Under the Shadow

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1069, 5 September 1930, Page 5

Under the Shadow

By

Elizabetb York Miller

Author of “ Conscience,” M Carry On,” 11 The Brass Box,” etc., etc.

CHAPTER XIX

She clasped her hands together, tightly and sank down, breathing in short, painful gasps. “Tell me, please, how it happened? Was he run over? Did he —did he suffer much? . . . Oh, poor Lionel!” The memory of his many kindnesses flooded her heart to bursting. “1 don’t think he suffered, Lady Hurst,” the secretary said with a great effort. “Death appears to have been instantaneous. He —it doesn’t seem to have been an accident ” “What do you mean?” Curtis turned his head away. He was completely spent, poor fellow. It was the sergeant who had to tell her. Hurst had been shot dead in his office. Murdered, beyond a doubt. A flush of pink along the eastern sky heralded dawn. It was four o’clock in the morning. Lights still blazed in the Park Lare flat. The butler still sat in the hall, but the newspaper had fallen from his hand, and now and again his head dropped forward and he slept for a moment or so. Orpen, partially undressed, lay asleep on a couch in her mistress’s dressing room. The French chef w-as making coffee. In the fresh morning air the odour of it penetrated through the vast suite and found its way to the library, where two grave-faced men, one in police uniform, were in conclave. The elder, in plain clothes, sat at j Lionel Hurst’s desk, with a bunch of keys in one hand. Several of the drawers were open. His name was Chator. and he was a detective-inspector of the C.I.D. Metropolitan Police. The other was the sergeant who had ac companied Curtis back to the flat. “Ask Lady Hurst if she can see me now,” Inspector Chator said, without raising his eyes from a paper he was looking at. The sergeant went out. “Has Lady Hurst gone to bed?” he asked the butler. James came to himself with a start, | and rubbed his eyes. “I don’t think so. I believe her lady- ! ship is in the drawing room with Mr ! Curtis.” “The inspector wants to see her.” j the sergeant said. ; “Very good.” ! James pulled himself together and, ! rising tip-toed as in the presence of , death, to the drawing room Curtis, the pale-haired young sec.roi rary, was standing in front of the fire- | place, drawn and aimless-looking. His j wavering glance followed Enid as she | jerked back the curtains from one of the windows and stepped on to tile balcony. He had a curious feeling that perhaps she was going to throw her self over and, if so, he was too oppressed with fatigue to lift a finger to stop her. Poor Curtis had gone through a terrific ordeal. It was he who, in company with the night-watchman, had found Hurst’s body in the luxurious private office, stretched face down ward on the floor, with a bullet wound in the head. He had evidently been shot while standing, and from behind, and the bullet had gone clean through

his brain and through the clock on j the mantel, as well, imbedding itself in the wall behind. The clock had stopped at a quarter past eight, thus fixing the exact time of the murder. Curtis had been present during the brief police examination which* followed, and mixed with the natural horror of such an affair was his affection for his employer. His dazed, tired eyes rested upon Enid with a listlessness that ap proached indifference. She had taken off the white Grecian dinner dress and donned a black one. relieved by strips of lawn at throat and wrists. In spite of the long night and its anxieties culminating in tragedy, she looked fairly fresh. But there was a dazed expression in her eyes also as she leaned against the fretted iron grille which protected the balcony. Down in street a procession of market carts with lanterns at their tails crawled slowly along, bound for Covent Garden. There were no omnibuses as yet, but here and there a motor-car sped mysteriously by, and there were huge vans filled with milk cans. “Lady Hurst —” Tt was Curtis who spoke to her and she turned, her glance falling a little apprehensively on the figure of the uniformed sergeant, who had followed the butler. “Yes?” “The inspector would be obliged if you could speak to him,” the sergeant said with polite solemnity. “Certainly, if it is necessary,” Enid replied. “Do you want me also?” Curtis asked. “I don’t know, sir. The inspector didn’t say. I’ll call you if he does.” Enid followed the sergeant into her husband’s library. It seemed to her that Inspector Chator and his assistant were much more at home in the flat than she was. The inspector rose and drew forward a chair for her. “I’m very sorry indeed to bother you with questions, Lady Hurst, but we can’t afford to lose any time.” “What questions can you possibly want to ask me?” she cried, a little tremor in her voice. “Sir Lionel and I were only married yesterday 'afternoon. I —l know so little about his personal affairs.” “Quite so. Has be ever spoken to you of anybody who might have a grudge against him?” “I don’t think so. I can’t remember anybody.” A film of moisture appeared about her lips and she wiped it away with her handkerchief, not once, but several times. In the end she pressed the handkerchief to her lips and kept it there, except when it was necessary for her to speak. “This man who was known to be with him about six o’clock—Lennox is the name Mr. Curtis had. Are you acquainted with him?” “Yes, Mr. Lennox is a friend—of ours.” “It will simplify matters if you can tell us where he is to be found.” “But he —he couldn’t have murdered my husband! You can’t be so mad as to think —” “Please, Lady Hurst.” Enid caught herself up sharply. She was trembling from head to foot, and could scarcely bear the prospect of what might be before her. “Mr. Lennox has chambers in the Temple,” she said. Inspector Chator made a slight inclination of his head, and the sergeant, who had been standing behind Enid’s chair, went quietly out. “You don’t know of any cause for a quarrel between your husband and this Mr. Lennox?” Would a lie save David from the terrible implication behind the man’s question? It was unlikely. “I don’t know of anything that could have induced Mr. Lennox to shoot my husband,” Enid said.

“Do you know why he went to the office so late, or if your husband was expecting him?” “Sir Lionel expected to be home fairly early ” “Excuse me, Lady Hurst, but I’m sure you’ll realise that. I’m only doing my duty in questioning you like this.” “Yes, I understand that.” “Then you must help me. We want to find out who shot your husband. You are not answering me very directly, and I must ask you a personal question. Of course, you need not answer it, but if you don’t, your re- | fusal will be set down in my report. ! Was Mr. Lennox a particular friend j j of yours, or of your husband’s?” I “Of mine—at one time,” she | ( answered, very low. ! “When did you see him last?” “Day before yesterday; I think it ; Avas, or rather the day before that, I for a few moments in the morning.” i “Thank you very much. Did Mr.! Lennox object to your marriage with | Sir Lionel?” “You have no right to ask such a! question!” - i “Yes, I have —but you can refuse to answer it.” She half rose, her hands held tightly to her breast. "I do refuse. I shall not say another word,” she cried. It seemed to her that whether she spoke or not, every moment of this terrible interview she was helping to put a noose around David’s neck. That grave, heavy-featured man sitting so coolly at Lionel’s desk, ransacking papers, had turned out the secrets or her heart as easily as he turned out the drawers of the desk. What had she not told him by her silences and half-evasions? Mercifully she did not realise that the most damning of all was her reluctance to let David even be accused. To the cold mind of the law it might seem that she was ready to shield the possible murderer of her husband. He was more to her than the dead man had been. “I am sorry you are so unwilling to help us,” the inspector said quietly. She hated the sight of him, scribbling in his beastly little book. What was he writing? If only she could look over his shoulder -and see. “How can you say such a thing!” she exclaimed, indignantly. “Am I a monster? I know David Lennox and 1 don’t believe he would do such a thing. I will make a full statement to you if you like. Perhaps it would be better.”

“Thank you. I’ll ask Mr. Curtis to come in. Do you object?’’ “I don’t suppose X can, very well. Oh, it doesn’t matter! . . . Yes—let me tell you and get it over. It doesn’t matter who hears.” For a moment she was left alone, and the unreality of what was happening left her mentally numb. She hada’t quite grasped the fact yet that Lionel was actually dead. It would not have surprised her at all had he appeared to scatter this inquisition with a roar of laughter at the very idea of his being dead. Perhaps it was a nightmare, and presently she would succeed in tearing herself out of it. But it was real. By this time the sun had risen aud shafts of yellow light filtered between the curtains which nobody iiad thought to draw open as yet. The electric light still burned. In the background of her living nightmare, the face of Curtis hovered like a great.grey moth. Enid wondered what, he was doing, until she took in the fact that he, too, had a notebook, and then she realised that whatever she said was to be properly verified. “Lady Hurst wishes to make a voluntary statement,’’ the inspector said. His voice, so normal and even kindly, reassured her. “How ought I to begin. Inspector?” she asked. “This is all so strange to me ... I think I know why Mr. Lennox went to see my husband . . “You are beginning very well.” “ • . . 1 was engaged to be married to Mr. Lennox, hut a misunderstanding parted us. I had not seen him for a long time until a few days ago, when he telegraphed that he wished to call. I saw him then. It was not for very long. He knew of my engagement to Sir Lionel and I understood that he meant, to ask Sir Lionel to release me. That very same evening I discovered that I could in no circumstances break my engagement to marry Sir Lionel, and I agreed that we should be married at the earliest possible moment. That was today—l mean yesterday. I did not communicate with Mr. Lennox. I knew that he would read the announcement of my marriage in the papers, and that would be sufficient explanation. .. . Because of the recent death of my father we were married very quietly, came back here for luncheon, and then Sir Lionel went owt. T understood that he was going * o his office, but he could not have done so. for it was only a little after three when he left, and I believe Mr. Curtis said it was nearly six before he reached the office. I expected him back in time for dinner at eight: o’clock. I was not greatly alarmed when he did not come, because of tho storm which was still raging. I had no reason to suppose that anything had happened to him. . . . One point occurs to me. It seems strange that, if Mr. .Lennox called at six. It was not until a quarter past eight that my husband was killed—that is, if you believe that Mr. Lennox shot him. They would scarcely have talked, or ’quarrelled’ for two and a-half hours. Sir Lionel would have been too impatient to get home. ... I don’t think I have anything more to say. Inspector.” Her voice trailed off to a mere thread, and her head fell back against a cushion. Inspector Chator nodded at Curtis. “Send for somebody. She ought to go to bed, now ”

A man who had not paid his board bill for three weeks sat in the sitting room of the “parlour floor” suite in a lodging-house in Ebury Street. The house was run by an ex-butler and his wife, assisted by their two daughters, and although they had their hands full they managed very well, and the place was beautifully kept. The lodger whom they knew as .Major Wallace had no ostensible occupation, and had described himself when he came to them as “a gentleman of independent fortune,” unaccustomed to semi-genteel surroundings, but who, perforce, had to live somewhere while his own mansion in Grosveuor Square was in the hands of the decorators. Mr. Rimple, tfip ex-butler, was not in the least impressed by his Dew lodger’s airs and graces, but the parlour floor suite happening to fall empty, he allowed Major Wallace to occupy it upon the payment in advance of two weeks’ rent. That was all Major Wallace had ever paid, and ever since he had lived on the fat of the land.

(To be Continued Tomorrow.)