The Error of Her Ways

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20952, 3 November 1939, Page 3

The Error of Her Ways

( By FRANK BARRETT)

A Dreadful Accident Harrowgate was still dozing before ; the fire, a silk handkerchief over his | baldness. Sibyl also was dreaming, but with open eyes, in the firelight, i when an excited servant opened the door without the customary tap, and gasped: “Oh, if you please, ma’am, here’s a dreadful accident happened. Mr Clifford has shot himself dead, and they’ve brought his body here.” With a cry of horror Sibyl sprang to her feet, while Harrowgate, struggling to gather his wits and rise from his chair at the same time, shot out a string of incoherent questions. They were bringing Tom into the house when Harrowgate reached the door. Under Sibyl’s clear-headed direction, the bearers carried their load to the room which had been occupied by Sylvia and laid it on her bed. “Where's Sylvia?” asked Harrowgate as soon as his consternation had subsided. “From what I hear, sir, Mrs Clifford left the house ten minutes before Mr Clifford could have shot himself,” said the constable. “Left the house! Oh, my God, Sibyl, what does it all mean?” “They can tell us no more than this, dear. I have sent Bendall back to fetch her maid, Fletcher.” The doctor now arrived, ordered hot water, a basin, sponge, waterproof, and other requisites; then, turning from his examination, he said to Sibyl: “There is hope; he is not dead.” “Thank God!” said she and Harrowgate, fervently, and in the same breath. Then there followed silence, broken only by the directions given by the doctor as he made closer examination of the wound. Sibyl herself carried out these instructions with a deft exactness which won his praise. “One would think you had been a trained nurse, only that you are not in the least obstructive,” he said—then, still dressing the wound, he pursued: “This scalp wound is ghastly; but that’s nothing. The trouble lies below. There’s fracture of the skull, and the bone pressing upon the brain produces this state of coma, which may probably continue until the bone is raised. There, little more can be done for the moment. A good deal of blood has been lost, accounting, of course, in some measure, for exhaustion; but I feel almost certain that he will recover no more than semi-consciousness until the operation has been performed.” “May I ask you, doctor, who is the very best man to make that operation?” Harrowgate asked. “There is no better man in the world than Sir James Neville, of Harley Street. His price is a little stiff—” “So much the better. I don’t be - lieve in cheap doctors, or cheap anything. Could I see him if I went up to-night?” “Possibly—a wire would settle that question in an hour.” “Good. And if I bring him back with me, you will meet him, no matter what time, eh?” “Undoubtedly. You must not expect him, however, to perform an operation on the spot. We must wait until the patient’s system has recovered strength.” “That’s for you and him to settle. My business is to lose no chance of saving that dear fellow by wasting time or sparing money. Excuse me, doctor,” with these words Harrowgate bounded out of the room to dispatch the telegram. “Do you believe, doctor,” Sibyl asked, when they were alone, “that he shot himself?” “It is possible,” replied the doctor, with a glance at the door, to see that it was closed, “but not probable. A man with the desire to kill himself would make sure of his aim—levelling the barrel full at his forehead or temple, and close. But there is no trace of powder on this wound, and the ball struck his head at such an obtuse angle that it failed to penetrate the bone and glanced along the skull. I hardly see how he could have drawn a trigger holding the weapon so far off and reversed, as it must have been, at arm’s length. And one can see no reason for his choosing such an awkward position or risking failure in an attempt of that kind.” Harrowgate went to Harley Street, saw Sir James, who heard all he had to tell (including some not unpleasing hints with regard to extra payment for prompt attention), promised to be at Sevenoaks by eleven the following morning, and to operate if the

Enthralling Serial Story

patient were in « lumiuun. lhen Harrowgate returned to Falconrest, jaded and fagged, a little before midnight. Sibyl had prepared supper for him, and tried to avert for a time the question which she knew must come by telling him that the doctor had called twice since his first visit and was satisfied with Tom’s condition. Then she filled his glass and plate, asking questions about Sir James. Almost brusquely (for him) Teddy interrupted her. “Is she upstairs?” he asked. “1 want to know,” he continued, taking the answer for granted, and striking the table with the butt of his knife, “why she didn’t come over with him. You wouldn’t have let me come over without you. I can’t understand the gal. The sight of his blood oughtn’t to have frightened her from her dcoty. Of course such a shock would upset anyone; but a good wife don t think of her own squeamishness when her husband may be dying, for all she knows.” “Never mind about that now, Teddy. Eat a bit of supper, there’s a good dear.” “No, Sibyl, I can’t eat till I’ve had it all out. * I’ve been thinking it over all the way to Harley Street and back, and I can’t make it out. But I must know.” “Not now, Teddy, dear—why?” “Why?—fhis is why: If Tom shot himself my gal’s the cause of it. Look how she’s been to him for more than a week past. Worse than she was to Angus when she thought she I had to marry him. No man can I stand a woman that’s everlastingly | sulking for nothing at all. I couldn’t. | But she’s done something more than i that to drive him to such a thing as ! suicide. Tell her to come down. I’ll | know what it is.” i “Teddy, dear.” “Tell her, Sibyl, to come down to me,” with another thump of his knife handle. “Teddy, love—she—she is not here —she has gone away!” Harrowgate laid down his knife, and setting his elbows on the table dropped his face in his hands and scbbed. just what I’ve been fearing ! all along coming home—exactly what I feared,” he moaned. “And just as we were beginning to be so respectable!” CHAPTER XLV. Psani Returns Sir James Neville came to Falconrest the next morning, and, to the astonishment of Dr. Lomax, then and there performed the operation of trepanning. (Had the good doctor seen the cheque Sir James took away with him he might have shaken his head at the principle as well as the practice of that eminent surgeon). However, the beneficial of the operation was instantaneous, patent to every eye, and a source of rejoicing and self satisfaction to Harrowgate. The moment after the bone had been lifted Tom seemed to awake. He opened his eyes, regarded the smiling faces of those about him, and smiled faintly in return. Then he closed his eyes again. “Your local man is clever, and knows his business thoroughly,” said Sir James in parting. “Under his hands your patient will get slowly —mind, I say slowly—better, and I think will have no further need of my services.” “If we could only hope as much for Sylvia,” said Harrowgate to Sibyl as he led her back into his room. “What will be come of her? What can we do for her?” “That is what we have to settle next, Teddy.” “I won’t forgive her, Sibyl—l won’t forgive her,” said the poor old man in a trembling voice, his inconsistency borne out by the tear that dribbled down his nose. “We can’t say that yet, dear,” she answered, laying her hand on his affectionately. ! “You don’t think she knows of this,” he said imploringly, with a jerk of his head towards the room above where Tom lay. “No, I don’t, Teddy. We have heard what Fletcher had to say, and Bendall’s account. Sylvia left the house quite ten minutes before Tom. Bendall going to Westerham passed her at the foot of the hill. That is quite a long way. She could hardly have gone so far and returned in the time to the place where Mr Tom was shot. And why should she return?” (To be continued) j J ' : ! ! 1