THE PRISONER AT THE BAR

Waikato Times, Volume 107, Issue 17917, 13 January 1930, Page 4

THE PRISONER AT THE BAR

(Published by arrangement)

BY RALPH RODD. Author 'of “Whispering Tongues,” “Little Lady Mystery," “Under False Colours," “A Marriage by Capture,” “A Step in the Dark." etc. (Copyright.)

CHAPTER I. The lights in the windows of “Mon Repos” told their own tale. Lights are so eloquent. A strong light in the room above the porch, a discreetly-shaded light in (Mr. Smyle’s bedroom to the right, and a light in the spare room to the left, given over to the trained nurse. There were other signs of the presence of sickness in the house. A load of straw had been put down on the road, at the end of the house, to deaded the rumbling sound of the country carts as they passed on their way to the neighbouring town. A notice on the gate asked callers to go round to the side door. The doctor’s car stood out in the roadway.

Quite a number of people had called at “Mon Repos.” Mr Wlndover Smyle was such a popular old man. 'He had not actually lived very long in his cosy little country retreat near the busy Northern town of Steelford, but he had been there long enough to win the good-will of his neighbours. They were more than a little sorry at the report that Mr Smyle’s tenancy of “Mon Repos” was drawing to a close. It was said that his lease on life had nearly expired. A tramp in the lane took in all the signs of what was happening with a practised eye, He knew the place well enough, had more than once got the price of a pint from the old man in the wheel-chair. Kind-hearted old gentleman Windover Smyle. The tramp watched the doctor let himself out, keeping discreetly in the shelter of the hedge himself. Then, the coast being clear, he passed a little lower down the private road and entered the kitchen garden by the white-painted gate. The night was chilly, if not sufficiently so to render, a casual ward desirable. At “Mon Repos,” there was an excellent pot-ting-shed in which the coke stove that heated the greenhouse stood. The old tramp knew it well; not to the owner alone was that snug little country abode “Mon Repos." The gentleman of the road sniffed the warm air with satisfaction. It smelt of the earth which which he was so familiar, and of the coke fumes which were so desirable. He went to the end of the dark shed where the old sacks, were stored. There was some straw,there as well, —straw in which the 'dahlia tubers, dreading the cold, even as he dreaded it, had spent the winter. Straw, and sacks, and warn stove —what more could heart desire 1 The tramp munched the bread and meat he had bought in the village contentedly, he forebore to light his pipe lest the smell of tobacco in the morning should indirectly cause the subsequent appearance of a padlock on the door. Then he stretched himself in the darkness, drew the sacks over him and slept the sleep - of man who knows no care beyond that of the moment. In the snug house the master might lie a’dying, but in the potting-shed his uninvited guest breathed as evenly as a healthy child. The one had done with the makeshift repose of earth, the other was enjoying it to the full. An hour passed, and then the tramp awoke. Sound as his sleep had been, he had long since acquired the knack of swift awakening. It is a useful one for a man who never pays for lodgings. J Someone had enteredHhe shed. The fact was against all rules. The gardener was not due until seven in the morning, when his first task would be to replenish the stove. It could not be seven as yet, for the place was very dark. The unwelcome intruder opened the small iron door of the stove, allowing the red glow of firelight to illuminate the interior of the shed. In the immediate proximity of the stove the light was fairly strong, yet it scarcely reached to the spot under the sloping roof where the tramp lay. The man was very keenly alive to the possibility of discovery. It made him more alert than usual. He was ’•cady to scramble to his feet ano make for the door should it be necessary, but first he meant to try the effect of lying very still, hoping that even now he might escape detection. And all the time he watched with eyes that missed nothing. His first fears died down somewhat. It was only a-girl who had come in, after all—a young girl, young and slight. Her face struck the watcher as very white, but the firelight tuined her hair red. An artist would have gloried in the rich • .warmth of its colouring, but the tramp, also a connoiseur in his way, disapproved of auburn hair —he called it “carrits. ’ . The girl acted strangely—or so It seemed to him. She had a basket in her hand, • and from it she took a large bottle which she set on the ground by her side. The watcher was interested in all bottles; the sight of this one fascinated him for just an instant a rapturous thought came into his mind —a basket and a bottle! Food and drink! Then the girl’s next action drove all pleasant thoughts away. She had the basket in her hand, and she was groping her way towards • him. She was quite close to where he lay now. In another instant she must surely discover him. He could see her silhouetted against the warm glow from the stove. Should he shout out and startle her, or should he still lie there and trust to luck? The girl, was stooping and groping with her hands. 'Once she touched his boot, a hard, muddy object, contact with which apparently conveyed nothing to her. Now he realised what she was doing. This girl knew of the straw amongst which he lay; she was stuffing some of it into her basket. An odd thing for her to do at that hour of night.. He experienced relief. The girl had turned away. Her basket was full of straw, he could see some of it protruding. She had gone back to the stove and had picked up her bottle. Food and drink, indeed —there ate dreams too beautiful- for realisation!

(To be continued.)

She closed the door of the stove, she had no longer need of light, closed it cautiously, holding the handle with the edge of her long cape, instead of slamming it as a man would have done. .Then the girl opened the door of the sited —the watcher cuaglit a glimpse of the stars —as she passed out and closed it behind her. The man was half-inclined lo get up and follow her. lie thought better of it. lie was comfortable, there was no sense in leu Ting fate.

jane Quariey was glad that the night was dark, because', thuogli com-

mon sense told her that she was not in the least likely to be seen, the nature of her work caused her unwonted nervousness. Her heart .was beating as it It had never done before. It embarrassed her, hut at least she had not thought of turning back.

At the foot of the garden of “Mon Repos,” at the point where the roses tried to Ignore their plebian. neighbours, the gnarled old apple-trees, there was a large, wooden building. It was too big to described as a mere summer-house; an artist had built it years before, as a studio. Mr Smyle knew nothing of easels and palettes, but he had seized on the place delightedly. He, called it his “wigwam." He had spent so many years in the narrow limits of an office that he welcomed the unwonted space and airiness of the big creeper-clad chamber. Tho best of his books wero In the house, of course, but many old favourites wer6 here, and so was a big roll-top desk, and, not for from it, Jane's typewriter, tt had been in this place that Mr Smyle and Jane Quariey, the secretary, had -for the best part of three years done their morning’s work. It had been here that in tho afterpoon and during the long summer evenings the old man and Jane Quariey, his companion—his adopted grand-daughter as he liked to call her—had chatted, and read, and watched the blackbirds and the thrushes searching for worms amongst the rose roots. Jane opened the door of the “wigwam,” as she had done so often before, slipped in and closed it after her. She dare not light the lamp, but she took a small electric torch from her pocket, and, pressing the button, she let a shaft of light travel slowly round the room, avoiding the window carefully. , She had been so happy there. It was an appalling thing she had come to do. £ach book seemed like an oIJ friend. The pictures—cheap pictures, but not ill chosen—on the walls,, the shabby, comfortable furniture, even the clicking typewriter, she loved them all. The/ represented home to her, the only home she had ever known. This was good-bye—-and worse I

If the tramp had followed his first inclination and had stolen to the window, if he had been able to push those drawn curtains a little way aside then he would have witnessed a sight which would have furnished him with a bar-room topic for the remaining days of his life. Jane Quariey took a key from her pocket, unlocked the desk and pushed back the shutter. She did more than that, for she took each of the little drawers out and scattered their contents on, the big blotting pad. Then she opened the large drawers. They were nearly full, there were' bundles of letters tied with string, an accumulation of other papers. Jane unfastened the strings, and thrusting her hands beneath the papers she raised them, heaping them together lightly. She did it reluctantly, as though she touched some loathsome thing. Once she shuddered. Rut she never paused. And over each drawer she sprinkled some of the fluid from the bottle which had aroused the tramp’s keenest curiosity.