"HIS LAST SHOT."

Wairarapa Daily Times, 2 July 1928, Page 7

"HIS LAST SHOT."

A POWERFUL MYSTERY STORY, WITH A FINE LOVE ELEMENT,

By MARY DREWE-TEMPEST. Author of “The Second Mrs Fairfax.” etc., etc

CHAPTER XII. —Continued. “Sweet wife of mine, don’t you realise there is such a thing as honour? It’s the breath of life to a man, darling.” “J. only realise I can't keep that promise any longer. So you’ve got to tell me now, Barry.” “I can’t, sweetheart. You have all my love and worship, Nona; won’t you try to be content with that’” Leader’s face was grey with suppressed suffering, but he gave her his whimsical, wholly charming smile. “I tell you again, I can’t Barry. It’s got beyond me. I must see inside this Bluebeard’s chamber of yours—whatever i). costs. Tell me, who tired that shot?”

lie opened his lips as if he would plead with her once more, but her look silenced him.

Nona began to feel that she was beating her hands to ribbons against closed bars.

“Who tired that shot?” she persisted in her agony. “It "/..s your revolver, Barry; I have seen it vour name on it —”

He winced, and a hand went to his

eyes. At the spasmodic action, her heart gave a.sickening somersault, in its sudden, and terrible fear for him. “Barry, was it you?” she breathed. ‘ • Yes."’

She clutched at the table with one hand to keep herself from falling, the other went to her throat to stay the dreadful hammering there. She fell on her knees beside him, clutching at his arm.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she whispered fearfully. “I am your wife, Barry darling, and there's nothing I wouldn’t do to help—to shield you. There must have been extenuating circumstances. Isn’t there allowance made for justifiable homicide?” She raced on, scarcely knowing what she said, in sheer terror for him. He raised her gently. “My sweet you distress yourself — and me —unnecessarily,” he began. Nona broke in upon him m fresh fear that he was going to “dig himself in” again. “But, having admitted so much, you must tell me the rest, Barry.” He put out a protesting hand.

Nona felt she was being driven back into the quagmire of her doubts and jealousy “Whom did it murder, Barry?”

He made a movement as if she had stabbed him.

“A-ali—you are pressing me too hard,” ho said. “Tell me,” she urged, her straining eyes on iris. “I can’t. You promised never to ask: to trust me!”

“Tell me, Barry.” He. made a slight, negative move ment, and sat down with a groan.

She stood in trembling irresolution, torn by all the agonies known to a jealous, loving woman. Then something pushed her roughly aside, and Laddie, his faithful brown full of- dumb distress, put two great paws on his master’s knees, and licked a tear from his stooping face. But Nona was too absorbed in her own desolation to see.

There was a tinkle as of metal upon wood —then the closing of a door. , At, the slight sounds, Leader dooked up —to see her wedding-ring glittering on the table—and an empty room. CHAPTER XIII. For four months Nona .wandered from one foreign city to another in vain- quest of that pale sister of happiness, peace. Always alone, there was nothing to divert her anguished mind from what was, and what might have been —and it was only in sleep that she found rest.

Quite suddenly, she decided to return to England.

Arriving at Folkestone early one misty September morning, she drove to the Hotel Bienvcnu, and went straight to her room, overcome by a sense of unutterable loneliness. With home, husband, father, and brother within fifty miles of her, she felt an alien in the land of her birth! As, tired in body and spirit, she stood gazing drearily out of the window at the grey ocean, she was conscious of an almost overwhelming impulse to throw pride and anger to the winds and rush home to Journey’s End and —Barry!

However, a cup of English tea restored her courage, and she began, to plan her life so as to best prepare for certain eventualities. She clearly realised that she had got to keep in health. To that end, she resolved to mix with other hotel guests and join in any diversions that were going. Having bathed, she changed her frock, and went down to the lounge.

She made a bad beginning. Two hotel “residents” deigned to engage her in conversation, and in ten minutes of adroit questioning and diffident answers, managed to draw up a precis of Nona’s private affairs for the edification of other habitues: “Her name was ‘Leader’; although lately married, she had been running over the continent —alone! Had a husband and father within reach of a car, yet nobody ( met her at Folkestone'! My dear, one meets such queer people in hotels!”

So, instead of making pleasant acquaintances, Nona found herself left severely alone. She had; had very little experience of social hotel life, and in her ignorance, accepted the tradition that English people were too exclusive. On the third evening, however, she

received some enlightenment. She was sitting in the lounge after dinner, sipping tier coffee, and enviously watching her neighbours. She glanced from group to group; an elderly couple, the wife knitting complacently, husband reading an evening paper beside her; a family party, the boy, self conscious in his new College colours, the girl munching chocolates,*and looking round at other boys, parents with fond eyes on both; a pair of lovers, dead to the world about them; a pretty girl with two admirers, and zealously fanning the Jlame of jealousy in the breast of each; two honeymoon couples; an elderly, grey-haired man, sitting alone — like herself—reading. She began idlly to conjecture about this man. An Anglo-Indian, to judge from his complexion; a soldier from his bearing, and accustomed to handle troops. Ho looked a gentleman. As she mused, he glanced up, and for a second, his eyes —like flashes of blue sky —rested upon her face. A waiter came and took her cup, and one of the honeymoon couples drew near, seeking an anchorage. Nona liked the look of the young wife. She moved, politely making room for them on the long, cushioned seat. They sat down. The bride seemed as sweet as she was pretty; the husband, jealous and watchful. His watchfulness had amused Nona at breakfast that morning. NVitli a great yearning for yeung companionship, she ventured a banal remark about the weather, obtaining a quick, eager smile, and an enthusiastic: “Oh, we've had sunshine all the time!” from the girl. The husband glanced at Nona; two vertical lines grew between - his eyes as they travelled from the goldf-brown, head, past the eyes reminiscent of honey, the warm, red mouth of the girl—• no older than his sweet young wife, and came to rest on the thin substitute for a wedding-ring.

Ilis gaze grew hard. “What’s she doing her without her husband —if she’s really got one?”

The question was in his glanc?, but he spoke instead to his bride: “Darling, I fancy there's a draught here. Let’s go to those seats in the alcove,” and with a frigid bow in Nona’s direction, lie took his innocent wife - away from possible contamination.

A faint amusement lay in the kazel eyes that followed them wistfully. “It’s no good trying to make friends,” Nona decided. “They seem to think I’ve g*ot a ‘past,’ and I suppose they’re right.” Early though it was, she rose and took the lift to her room. She went to her open window, and for a long time remained there motionless, listening to the soft lapping of the -waves. Theff the maid came to prepare her room for the night. When she had gone, Nona slowly undressed and crept into bed. There, safe from prying eyes, she followed a custom now four months old, and sobbed into her pillow. The hotel grounds faced the sea on a higher level, and in one corner of them dwelt two basket chairs beloved of honeymooners. After lunch, next day, Nona remembered this sequestered spot, and determining to stake a claim on it, hurried away from her meal and took the position. No one was likely to have the temerity to occeupy the other seat, but to make assurance sure, she placed her work-bag on it. Then she took off her hat, and for some little time, basked happily enough in the sunshine.

All about her was the hush of whispering leaves —talking to themselves; above her, a perfect September sky of a sweet, egg-shell blue, dappled over with little drifts of white clouds; far out on the glittering sea, ships—like phantoms,in the shimmering haze, passed on the horizon. Presently Nona came out of her long reverie. She opened her bag and took from it a dainty scrap of cambric and began to sew some lace on a tiny sleeve. As she worked at this pretty trifle, a smile woke the latent sunshine in her eyes.

“I am not going to let scandal-mon-gers worry me —nor make me sorry I left France —” she soliloquised. “I am glad I came back; I couldn’t let Barry’s son be born on foreign soil—”

A man’s shadow fell across the empty seat. Startled, she glanced hastily up to see the Anglo-Indian standing beside her with up lifted cap. “Will you forgive if I intrude?” His voice was pleasant and cultured —reminding her of her father’s, and sounded like the voico of a friend.

, She glanced at him again. He was elderly: sixty or more; his grizzled hair had receded from his temples; there were deep folds in his lean, leathery cheeks; the mouth was thin and wide. But it was the eyes that held Nona's attention; they were bright blue: the kindest, yet the saddest eyes in the world. (To be Continued).