, my friend. “ Giles© you’ll get the credit all right, if it is only post mortem, as the duke who gunned his poor old nnole in a had light,” rejoined Conran. “So long, and don’t forgot the prayers. One ol us will wait upon you presently." Ho wont out, preceded by the silent ’'Coyote,” slamming and locking the door behind him. Loft to himself, the condemned man wondered if the bogus chaplain’s suggestion had' been a genuine overture from Ludwig Bauer. It might well have been so. New York’s gunmen being blessed with a. mighty ignorance of human ethics outside their own trade. And then, while ho was professionally analysing this trait in the character of a limited section of his fellow-countrymen, he flung aside all such untimely speculation and began to tremble like one stricken with ague. He even uttered a scarcely audible whimper, such as a child utters when receiving an undeserved blow. Somewhere in the same corridor a door had been opened and shut, and in the momentary interval between the opening and shutting he had heard the clear tones of Aclela, Maidment’s voice. The murderous gang had played him false. The girl lor whose life he had bartered his own was still in the grip; of their mutual enemies- - Alive to In p resourceful pluck, they-dared not let. her go. And if, fortifled_ by the ; letter which he had fondly believed to he r safeguard, they dared not, let her gi they would never let "her go at all She was doomed to share his fate. He cursed his folly in meekly walk ing into this'den of ravening wolves in stead of informing the police that hj believed Adela Maidment to he fordid detained at the Prior’s House., He Inc done it in the hope'of shouldering t!: whole burden of disgrace as well as ( physical danger, hut he ought to him known better than to trust the scum of New York’s underworld. He cursed, too, his impotence to atone for his folly by an attempt at rescue. To engage the gang in a ding-dong combat while Adela. slipped away and then go down overpowered by numbers would have been a man’s death. Bnit he had to await the inglorious end of a trapjied rat—-behind a locked door. ■ And then, suddenly, the locked door Was opened and the- bogus philanthropist's “gorgeous lady secretary ” entered, shutting the door behind her. Raynham had never seen Miss Helgarde',Bo gorgeous. In low-cut eyeniug dress and in, full warpaint, of powder and cosmetics she gave the impression of; having tried to make the best of the stale remnants of whatever meretricious charm had once been hers. She carrier! an electric hand-lamp, and as she flashed it over the room Raynham, oven in Ids agony of mind, found pathos in the sight of this raddled associate of a professional assassin. Some time in the lon’g ago she-, must have been a pretty child, in a fond mother's arms. That brief dream soon went the way of all dreams. “See here,” she began, “you hare just got to listen while L talk. They are drawing lots downstairs who’s to kill you. 1 can show yon a way out. Stick to your duke fake and make me your duchess. You’re Honest Injun, I think, and anyhow I’ll take your word. Give me your pledge and I’ll engage, to put all those hobos to their long last sleep before they can touch you or bliss Maidment. .I’ll check her in as a maker weight, though I ain’t keen on it if you can let her slide.” _ _ • Though he believed hunself to _be standing on the. brink • of eternity. Raynliam’s sense of humour was tickled by' this naive suggestion. First- Conran’s hint of a reprieve on condition tliat he joined the gunmen p now Miss Flossi© Dclgarde’s matrimonial proposal on condition that he remained a duke. His value as a, crook was surely rising, he told. himself, as his literary value waned with approaching dissolution. He was about to voice this idea in cynical phrase when any sort of renly •to the painted, syren was barred Ti.v an act of-swift retribution. Ludwig the Dude, who had silenced his approach by the simple process of taking off his shoes, suddenly loomed behind the lady wooer and very distinctly forbade the banns by twining his capable fingers.round her shapely throat “So that was your game, my beauty 1” , His’ wrath nearly • stifled utterance.' “I guessed sure, wliat yon stole away for. Now you’ll come down bo the hoys and hear what sentence they’ll pass on a traitress.” But it seemed that Miss Del garde objected to face the justice likely to he meted out by her compeers. Lithe sas an eel, she wriggled free from the clutching lingers and set her own to work on the face of the boss gunman with the fury of a wildcat. An two seconds his- cheeks were scored with gory streaks, and then, leaving tactics for the higher strategy, she concentrated all the force of her tearing nails on tlie Dude’s bulging eyes. Raynliam, perceiving that the combat was likely to he prolonged, took instant of the diversion. Leaving the swaying, panting antagonists to their own devices, he slipped by them into the passage. where._ as luck would have it, a light was burning. On either side were two rows of doors, in one of which was the key on the outside. Instinctively making that his goal, he turned the key and entered. An oil' lamp showed' Adela. standing in the middle of the room. “Come!” Raynhanvs level tone?, checked the astonishment surging to his fellow captive’s lips. “There is not a moment to be lost.” ; „, ; As they passed out into- the passage a long- blast on a whistle rose above the muttered curses and the scuffling in the box-room. Ludwig was summoning assistance from the lower regions. H-aynhain relocked the room they were leaving. . “In here,” be whispered, opening the next door- “Their principal preoccupation will be to search for me, amt they, won’t look in your room now it is locked on the outside. ' Ah, here they cornel” A rush of feet and a clamour qt voices on the stairs heralded the Duke's reinforceemnts, and Raynham dosed the door of their precarious refuge. He turned the key, which was on the inside. “ This is our only chance,” he muttered under his breath. “God grant they search for me farther afield. ’ In the darkness they Availed-, listening to the growing turmoil down the passage. Raynliam had grasped Adda’s hand to ’guide her, and it. remained passively in. his. ‘The noise increased in volume, then suddenly scattered, voices and footsteps sounding from different directions.' The door of Adda’s recent, prison was tried, but. being found locked, was not opened. The din receded to the lower floor of the house. “We have gained a. breathing spell," said Raynliam at last. “I wonder where we, have found sanctuary.” He struck a match. The knick-knacks on the.toilet table and other indubitable signs pronounced it to be, Alisa Delgarde's bedchamberAdela spoke for the first time- ■“ You seem to have conducted that retreat in a masterly fashion- ’ Idle smiled rather faintly as the match flickered out.- “Let us compare notes and then see if we ran give these unpleasant people the slip.” Would it not be wiser to defer mutual explanations and attempt to “scape first?” suggested Raynham, (To he continued.)