High Doom

Waikato Times, Volume 116, Issue 19461, 28 December 1934, Page 8

High Doom

BY j /. L. MORRISSEY

THE FIVE OF HEARTS. Sebastian Martin, Foreign Minister, met death in an aeroplane crash, but Detec-tive-Superintendent McKnlght, who round an Ingenious little weapon in the wreckage which he took as - a clue, thinks there has been foul play. Shortly after the crash Bill Cleveland, McKnlght’s journalist nephew, who is friendly with Rosemary Martin, daughter or the Minister, is shot at while boating with a rrlend, Brian Clarke, orr the Thames. A medallion 13 found in the bushes from which the shot came. Sebastian Martin was one, Five of Hearts of Bonchester School, a mutual bond of affection formed in youth for his widow, Mrs Peggy Martin. The others, who dedicated their celibate futures to her after her marriage, were Premier Hubert Tullls, Sir Michael Loder, specialist; Gerald Harker, artist; and John Martel, famous singer. Had the bond been broken, add was there now a vendetta? These theories are being investigated by Mcknight and Carswell, his assistant, and at the same time they are keeping in mind Enrico Paola, an Italian, who wanted a locked diary belonging to Martin. CHAPTER XLlX.—(Continued.) For a moment McKnight looked round his flat with the hunted look of one who knows not where he should go. Was this the end? liad he finished himself? Were those methods on whicli he prided himself at last to bring him to disgrace? Of course, Colburn could place only one construction upon his release of Paola last night: It was as he had told himself the night before. -McKnight himself was directly responsible for the slaughter of Ilarker. That was if Paola had done the thing. But it was all too self-evident that it had been his hand that had struck down the artist in the triumphant moment of showing his picture. And yet . . . again McKnight felt that hammering inside his head. There was something he should consider . . . something he had not reckoned with. What was it? For fifteen minutes he paced the carpet, his brain on fire with the effort, to think clearly. Then he seized his hat, and, rushing head-long down the stairs, came out into the fresh morning air. The ferment inside his brain was struggling to tell him something ... it was struggling to the edge of his consciousness . . . soon it would come back to him. It was maddeningly painful to have this feeling. But it would not last he knew for certain. He had experienced it before. It was as though his subsconscious mind, trained in the methods of thought of the mind whicli was ils master, was now working in a well-marked groove to bring to light something which had been 'dropped therein and had lain fallow and unnoticed.. In Pimlico,

When he arrievd outside the house In Pimlico there was a small crowd ■of curious onlookers on the pavement drawn by the vivid accounts of the crime which had appeared in the morning papers. McKnight had seen them, had groaned and been thankful that for once his nephew, Bill Cleveland, was not responsible for them. 'The policeman on duty at, the door saluted him briskly and passed him in. McKnight breathed a sigh of relief at this, for it showed him that whatever the Commjssoner’s attitude towards him might be, It had not so far affetced his official status. Another constable was standing at the door of the studio and McKnight spoke to him. “Inspector Carswell been here yet?” he asked and the man nodded. "Here at seven this morning he was, sir,” was the reply. “lie ieft ten minutes ago and says lie’ll most likely be . back in half an hour."

McKnight walked again Into the studio and, standing six l'eet from the easel, allowed his eyes to roam round the room carefully. Empty now of human beings, it looked more ominous Ilian it had done on the previous evening beneath the electric light and, walking lo one of the windows, he pulled aside llic curtains lo let in the morning sun. A shaft of its yellow radiance fell athwart Hie curtain easel and upon a dark stain on the floor in front of it. Missing Glass. In McKnight walked round ihe room considering everything lie came across. Then lie stopped and, holding up his left hand, licked orf on ils fingers 'the names of those who had been present. Carswell, Paola, I.Oder, Mrs Martin, Martel. That made live. ' llarker was. out of it for Ihe obvious reason, and so was .McKnight himself, His mind went off at a tangent and his eyes swept the floor. Everything lay as it had looked the night before, untouched, by any hand. Vet there was a glass missing. Seven people‘had been served with cocktails that night.. Martel, Loder, Mrs Martin, Paola, Carswell,. McKnight, and, lastly, llarker had taken one himself. The detective remembered distinctly that the tray had been empty and had been lifted by llarker on to a sideboard. Marker's own glass had been set out on bis paint-table before lie fell, McKnight remembered that, and it now lay shattered on Ihe Hour, broken when Ihe lighls had gone out. Yet there were left only four glasses. McKiiight's own glass lie had set down on the empty tray, and it was slill (here. One glass was missing. \ Two were set back upon (lie Moorish table he had righted last, night. One was resting on Ihe sideboard, and one lay In 1 lie middle of the lloor, its stem broken, rolling sligh-Uy as the floor creaked to his tread. He considered it with fascinated eyes. Seven glasses

. . . six left. Where was Ihe seventh? The idea held him spellbound. If lie ■could discover whose was Ihe seventh glass and where it was, ill on might lie lie sure that lie had the murderer of Marker in liis grasp. Tho Motive? But Paola had killed the artist . . . that-was a certainty. There were no two ways of looking at it. It was Paola’s crime. The weapon fitted, Ihe motive . . . ah! what was the motive? Was lie lo think his original idea was right, namely that llarker and the Italian had been working in concert until now? Paola, turning upon the artist, liad struck him down in dcatii. l-l seemed as though Hint must be right. Since Marker’s death MoKniglil’s original suspicions of bis complicity with the earlier crime had been dulled. Now they sprang again lo life, full-armed and revitalised, .lust such a tiling ns Paola would do! Smouldering with haired for some fancied or real wrong done him, lie had slain iiis partner in hot blood, iiille reckoning the consequences. Supposing, oh 1 just supposing Hint his was ihe vendetta against Ihe Five. Supposing Marlin i.<iTl been 1 lie first . . .

Marker flie second. Who would the. third be? lie breallied a sigh of rereiief as a linn step sounded in Ihe passage outside, ills fancies were beginning lo ride him like hags. The air was close in tlie studio. '•Thank heaven you've come, Carswell,'’ he greeted his subordinate. •Tve been prowling round here looking for something . . ."

"Looking .for something, sir?" ejaculated Carswell, and McKnight nodded.

“Yes, the seventh cocktail glass.” Carswell’s .face had fallen when he had stepped Into the room. Now he looked more woebegone than ever. “You’ll have to pull yourself together, Mr McKnight,” he said warningly. ‘l’ve just been speaking to the Commissioner about you, and he says . 1 .”

“Wants to see me, eh?”m zfiflffffi.bg

“Wants to see me, eh?” cut in McKnight, and •Carswell nodded dismally. “If I was to tell you what he said about you, sir,” he said, “you’d push my face in. I’m to tell you to report to him at Scotland Yard as soon as I see you. He’s been ringing you up at your fiat all morning and can’t get an answer.”

“Dreadfully bad service we have in our district,” said McKnight blandly. With 'Carswell’s coming he had recovered much of his sangfroid and now he .smiled into the little man’s face amiably.

“Leave that for a while, old man,” he said wheedingly, ‘and bend your mind to this little problem. Now you see, last night seven cocktail glasses were handed out and none were left on the tray . . He went on to explain to Carswell what he had been thinking, and, when he had finished, Carswell remained for a few moments in frowning silence. CHAPTER L. The slashed Picture. “I thought you were sure it was Paola,” he said at last, and McKnight flicked his fingers irritably. “The glass,” he said querulously. “Concentrate on the glass. Leave Paola out of it for a moment and think about the glass. Who was the person who held, that glass when the lights went out, what did that person do with it then, and, finally, where is it now?” “Have you searched the room?” came from Carswell helplessly.

“No,” replied McKnight thoughtfully. “I haven’t searched the room. For this reason. No one in this room last night had any reason for hiding the glass here. What I’m thinkng about Is that the person who had it wanted to hide it indefinitely ... do you see . . . wanted to take it right out of our way . . . finish it . . . destroy it. Now do you see, man?”

Carswell assumed that worried, hunted look he always took on when a question was asked him to which he had no fainest clue of the answer. He took his bowler hat off with his left hand and scratched his black hair with his right.

eyes were gleaming as he hissed out one word:

“Finger-prints!" •Carswell jumped slightly and reset his hat on his head. “Finger-prints on the glass . . . ” he said vaguely, and McKnight nodded his head' vigorously.

“Yes. ‘Finger-prints on the glass and on the knife. Carswell, the man who killed Harker last night is a very clever man. He is filled with the cunning of the very devil. His mind works with the speed of lightning. He can execute a complicated movement like a flash of electricty. Think what happened here last' night? He switched off the light . . . then-with a clear picture in his mind of the positon of that dagger on the table, he stabbed Harker In the back, put his empty glass in his pocket, and then . . . what did he do then . . . ?” he stopped helplessly and spread out his hands. You’re Sure ” “You’re sure it Avas a man?” said Carswell,, feeling that the question was a trifle foolish but aware that he must at least, seem to be following the thread of his superior’s reasoning. McKnight started and looked at him quecrly.. “Sure it was a man?” he repeated, then he laughed and clapped Carswell on the shoulder. “Absolutely, old man, he said. “You see, Mrs Martin was the only woman in the. room, and she was scared stiff of Paola all the time, and she fainted when the lights went out,. It was a man, Carswell, a man—or perhaps I should say a devil. He did all that I said in under one minute, and only had no time to remove the paint-knife, wipe it, and Hide it. llis brain told him that in that flash there would be no time for that, for lie could not he quite sure how Harker would fall. The finger-prints must remain on the knife, therefore lie would remove the only other object in the room that might betray him —his glass. Besides, Carswell,” he added inconscqucnUy, “Mrs Martin loved Harker, and she isn’t likely to have killed the man she loved.” (To be continued.)