ENTERTAINMENTS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 259, 2 May 1912, Page 8

ENTERTAINMENTS

EMPIRE PICTURES. THE DEAD MAN'S CHILD. There was a fair audience at the Empire Picture Palace last evening, when the above drama by the famous Nordisk Company was. screened. Throughout the picture was watched with intense enthusiasm. The story is that of a count who has an only daughter, who is 'engaged to Baron Sternberg. The count informs his daughter Edith and her fiancee that at his decease they will inherit his property. Meanwhile he visits an old friend of his, James Pendleton, and after a short conversation departs. The count, while descending the steps leading from Pendleton's house, falls and sustains injuries which prove fatal. He at once summons Pendleton and appoints him as his executor, and has a will drawn up to the effect that providing his prospective daughter and her future husband have no children the count's property will fall to Pendleton, as his next best friend, at their death. Pendleton's greed for wealth becomes too much for him, and he arranges with an Oriental doctor to kidnap Edith, the late count's daughter. The wedding day of Edith and the baron has arrived, and • while the bride is in the church waiting for her lov«r the Oriental doctor hands her a rose which he had previously doctored with a narcotic drug. This has the effect of rendering her unconscious, and m this state she is conveyed to her bed chamber. The black doctor makes his appearance through a secret door in the wall and repeats his narcotic drug experiment. He goes to Pendleton's house and tells him that Edith is unconscious and will remain so for four days. Thinking the girl is dead she is interred in the family vault, and under cover of darkness Pendleton and hia accomplice enter the churchyard and conS3?. ™? in a cab to Pendleton** house. Mith is restored to consciousness and hears the two accomplices planning to escape with her by the 9.30 train the next day. With the diamond in the ring on her finger she writes this on the window of the room in which she is concealed Meanwhile the baron's servant enters the vault and informs his master that the vault is empty. The baron sees at once that there has been foul play and communicates with Detective Nenton m the matter. After reading the contents of the dead count's will he suspects Pendleton as the culprit, and setting out in search of him, comes upon his prey who is in company with the Oriental doctor noted by the police as a specialist m poisons. The detective decides to inspect Pendleton's house hut on reaching there finds no trace of the late count's daughter. His keen eye. "however, detects what the girl had previously written on the window, and he knows that by this time the train in which the two culprits and the girl purposed travelling is nearly ready to depart. The detective arrives at the sta-

tion only to find, as he expected, th< train gone. This does not deter him ir the least, for he hoards a motor-car am taking a shorter way gets some distance ahead r>f the train, mounts a bridge anc while the train is steaming under'this at a.terrific pace he pluckily drops from his position on to the top' of the car. nages. His next action is to don the guards coat and hat and under the pretence of collecting ticket's enters the carnage where the two villains are sittino with the girl quite unnerved. The detee" tivs handcuff* Pendleton, but while so doing fa attacked by the shady doctor. Ihe detective in the scuffle takes him to the edge of the platform and pushe* him from the moving train. Tlvi> «h-1 i s restored to her lover and Pendleton "ets his just deserts. '-'The Three Musketeers" and "A Trail of Books," Edison and AB dramas respectively, were also up to the usual standard of excellence of these high class films, while the comic portion of the programme was well catered for. The programme will be screened again to-night and Friday, when picture lovers should not fail to be present