THE BANNANTYNE SAPPHIRES

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 789, 9 October 1929, Page 5

THE BANNANTYNE SAPPHIRES

BY

FRANK HIED

CHAPTER XL. Meredith and Patricia went into the inner room, but the stone walls showed an absolutely unbroken surisce. Remembering the painted door io the ravine, Meredith and Patricia fnlt the whole length of the wall as h'Sh as they could reach, thinking 'hat some portion of it might be a, 'loor, camouflaged like the outer one. But nothing was painted. Their nands touched only cold, hard stone. They went from end to end of the "'all again and again, each time with tlle same result. Finally, Meredith tapped each one of the big square stones with the end of the crowbar. s t°ne rang solidly. ... There’s nothing for it.” he said, •w to „ r ' s * t Koing by the ravine.” >es," Patricia agreed, “and we ""ght to go at once. Suppose Santo tomes back here!" Another thing they- forgot was anto s key,” Meredith said as he Pened the door into the passage. "I iin t n a **lue funk about that, right so v ' as *- minute. If they'd ,„“ rc , hec i me for it they would have fo «nd the necklace ” ,h 0 , s surprise, when he pushed at mia», S j iDR door it did not move. He able ° harder. It was still immovk°°k. Guy!”

Patricia was pointing to the edge ot the door. Her quick eyes had caught th glint of steel between the woodwork and the wall. From top to bottom of the door Meredith counted five square pieces of steel. Then they both understood the crashing sound of big bolts being shot into their sockets that had come to them after the man had gone. The swing door was bolted to the wall. For a little while neither spoke, each dreading to voice the fear that had come upon them. The door was of pitch-pine, made in long, unbroken strips of wood reaching from the top to the bottom. “If I can get out four of those strips with the crowbar,” Meredith said, “we can squeeze through.” He raised the crowbar above his head and struck downward 'on a division between two of the strips, hoping to splinter the wood. There was the clang of iron meeting iron, and the sharpened end of the crowbar flew into the air and fell to the ground. . He leant against the wall, sick and dizzy with apprehension. They were trapped—absolutely trapped! Then there came sudden darkness. The electric light had gone out. Patricia, stifling a cry of fear, put out her hand and touched Meredith. “Oh, Guy, I didn’t bring the torch! I thought we shouldn't want it with the light.” , .. _ He took her hand. It was trembling. "Don't you remember, the switch was here, just on the right of the door.” , Meredith tried to speak leassuiingly, but Patricia divined his anxiety and clasped his hand closely. With his other hand Meredith

fumbled about on the wall near the door and found the switch. There was a click, but no answering light came from the ceiling.

“Santo must have come back and switched off the light from the villa,” Patricia whispered. “It could only come from there.”

It was useless to remain in the passage standing against the steelbolted immovable door. Their only hope was in the inner room. Per* haps, thought Meredith, in desperation, some sound from above might show them the whereabouts of the entrance to the villa. Still holding Patricia’s hand he felt his way along the wall to the door into the first room, she following him closely. There he turned on the electric switch. Still no result. Running his fingers along the edge of the bench, they came to where it ended. Immediately in front, Meredith knew, was the opening into the inner room. “You hold on to the bench and don’t let go of me,” he said, moving several paces out into the blackness. He stretched his left arm to its full extent, feeling for the wall, “Come as far as you can without letting go of the bench.” He went farther forward, step after step, until Patricia cried hurriedly. “No farther, Guy! My fingers are just on the edge of the bench.” He stopped, moving his arm slowly to right and left. When he moved to the left the side of his hand touched stone, stone with a sharp edge. He knew then they had found the opening. “It’s all right, darling,” he said; “we’ve got it. Come along.” Slipping his hand along the surface of the stone, he found the other edge and grasped it with his fingers, holding them there until Patricia was abreast of him. Then he put his right arm round her shoulders and drew her after him as he went round the projecting piece of wall, on to which he still held. Once through the opening, he remembered that a sharp right-angle turn would take them directly into the inner room.

Directly they made this turn they | saw <? light in the distance. There was no need now for Meredith to keep j

his hand upon the -wall tor their guidance. Everything was dim in trout of them, but beyond a clear light streamed down on the wine cases they had seen the day before. Then they had all been neatly piled one on top of the other; now, with lids prised open and straw scattered around them, they were lying here and there all over the floor on the farther side of the room. “You were right, Guy,” Patricia said, “the jewels were all in these cases. Oh, if only we had had the screwdrivers yesterday.” Both thought the light came from an electric globe, but when they reached the wine cases and looked up they saw it was daylight, bright daylight, streaming through holes in the wall above their heads. Meredith could feel his heart thumping under his ribs as he rushed forward. Here was touch with the open air, at any rate, and somewhere, too, close to the villa. If they could do nothing except shout, someone would

| hear, perhaps Flaxton. Santo had j said he was coming. Patricia grasped his arm. She saw that the light came through a series of slits, cut upwards and downwards, one after the other, all along the top of the outer wall close to the roof. Between each set of four slits there ! was only a narrow division of stone, j .| At a little distance from this outer J wall, what looked like a curtain of 1 j stone hung down for some six feet ; or so from the ceiling, giving the im ' pression that it was the upper part of a stone partition, the lower portiop of which had been cut away. The light filtering through the series of slits struck directly on the inner side of this stone curtain, each series making a star of four points. 1 Patricia looked at the light streaming' through the slits in the walls, then at j the reflection on the stone curtain. ■ | If you joined the points of the star. two aud two, you would have a , 1 Maltese cross. Why should she think of Maltese crosses? “Guy. I’m certain we’re under the loggia,” she exclaimed, then rapidly ! , explained what she had noticed that morning in the loggia—light appearing to come through the sides of the ! painted Maltese crosses in the top row. j “And it was light I saw. and not painting, as I thought.” she concluded. “Those men must have been working ; here, under our feet, with the electric ; light on.” ‘ By jove. I wonder if you are right?” J cried Meredith. “We can easily see. lie piled the wine cases one upon the other, until, standing upon the topmost, he could sec through one of the slits ’ You’re right,” he whispered, lookj Ing down upon her. “This is the back

wall of the loggia. Shall I shout? Perhaps Flaxton may be there.” Patricia was alarmed. “Oh, no. Suppose Santo and Maria hear you?” Meredith climbed down to the floor. “But we must do something,” he said. “Yes.” Patricia agreed, “but if you ; shout, and Santo hears, he may come in here by the way we can’t find, and |then —” “I think I could tackle Santo.” “But suppose he had a pistol?” i Meredith was silent. Santo armed with a pistol was an ugly possibility ! —no, a certainty. Wasn’t it tacitly 1 understood that he would find them both dead of starvation when he came back in a fortnight, and wasn’t he to have his “instructions” from Wryce? ;If he found they had got free from their bonds, the pistol for Santo would jbo the only solution. Patricia was | right. She always thought more ! quickly than lie did. | Patricia was looking up at the slits I in the stone. I “Don’t you remember. Guy. we noticed yesterday how well ventilated these rooms are? The air comes in ; through those slits —there’s no other possible place.” “Well?” asked Meredith, seeing she had some idea in her mind. “And those slits have been cut in the stone. I can see the marks ol the chisel from here. That is wh> Maxwell Wryce left those hideous pianted Maltese crosses on the wal of the loggia. He cut through all the ' Small tin of Shnrland’s Egg Preser j vative preserves 15 dozen eggs. Iveey | perfectly. Obtainable all stores. \

arms of the crosses in the top row I to ventilate this place.” ! “Well?” said Meredith again. | “That means the stone must be soft or he could not have had it cut,” Patricia continued. “Do you see what I | mean?” “Not ill the least.” "Book there!” said Patricia, pointI ing to one of the series of slits. “Those lour lines all come from one centre. That means the small piece of stone in the middle has four cuts all around it and close together. Couldn't we do something with the screwdrivers and the crowbar to knock out the j centre bit?” "Are those slits in the wall very deep?'-’ -asked Patricia. “No, they're not!” replied Meredith. “1 was suprised. I thought the wall would have been much thicker. But, all the same. I don't see how knocking i out the centre is going to help us.” Meredith added doubtfully, j "Try the crowbar,” Patricia suggested. He clambered on to the top wine ] case, and pushed the crowbar into one of the slits at the point where it started from the centre. A jagged piece of iron stuck out from the broken edge of the crowbar. This he rubbed on to the surface of the stone, calling out in a i triumphant whisper: “Patricia, the stone is positively rotten! It’s coming away in powder!” "Ah! that's good! Rut can't we lie another case, so that 1 can work with the big screw driver?” ;! (To be continued tomorrow)