The Courage of Love

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 931, 26 March 1930, Page 5

The Courage of Love

PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

by

MADAME ALBANESI

Author of '■ Love’s Harvest,** “The Road V> Love.” ”The Way to Win,*-’ etc..

CHAHPTER Xl,—Continued

“Well, I’ve got nothing to do with Francis, thank goodness!” Burke said in a sullen voice. “I wash my hands of him. What does the doctor say?” Townley gave hint the report of the doctor, and Burke shrugged his shoulders. “Well, you evidently missed it this time, Cyril!” he said. ‘‘Couldn’t you have stopped the girl from jumping out? You with your big, strong hands!” "That'll do,” said Townley, savagely. “Well, this is a nice mess up, anyhow,” said Burke, going on in the same peevish, sullen, and yet nervous voice. “It holds up everything. And what really is going to happen to us if this girl passes out? She looked like a dead thing when I saw her just now ” “And you’re an expert on knowing what dead people look like, aren’t you?” queried the other man, in the same savage way. He had poured out more whisky, and it was evident that he was very

perturbed. What was he going to do if Diana Ladbroke were to die? And how go on even if she had a very' bad illness! He cursed himself, and he cursed her, and everything to do with the accident. ‘ rT ow was I to know?” he queried iu a furious tone, “that she was going to do that asinine sort of thing? She had got the door open and had jumped out before I knew what she had in her mind.” But Burke went on with his grumbling. “Seems like,” he said, in his sullen voice, “you’d ought to have been strong enough to stop her from flinging herself out of the car. Why, she’s only a bit of a thing—no weight at all.” Townley turned on him with a snarl. “I tell you she took me by surprise. Why, you can be pretty well sure if I’d had the slightest glimmer of an idea in my mind what she was going to do, I would have pretty nearly strangled her rather than let her slip out of my hands; hut she was too quick for me.” Henry Burke gave a queer sort of laugh. “Takes after her father, maybe; a chip of the old block,” he said. “That’s the sort of thing that James Ladbroke would have done, and did do, even when he was a dying man.” Then he turned on Townley. “I don’t know how you feel about this business,” he said- “Of course, it looked pretty easy when we were on the other side, and yve talked it out and made our plans; but it’s getting | to look different business to me now.” ] Townley’s lip curled contemptu-! ously. “There’s a yellow streak in you, Henry.” he said, “nothing will ever! stop it from coming out.” The other man blustered angrily. “Yellow streak yourself! I’m not aj coward! Nor am I a fool 1 I tell you j we’ve taken on something that isn’t | going to pan out as easily as we thought. Don’t you forget either that! for all we know, another person in j the world may be on our track now.! and he won’t be such an easy person to manage as this girl is. Look here,: Townley, I’ll tell you one thing.” Burke put down the newspaper and got up and faced the other man. “I’m not going to stand for any ugly treatment, of this girl—that’s got to be made clear before we take another step. If you can work the trick with vour swarmy ways, well and good, but I tell you again, I’ll have no rough-house handling. ( We have got quite enough on our shoulders as it is.” “You leave me to deal with this matter in my own way, Henry,” said Townley. speaking now in a cold, calm v ,- a v. “Just to save your skin, stand aside —don’t, interfere. Don’t inter- i fere, I say.” [ Burke did not answer, nor did he move for a short spell. Then he shrugged his big shoulders, and he j slouched out of the room through the window into the garden beyond. ! And the man who had brought j Diana away from Middleston stood I

] and looked after him. His thoughts were ugly, and his expression was ugly, too. The suggestion that flashed through his mind at that moment was in query form. How was he to deal with this problem? Such a creature as Henry Burke constituted a kind of perpetual threat. And the third man who was to play such an important part in the conspiracy he had on hand was just as uusatisfao tory. He was a young man whom Townley had brought into this business because he needed a young man. And he was the type of individual who Townley imagined, would be willing' to carry out any nefarious scheme if he were given enough money. The fact that he was the son of the i woman who occupied the post of housekeeper, and cook, and general j factotum in this house, was the only | cause for satisfaction where this j young man was concerned, because, j as Townley had the mother under j his thumb, through her, her son could j be forced to do anything. Not for an instant did Townley | imagine that Francis Stanton would 1 rebel against liis part of the working of this conspiracy against the girl who I lay so white and unconscious in that top room. For after all, he was to marry Diana! That was the part he had to play. He was a good-look-ing young man, rather dissipated, but j having a spurious air of smartness j about him. His mother, of course, had ruined him, and it was because of him that she had drifted into this man Townley’s hands. It was true at -the moment things did not look so rosy as they might have done, but as Cyril Townley continued walking to and fro in that long room, gradually his usual arrogant faith in himself came back, and j he laughed more than once. If he I could have overcome all the mass j lof difficulties which had been over- j ! come in the last year, well then, there I was no reason why he should doubt j his capabilities for carrying through his scheme which was to bring him j wealth, and a certain place in life. I

CHAPTER XII,

Although Hugh Waverley never I ceased feverishly to search, to inj quire, to write, to turn in every direc- | tion to find some clue on which he | could work; some clue that would lead | to the discovery of what had happened | to Diana after she had been driven j away from the County Hotel in MidI dleston, he had nothing to work upon ! except what the manager of the hotel ! had told him. that Cyril Townley had i come from London, and that the car ! had gone back to London. No one. it appeared, had noticed whether Diana had got into the car or not; that was a great drawback. She had been to the hotel to meet Townley, and as she had driven away with him, it had been naturally supposed that this was an arranged matter. Although she was known to various tradespeople in Middleston, she had never been to the hotel before and no one there had known who she was, all of which was very disappointing to the man who was fretting his heart out about h^r. As has been said, he fell in almost eagerly with his mother’s suggestion that they should go to London. But it was a very big undertakng to try j to find the man lie was seeking in ! such a big world as London! The I trouble being that Waverley had nothing to go upon. He was ignorant of all concerning this man Townley except that he convinced himself very surely that he was a scoundrel, and a dangerous man. Here again it*was his mother who proved of valuable help. Unknown to her son, she wrote to a school friend of his and entreated

him to come to see her. Martin Joyce was a journalist, doing very well in his profession, and already being a person of some importance in the newspaper world, and no young ; man could have had a more sincere and admiring friend than Waverley had in Joyce. / The journalist was dreadfully shocked when he met Hugh to see how changed the other man was. And when he and Mrs. Waverley were alone and she poured out all that was in her heart, the other young man at once dej termined that he would work in with ■ her and her son, and that together ! they must let no stone be unturned .in their efforts to come in contact , with something, or somebody con- ’ nected with this very strange disappearance of James Ladbroke’s daughter. Martin Joyce smoked several cigarettes, and lapsed into silence for a long period, then when he spoke he put a new idea into Mrs. Waverley’s mind.

“Of course, this man may have had something to do with her father. I mean something more than was given Mrs. Thorp as an explanation for being compelled to. give up the care of her brother’s child. The mere fact that Miss Ladbroke has disappeared, that this man Townley has behaved in this strange manner, abducting the girl when, according to what you tell me, she would have gone into his care openly and legally after the matter had been thoroughly investigated by Mrs. Thorp’s lawyers—points to the fact that there is something more we shall have to find out,” Joyce said, j when he broke his silence. “In fact, i the more I go over the different points ; of the story,” he added, “the more I am convinced that there is something mysterious, something sinister, mixed up in this business. Who has the 1 papers that Townley was to give to Mrs. Thorp? Was anything found j after her seizure?” ; “Nothing but a very disjointed and J incoherent, and unhappy account of

what had passed between herself and Mr. Townley in the hotel. She must have written this the night after she had met him. She says he told her that she was to take the papers with her, but she was so distressed and agitated she never realised until she was

away from the town that she had not brought any document —so nothing has been found except the letter which was addressed to Diana, and which the girl left with her aunt.” “Well, of course,” said Martin Joyce in his practical way, “this poor woman must surely have gone all to pieces, otherwise she never would have given in so quickly to such a preposterous, story. To me, dear Mrs. Waverley, it reeks of lies from beginning to end! And why, or how could Mrs. Thorp have allowed this girl to have gone to the hotel to meet a man whom she evidently distrusted and disliked, is something which passes my comprehension! It is altogether a story which is going to be a very difficult one to deal with. Poor Hugh!” Joyce said quietly, “no wonder he is in such a wretched condition! But, dear Mrs. Waverley, we must not let this spoil his career! The best thing in the world for him will be work, and if he can’t go back to the old Abbey, well then his firm must give him something

to do here You may be quite sure f shall stand by him. There’s my hand on it. I am going to do everything In my power to give him back his peace of mind, and lead him. if possible, to his happiness.” To be Continued Tomorrow.