A DESPERATE GAME.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10111, 5 October 1910, Page 2

A DESPERATE GAME.

(OUR SERIAL.)

By OWEN MASTERS. Author of "The Master of Tredcroft," "One Impassioned Hour," "The Deverel Heritage," "When Love Rules the Heart," "Captain Emlyn's Bride," etc.

CHAPTER X.—Continued. "And if I refuse?" I asked. A swift, ugly-looking smile wrinkled his fat face, but for the moment lie did not reply. "Tell me," I went on, "is it that you wish to help mo, or is it that you want to get rid of me?" Again that malignant, ugly smile flitted across his face, though his eyes remained stern and intent. * "You have my offer," he said; "its motives do not concern you. Perhaps 1 want to help you, perhaps I want to get rid of you—who knows? At all events my plan achieves both. And if you went," he added slowly and thoughtfully, with his eyes fixed on my face, "this question of your appointment of Vanneck might never be raised."

silence while I looked him straight JD the, (}CS. "Roimy.'' hi- srwi at last, ' 1 co\ld not believe it. At the trial you were certainly proved guilty, but I could not believe- it. Besides," he added, with his ready smile, "you were never clever enomdi, never had the pluck to do thai\ Come and have a cup of tea and let us talk it over." He piloted me to his rooms—he

had three—bedroom, sitting room, and a narrow little cupboard con tainin'g a gas stove and a sink—and ousheel me into a cavernous easychair, set about preparing tea, keeping up a steady rattle of talk all the time. ""Yes, I ani flourishing," he said

"That sounds like a threat, Cousin Ephraim," I observed bitterly; "and, anyway, [ refuse."

"Think " "I refuse to leave the country." "That is final?" "Absolutely." "You are a fool!" he cried angrily as he walked towards the uoor. 'Possibly, but you can't part a fool from his folly, and I mean to cherish mine. And, look you, Cousin Ephraim " He paused in the doorway and turned facing me. "If that matter of the appointment turns up, I shall lay it at your door."

"If that matter of the appointment with Vanneck crops up you will probably be hanged!" he responded, with his slow, ugly smile. He went away closing the door softly behind him, leaving me a prey to gloomy, harassed thoughts and forebodings. I had played the game while he was there, but the reaction when he was gone was terrible. Perhaps, after all,, I was a fool,, as he said, not to accept his offer, but I had put my hand to the plough and would not look back. Nevertheless, it was with a heavy heart, and reluctantly, that I turned my thoughts to Maynard Drew, and the Help ho had offered, mev

in reply to a question from me. "I am doing big things just now. I have written two books—shockers, but one of them achieved a sale of twenty thousand copies, and I am having four hundred pounds for the next. Then I am running the 'Sunday Post'—eight hundred thousand circulation. I am news-editor and crime expert. I attend to the crimes during the week, and the news editing on Saturday. We make a feature of crime in the Tost,' but the people seem to like it,, and what the people want, that we give them. We don't go in for educating the masses —not much! I've got a little thing on now down Hampstead way, as pretty a mystery as ever was." I pricked up my ears at this, as you may imagine, but I did not interrupt him. "An old man, name of Vanneck," he went on, "has been murdered, and the daughter has gone away with the servant girl. Queer thiiig, that, but I have my own opinion." I waited for more with an eager-

CHAPTER XI

jigss I could hardly repress, but for- > tunately Harold was bending over the frying pan with his back towards me. ''The servant's name is Nora Hardcastle," he went on, "and as things stand at present either she killed the old man, or the daughter did. But I doubt their going away together." "I have seen the ease in the papers," I said a little hoarsely. "So what is your theory." "I am looking for the body of

HOPE RENEWED. But even with regard to Maynard Drew I could not at all fell that my course was clear. How was I to approach him, how to treat Mm? Should I go on accepting his bounty, but acting as a spy? And what of Constance? I went out for a walk, twwTiping weary miles, and spending dreary hours trying to make up my mind. I was strolling aimlessly and moodily along Holborn, unheeding the busy crowds thronging around me, when I felt a hand on my shoulder, and heard a voice saying: "Ronny Normington, by Jove!" I swung' round and recognised my interlocutor immediately. It Mas Harold Reckitt, one of my friends of the old days, whose recognition' of me now was, on first thoughts, anything but welcome. My iirst impulse was to shake him off and stride away, but he prevented that by thrusting his arm through mine and drawing me along with him.

Constance Vanneck," he replied. "Suppose Xora Hardcastle killed the old man ; suppose the girl saw

her do it—there you have the thing in a nutshell. The commission of a second crime to hide the first is as common as buttercups in a' field. I could cite dozens of cases. But now we're ready for the feast. Draw

A very few lines will suffice to introduce Mm to the reader. He had joined the bank as a clerk about ;* month after myself, a ruddy,, careless round-faced youth, with an offhand manner that was gall! and -orniwood to the cashier and-chief clerks. He possessed what seemed to be an almost unlimited allowance of pocket money. We became good friends ,and then I learned that lite was an orphan with- a hundred pounds a year of his own, who had been brought up by an uncle, an important client of the bank. Buthe was a clerk there only a little over two years. " "

your chair up to the table." "By the way," he said suddenly, "this Vanneck affair concerns you a bit." "The piece of bread I was conveying to my mo'rth broke its journey half way, and icrnained poised in midair. But his next words reassured me. "I remember now that Ephraira Turbutt was your cousin. He has made his pile since you went away, and has given up the law business. This Vanneck was his right hand man, sort of general manager. "I remember the name now i:hat you mention it," I mumbled. "And now," he went on, "what are you doing?" ".Doing?" i echoed bitterly. "Trying to perform the impossible, trying to put crooked things straight, and prove my innocence." "Gad! mat is an all but impossible task unless you have some unbelievable hick. And you're not cut

out for it, Romiy, not at all. A trained detective might hesitate at a ask *-i<e that. I should dread it, I know." "It will be difficult—" "Difficult is a small word. Just look at the case. Supposing you actually wore innocent "

"I see you don't believe it," I chimed in.

"I've had enough of this ink-sling, coin-counting rot," he said to me one day; "I'm going on my own, sink or swi*a. I've got a job on the 'Daily Mercury,' and I am going in for journalism." He went, and being a youth of parts and push, journalism took him to its heart. He did hot remain long on the "Mercury." I think he quarrelled with the proprietor about i the third week—but lie plunged promptly into the swell of what is called free-lance journalism, and having youth and abundant impudence on his side, he did as well as most. Sometimes he would be rolling in wealth and luxury, raking in seven or eight pounds a week, and then, perhaps a month would go by and lie would not make as much as seven shillings. ' But he always had his hundred a year, which was tightly tied up, and which he was wiao enough never to mortgage. "I've rooms in Staple Inn here," he said. "Come in and have a tr.p of tea. I brew it myself, boil my own eggs ,and fry my own bacon." , He drew me through the old I'at-lv-ioned gateway of the inn, but in the courtyard I paused and turned and faced him.

"It isn't a question of belief, Ron-

Ny," he said seriously. "It's a matter of upsetting the clearest proofs on -record. Supposing you to be innocent, then it was all a' plot against you." "It was." "A plot so cleverly conceived that there was not a single flaw—a plot so brilliantly carried out that there was absolutely no weak place. Now, how are you, an amateur, without money, to fight the man or the men capable of such a piece of damnable work? And then, nearly five years have gone. Any loose ends there may have been will have been soldered up long ago. Your enemies may be dead, or in America or anywhere out of your way. Its a difficult case, Rortny, unless yon lmve a certain clue. However, that was not what ] meant when I asked you what you were doing. I meant, how were you getting a living? Arc you working? Do you want work?"

"Do you know whore I have ken lately?' I asked with that morbid self-consciousness which was rupidiy becoming a curse. "I do," he laconically responded. ''l was in court. I reported th.Mase for five, evening papers." "You think I was gnilt.7!'" "I never troubled mv soil abovt it.' "I was not, Hari'y," I said, ' on my soul and honour i was iu;fc." ; He stood for a moment of two in

"No," 1 said, "J wa?>t money, Heaven knows, but I don't want work." "Yon art> one of the big crowd, Itonny," he replied with a laugh. "I'd like a pasture of that sort myself ,plenty of cash and no duties. But relaxations of that kind are few and far between."

"if I have to work for a living I can never hope to prove-—-" •'w'liat of your cousin-?" he asked abruptly. (To hi' continued.)