The Seago Diamonds

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 74, Issue 58, 10 March 1931, Page 10

The Seago Diamonds

Serial Story

SYNOPSIS. Alexine Floyd is jn [he power otB Pitiless man—Arnold King. . is BD « a sed to David Fennell, . 0 ls . ln South Africa. In despair • e writes to her lover imploring him to return home. David Fennell is assistant to Seago, vi -4 m ° nd min *ng man.. David is •'sited by Anna Richards, a woman he nad become acquainted with on the Loat coming out.

A most amazing robbery took place 'aiuable diamonds being taken from under David’s very hand, when he is in *} locked and shuttered room alone. I he only clue he can find is a small piece of jade—broken from a larger piece—a woman’s ornament. David is convicted of the robbery, but escapes. As he is dodging along over rough land not far from the township, he sees' Anna Richards fleeing as if for her life, clutching her dress fiercely to her breast. Anna comes upon a woman with a horse and cart outside a hut. She knows the woman to be Sarah Redmore, a spinster over forty, the daughter of a blind farmer who has just come into the family peerage and is returning to the home of his boyhood. Sarah is suspicious of what Anna is holding to bp’’ breast so carefully, and makes a move to And out. Anna, in a panic, thrusts h c, r back. Sarah falls to the ground, and dies, her heart weakness killing her. Aware the police are after her—she has robbed her brother of a wonderful diamond—Anna jumps to a quick Gcci-sion. Her only ’way of getting clear is for herself to become the Hon. Sarah Redmore. She changes clothes with the dead woman, while the father sleeps. CHAPTER XL—(Continued.) “Yes, little girl, but there are still people who would know me with a deadly sureness if they had a good look at me. There are some—a few—that will never be convinced about my death as long as nobody has been found. And there’s a heavy sentence hanging over me. I’m a convicted man. It would be still worse for me if Seago died—and bls life’s not absolutely safe yet. It’s his own fault. He called me a thief, and struck me, and when I struck him back he fought like a fiend. I had to fight with all my strength, too—to fight for my very life. I don’t want you to think I was a brute, and I didn’t want to make a mess of things, if only for your sake. But I think it was fate—the same fate that has brought us together here in this place now, the most unlikely place in London. How is it that you are here at this time of night—nearly one o’clock in the morning—in a neighbouhood like this, running for shelter into a cab garage, bare-beaded and in evening dress? What has been happening? Where have you been?” She told him of the dinner that had been given to celebrate the coming of age of the Cornet and how wonderful, undeserved things had been said ebout her; that she was the cleverest, of editors and a marvellous girl who bad brought the paper the best of luck.

“And, of course, Arnold King, knowing how much he has helped me, has been bitter about the whole thing,” she went on. “He was angry because he could not go to the dinner, but he said he would call and take me home. He had made up his mind that before he left me I should fix a day for marrying him—a day that must be soon. And I knew I couldn’t. The very idea of it was horrible to me, even though I depend upon him so utterly for keeping my work. So I slipped away before he was due to call for me, and I got into a panic. I’ve been hurrying on blindly, dodging in and out of small side streets, never thinking where I was going, until the rain came on and I stopped and looked about me, and all the while I was coming to youl Oh, David! Isn’t it like a miracle?”

But the arms that were about her m the darkness of the cab had tightened convulsively.

“A miracle? Yes. But that man—that scoundrel King—must be thrust out of your life. I’ve been finding out things about him. He’s richer than he ought to be for the open, honest work he does; and there’s a suspicion that he’s got a secret trade—dope smuggling. The idea of his daring to want you to pay him for what he does for you by giving him yourself makes me feel half mad with anger. The insult of it, the outrage of it I" “David I”

‘ 1 told you I was coming home to save you from him. I had made up my mind to do that before there was any need for me to come over for my own safety. After all that long separation, Alexine, I wanted you as much as on the day when we said good-bye when ! went off to South Africa’. Until you came here to me now through the night and the rain, I was racking my brains as to how I should manage to see you—to make myself known to you. I went to the Comet office and said 1 had come to see to the lights; but I was told I must have made a mistake, because the liahts were all right, and if they hadn’t been there was a resident electrician in the buildmg who would attend to them then, yesterday evening, I went down . and hlln « about your mothers house, hoping you were down there and I might see you pass mor out I didn’t dare to ask to see IhA m m ° r : lcst the sl « ht of me d e^ e , hvr a shock t 0 the nerves that might be serious. 1 waited about for hours, and then at half-past ten I gave up hope of seeing you I went romnd then and looked a? the ouEe let » 7 G ° UrL 1 was curious to get a glimpse—even a moonlight glimpse-of the place that was the new home of the man i d alwavs known as ’blind old farmer Redmore ’ and his prim spinster daughter ’’ “I shouldn’t have said that' there «® S oh a " yt^ ln « VPry P rim ab °ut Lady Redmore, ' Alexine said “leu’ve seen her?” “Yes, 1 called to ask her to give me a paragraph for the Comet. That was Wouldn’t e h t ° ld Inle 1 nle “ he Was oerUUn F° u couldn t be alive. And even then in those moments, you were on your way ?° w ."„ to that neighbourhood. Oh David! ■ At half-past ten, or eleven o’clock when I was standing outside her gates

Mane Connor Leighton)

in the moonlight, T had half an idea of going in «nd seeing her and throwing myself on her mercy and asking her to help me. If it hadn’t been so late I might have ventured it. I was beginning to despair of ever getting to see you without help. And every hour's delay was awful to me, but I’m glad now I didn't take the risk. Il would have been a great risk.” He drew a deep breath. Leaning forward, still with one arm holding her close against him, he let down the right-hand window of the cab and listened. The downpour of rain was slightly abating, but there was still no light or sound of movement anywhere in the yard.

“You didn't ask for me at my rooms up here in London?” Alexine said. Her hand, adoringly touching his face, felt that he shook his head.

“I made up my mind not to do that unless, in the last resort, I should be absolutely driven to it. I knew there would be no chance ot finding you there until the evening, and if a grimylooking man in working clothes called and asked for you then it might cause remark. As 1 am now, I don’t look the sort of fellow to be going to tage a beautiful, well-dressed girl out to dinner or a theatre or a dance. And that cur, Arnold King, might be about.” “He doesn’t know you by sight; he has never seen you.” “No, but he must have seen my photograph in the newspapers a dozen times lately, and he's sure to be quick-eyed where any man coming near you is concerned, and if any trouble arose I mightn't be able to keep my hands off him. There might be a blaze up with the police then, and newspaper reporters—a blaze up too soon—before I’ve had time to find proof that I did not steal the Seago diamonds and that my conviction In South Africa was unjust.” The girl was breathing hard. “David, we must work night and day to find that proof. I’ll do my share if you'll show me how." “How?” David’s low voice was fierce and bitter. “That’s the puzzle that’s keeping me from sleeping. I’m turning it over in my head all the time, that I’m looking after my engines in the power station. I can’t get you until I’ve cleared my name end can come back openly from the dead. And I can't wait long. And yet I can’t solve the mystery of the Seago diamonds without going back out there—to the place where the stones vanished—and I daren't risk showing myself there for many months to come. You see, the diamonds were worth a quarter ot a million. People take a long lime to forget an affair that meant the sudden and mysterious loss of a fortune like that.” “David!” Her clasp ot him suddenly tightened. “I had a very strange cream last night. I didn’t know you were living, but I wanted your name to be cleared just as much, and I dreamed that the mystery ot the diamonds will be solved over here—here in England.” “That's only a dream, dear. It’s not possible. It it weren’t lor one tiny thing I should believe absolutely that it was Seago himself who came into the office, while that curious attack of faintness was on me, and for some reason took his own diamonds.”

“He couldn’t just have happened to come in while you were ill and unconscious, David. If he did come in then he must have known that you were going to be ill, and must have calculated the time. Don’t you see that your spell of unconsciousness was part of the business of the robbery? Can’t you see that? What is the tiny thing that makes you think it mayn’t have been Seago that came in?” “A little bit of jade that I found on the floor of the office and that must have been broken off an ornament of some kind worn by a woman.” “Worn by a woman?”

“Yes. I’ll show you the bit of jade when we next meet—somewhere where we can dare to have light and I can look at you as well as feel you close to me. 1 must tear myself away from here now. My time is up." "Surely you can’t be timed at this hour of the night? It must be between one and two in the morning." “That doesn't make much difference with a job like the one I’ve got now. I shouldn’t have been here only I took three-quarters of an hour off for the fresh air to get the fumes of the battery room out of my lungs. Then the rain storm drove me into this yard for shelter, just as it did you. But I daren’t stay longer now. No doubt I am being waited tor. I daren’t risk losing this work.” Shielding the light from the yardside window of the cab he flashed his lamp's beam for a moment on the dial of his watch.

“I’ve seven minutes left of the three-quarters of an hour. But I can’t spend those seven minutes here, dear heart. 1 must get you a taxi and see you safely started on the way back to your rooms before I leave you. And from this moment, remember, I’m not David Fennell. David Fennell is temporarily dead. I’m John Williams—Williams is a better name than Smith to hide under. It sounds more natural.”

“John Williams!” She repeated the name in a slow, unwilling way. “Oh, it’s all so amazing, so full of mystery 1 The mystery frightens me. I feel as if 1 were living through a dfieam that is a glad dream and yet a horrible nightmare at the same time ” “Don’t let your face betray you to Arnold King. You must try to look and act just the same to-morrow as before—Just the same as if nothing had happened during this night He’s a suspioious-natured man. You’ll have to he very careful. Don’t tell him at once that you’re going to do without his help on the Cornel jel him send in his article this week as usual, and we’ll do another one together and make it good enough for you to put in the paper instead of his f hen you ran let. him think you did it', lell him you can t endure any longer to be praised for work that you’re not domg and you're going to learn to do (To bo Continued.!