THE SOLUTIONS OF RADFORD SHONE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXX, Issue 8989, 26 November 1907, Page 2

THE SOLUTIONS OF RADFORD SHONE.

BRING NARRATIVES BY OFFICERS OF TIIK- CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION I)E P A HTM EN T, AND OF THE PROVINCIAL POLICE, IN RESPECT OF DEALINGS WITH THE EMINENT EXPERT, SIR RADFORD SHONE.

Communicated to and Ki>m;n nv HE AIB # M IH liij.

[Published By Special Arrangement.] [A.ll Eights Beseryed.]

CHAPTER lll.—Continued

"Now attend to me, Inspector Quilliam," l.e said, in conclusion. "You iTiuat step on the tips of your toes in this matter. The India Office does not want to mar the festivities with pjblic scandal. English prer.tige would suffer in native eyes if it became kiiovvn that such a solemn event had been seized on by Englishmen for dtspoiling native potentates come to do honour to their sovereign. Stop their came, even kill them, if need be; but don't let us have any arrests, except in the last extremity." A month had passed since this conversation, and one morning in December I found myselt sitting on the verandah of Mason's Hotel at Delhi, gazing out over the vast perspective of the Maidan. Though the great ceremony of proclamation was not due for a fortnight the camps of the Indian princes, of the press correspondents, and of the wealthier sightseers were everywhere in evidence oil the plain, the white canvas shimmering in the heat blaze. Like all the others' in the place, the hotel was crowded —at fabulous prices. Suddenly., from the chair next to mine on the verandah, I heard a chuckling laught, and glancing askance I saw that its occupant had become interested in a paragraph in tie Delhi Gazette. He wa; a heavily built, youngish man, somewhat loudly dressed, and heavily metalled as to watch-chain and rings. Having read the paragraph through, he offered the paper to his neighbour on the othtr side. "By Jove, Shone, but your fame precede? you," he laughed rather nervously. "Seen this?" "Read it aloud," was the response, in a thin, strident voice. "But--but it gives the show away," whispered the stout young man, glancing round the thronged verandah. "Read it aloud/' the other persisted,, in a tone that would take no denial. The first speaker then read as follows : "We understand that the celebrated investigator, Mr Radford Shone, has arrived in Delhi, haying been specially retained by the Nizam of Gcojerat to protect the priceless jewels, including 'The Star of the South/ which His Highness is bringing to wear at the celebrations. Needless to say, the services of such an expert as Mr Radford Shone entail a fabulous fee; but doubtless the Nizam regards it as a positively safe insurance premium for the protection of his gems." "Thank you, Martin," said the man on the other side of the reader. "1 anticipate great things from that announcement." "I was afraid you migbt be annoved at it; the—er— publicity " A grating laugh interrupted the halting surmise. "My dear Martin, I put that paragraph in myself," said the other. "Don't you see the pull it gives me over any scoundrels who may be plotting to plunder my client? Hearing that Radford Shone has been pitted against them, the chances are in favour of their entirely abandoning the attempt which.His Highness has been warned against." "I never thought of that," was the modest reply. "You seldom thing of anything," came the severe rejoinder—so severe that it induced silence both on the part of its butt and of the other occupants of the verandah, who must have heard every word of the conversation.

To me it bad been of absorbing interest, for I had not been aware that the Nizam had received a separate warning—still less that he had taken steps for protgcting Iv's jewellery by employing an English private detective. Radford Shone was known to me, by repute only, as a clever investigator who went about his business accompanied by a sort of tame fugleman who was supposed to be writing his memoirs. I-will confess at once that his ideas of countering dangerous criminals by advertising himself as their opponent had elements of novslty which hardly appealed to me. But probably he would have bidden his historian note that I was a hidebound official if I had introduced myself and mooted as much. I was ruminating cn this new factor in my task, when a gentleman who had been sitting further along the line of chairs, rose and walked tbwly by, casting an interested glance at Radford Shone and his companion as he passed. He was a tall, spare, clean-shaven ascetic-looking man of some sixty years, noticeable by the professional cut of his European garments, which, unlike the other tourists about, he had not discarded in favour of lighter Save for the puggaree and solar hat, he might have been a spruce consultant just stepped out of his house in Harley street. His gaze, removed from Radford Shone and Martin, rested on me for the fraction of a second, to be instant! ; shifted to a clattering crowd of Ani . :can globe-trotters who came trooping -.1 to the verandah. And I was glad of that respite, for in that fraction of a second I had recognised •the hawk-faced ascetic as one of the princes of crime, known to his associates as "Deadly Smooth," and to Scotland Yard by half a score of aijases. 'Stay, though. Could I be nustiken! The foremost of the Americans—a big, creature, with plutocrat yyritten large- addressed him by name and shook him genially by the band. The restgof the tribe, an elderly lady, a very pretty girl in a smart Paris frock, and two attendant cavaliers, seemed equally pleased to meet the man who was beginning to loom so largely in my calculations. "Ah, Do-br Nigbtingall," ex.

claimed the fifead "fif the party, "I reckoned we should find you here. We've come to carry you off to our own camp on the plain, so as we can hear some more of those cunning yarns you told on the way up from Bombay. Your'e the sort of a chance acquaintance that's got to be turned into a friend, I guess. There's a slap-up tent ready for you, and I'll hire another nigger to wait on you." "Do come, doctor," chimed in the pretty girl, and she was backed up by a chorus from her attendant swains. The proposed guest was not of an age to excite their jealousy. The gentleman who was in such request demurred a little, and it struck me that, though eager to accept the invitation, he was somehow embarrassed by it. The Americans pressed him hard. _ , "Very well, Mr van Cortlandt; it is difficult to deny oneself such a pleasure'* he yielded suavely at last. "But I should like to be allowed to defer joining you till this evening, as 1 have some business to attend to in the city first." In his breezy manner old van Cortlandt assented to the arrangement, and led his chattering crowd away as noisily as they had come. Nightin-; gall stood dreamily looking after! them, his stern lips creased with a faint srnile, which faded suddenly as he turned away and looked straight at me. I wab not looking at him, but I felt the magnetic influence of his eyes, and I feared that he knew me. Then came relief, as he consulted his watch - and walked rapidly away along the verandah. "Evidently a gentleman of distinction and in great social demand," was Mr Radford Shone's verdict. "And he's in luck, being asked to the camp, for that was a ripping girl," Martin avowed. It was not for me to pass judgment on the great expert's complacency, for I was by no means sure that my suspect was the man I took him for. I had never had "Deadly Smooth" in my hands, and had only seen him once across a crowded court a dozen years before, when he had been sen - tenced to a long term. But I had his record at my finger tips, and I knew that if "Dr. Nightingall" was his latest alias, I should have my work cut out for me. Impressed with this idea, I rose, determined to find out what was the "business" which delayed hisjjprompt acceptance of the van Cortlandt hospitality. At the entrance of the hotel I caught a glimpse of his spare figure entering a shigram, one of those rickety four-wheeled vehicles which are base mockeries of the London "growler." Giving it a sufficient start, I chartered another, and so shadowed my man to the shop of a brasi-worker in the metal bazaar. An hour later, after "Doctor Nightingall" had departed, a liberal backsheesh opened the craftsman's mouth, and I knew all about the transaction. The Sahib had called for a hollow wall of gunmetal with a hole in it an eighth of an inch in diameter, ordered the previous evening. The thing was undoubtedly a bomb. I knew that I had made no mistake, and that the first time the Nizam appeared in public wearing "The Star of the South," that bomb would be used with fatal effect, and the jewel rifled in the confus'on. My mind was instantly made up as to the course I would adopt. Remembering van Cortlandt's promise to engage a servant to wait upon Nightingall while his guest, 1 determined to disguise myself as a native and apply for the situation, trusting to my lucky star to be in time to obtain it. Making all speed back to the hotel, I took the proprietor partly into my confidence, with the result that with his aid I was soon transformed into the complete semblance of a Bengali khitmagar, stained dusky brown from head to foot.

On my way out I had to pass the door of the billiard-room, and a sound of a strident voice inspired a spirit of mischief. Entering the room I found that its only occupants were Mr .Radford Shone and the former enthroned on the settee, contemptuously watching his friend's solitary practice. Shambling over to Shone, I made low obeisance, at the same time addressing him in the vernacular. The response., accompanied by an angry glare, was the question, in English: "What do you want, you rascal?" Score one over the great expert. He did not even know the language of the country to which lie .had come a thief-hunting. (To be Continued)..