BUCKY FOLLOWS A HOT TRAIL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 April 1939, Page 12

BUCKY FOLLOWS A HOT TRAIL

PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT.

COPYRIGHT.

BY

WILLIAM MACLEOD RAINE.

■ CHAPTER XXIII. (Continued). “How do you know ne wrote the note?” "Why would he be waiting there in the room, in the darkness, if he hadn't oeen expecting me?” Chill gripped the heart of the girl. Neil Cameron was her enemy. A hundred limes she had told herself so. She could not remember the time when they had not been in antagonism. But a aeep emotion in her clamoured for belief in him. In spite of tne mockery with which he always met her she believed that he respected ner, and sometimes there surged up in ner a queer certainty that he liked her as mucn as . . as she liked him. "Did you know the men with Bucky Cameron?" Kathleen asked. “There were only two. One was his foreman Murphy. The other was Judge Lewis.” “Judge Lewis.” A tune strummed in Kathleen’s veins. "Then tjhere is a mistake somewnere. Judge Lewis is one of the finest men I ever knew. I felt there must he a catch. Much as I detest Bucky Cameron’s show-off ways, I was sure he wouldn’t do anything like that.” “The answer is that he did,” the banker said heavily. "I’m not going to argue this with you. This fellow is a scoundrel. So are those tied up with him. i won’t listen to any defence of them.” Garside’s voice rose as he talked. The ruddy colour in his face had deepened almost to purple from anger. It was always so when she suggested the Camerons were not such complete villains as' he thought them. There was no use annoying him further now. She handed him his dress shirt, waited to adjust his black tie and kissed him. "Don’t get tight, Clem.” “Did you ever see me tight?” he asked. “I hope you take your own advice.” “I do, thank you. One cocktail for Kathie, two on a big day. I’ll have two when my dad is elected United States Senator.” She kissed him again. He pinched her cheek. “What are you trying to get out of me, young lady?” he inquired suspiciously. "By the way, I’m expecting a man at the house to talk over business with me. He will probably be late. Tell Fernando he needn’t wait up. I’ll let him in myself. Kathleen went into the living room and sat down at the piano. She played absently, her mind occupied with the perverseness of life. You knew a hundred men, grave, gay, handsome homely, rich, poor—and only one of them stirred your pulses. He had to be the most unavailable of the lot, one whom it was your duty to hate and with whom you had fought all your life. Abruptly she rose. She was falling into this kind' of mood too frequently of late. Fernando walked into the living room in the morning, drew back a window curtain .turned, and swiftly bolted out. of the room, calling for help/ Out of the kitchen came the cook and a' maid. Kathleen ran downstairs in a dressing gown and joined the others in the hall. "What’s the matter, Fernando?” she asked. Wild-eyed he pointed to the living room. Kathleen pushed past the servants, a prescience of disaster, in her heart. She stopped, gaze fixed on the bulky figure huddled in the big chair. With a cry she ran forward. “Father! Father!” When she put a hand on the nearest shoulder, the inert head and torso slumped against her. The girl swayed, caught at the chair, steadied herself. "Get a doctor —quick!” she managed to cry. - But she knew her father was dead*. There was a small hole in the forehead, and below it a little stream of blood. Probably he had been sitting lifeless in that' chair when shd had passed through the hall to her room on the way back from the Country Club dinner-dance early this morning. Kathleen gently eased the body to the floor. The maid was screaming hysterically. “Stop that noise, Maud, and call the police,” her mistress ordered snarply. "Fernando, help me lift father to the couch.” To Kathleen it seemed that hours passed before the doctor arrived on the heels of Chief O’Sullivan. The most casual examination was enough to show the banker was dead. "Who found Clem?” the police chief asked, looking round. “And where?” “Fernando found him,” Kathleen answered, her lips ashen pale. ‘'Sitting on that chair. When I touched him. he . . . fell.”

"How long has he been dead?" This question was fired at Dr Raymond. “I should think about eight or nine hours.” "That means between ten and twelve last night." Mitchell walked into the room. O - Sullivan nodded to him. “Thought you might be of use, so I sent for you.” The detective glanced down at the body on the lounge. “Good heavens, Garside!” he cried. “When was your father last seen alive, as far as you know?” the chief asked Kathleen, the harshness gone out of his voice. "I don’t know. He left here for the Development Club dinner. t t . -see him again after he left the house. When i came home from the Country Club dance it must have been half past two.” The face of the girl was colourless.

O'Sullivan ordered the servants taken into another room and detained there until he was ready to question them. Mitchell moved a chair forward to Kathleen. She dropped into it. "Have you any reason to suspect anybody in the house'?” the chief asked. ■■None whatever.” •'Were any of the doors found open or any of the windows unlatched when the servants earne down this morning?” -I don’t know. I haven't had time to talk with them. The eyes of the girl dilated. “My father may have let him in himself. He told me he expected a visitor after he got back from the dinner. Me asked me to tell Fernando he needn’t wait up.” Mitchell asked a question. “Did your father say who the expected visitor was?’’ •■No.” A policeman spoke. Here’s a gun

m the drawer of this table, Chief.” "Don’t touch it,” O'Sullivan ordered. 'Don’t touch anything. We'll have the room dusted for fingerprints.” The table was close to the chair in which Garside had been found, and the drawer was open about six inches. "Do you know whether this your father's gun, Miss Garside?” Kathleen walked to the table and looked at the weapon. “It is his gun,” she said, a queer contraction at her neart. " You don’t think ” Dr Raymond answered her unfinished question. "No. It would have been almost impossible for him to inflict such a wound on himself.” "Have you any reason to suspect anybody of this, Miss Garside?” the chief asked. "1 mean, any enemy your father may have spoken of lately.” "He told me last night about a man called Dan West with whom he had quarrelled during the day.” “Did he say what about?” "Yes.” There was a perceptible pause. "Father thought his manner toward me was insulting and told him so. That man left him a violent rage.” Inside, the girl was a river of woe. She was asking herself despairingly if she had been the cause of her lather’s death. “Do you know this man West well?" “Scarcely at all.” “Have you ever had any trouble with aim?” "Once.” “Will you tell me what took place then?” Kathleen told how Neil Cameron had flung West through the window and taken his gun from him. The mention of Bucky's name brought O’Sullivan to another suspect. “Did you father say anything about some recent trouble with Cameron?” "Dismay swept through her. She had not thought of Bucky in connection with the death of his enemy. Instantly she repudiated the misgiving. Not Bucky! Anybody but him, she cried to herself. “Can’t Igo now?” she begged. “Until some other time. I’m feeling faint.” “I’m sorry,” O’ Sullivan apologised. “I ought to have known.” He jumped to his feet and offered to support her as she left the room. Kathleen declined. “I’ll be all right,” she said. CHAPTER XXIV. After Kathleen had left the room, Chief O’Sullivan got busy on the telephone. He gave orders for the rounding up of West, Cameron, and Murphy for questioning. Also, he told the desk sergeant to send the fingerprint experts to the scene at once. With Mitchell he made a careful examination of the room. The windows were all latched. In the ash tray on the table beside where Garside had been sitting were the stub and debris of a cigar, but there was no ashes in any of the other trays. If Clem had had a visitor the man either had not smoked, or had removed the signs of it. O’Sullivan left the fingerprint men to do their work in the living room while he examined the servants. None of the staff had been up when their master returned home; they had heard no sound or quarreling' and no shot. All the doors of the house had been , properly fastened when they came down this morning. Nor had any of them heard Garside say who. was the visitor expected so late at night. The chief brought out that Fernando, the Filipino butler, had heard words between Neil Cameron and the banker a few days earlier on the occasion of the CC man’s visit to the house. GarI side told the other to leave his house j and never come back again. Within two hours West and Cameron were brought in to the office of the chief. Both had alibis, which O’Sullivan viewed with scowling suspicion. That of West depended upon the testimony of some of his Red Rock friends, with whom he claimed to have been playing poker in the rear of an unsavoury saloon. Bucky’s witness was Nancy Graham. His story, corroborated by her, was that after a picture show he had taken her for a long drive up Buckhorn Canyon and back to town by way'of the Ledge road. "Meet anybody?" the chief 'asked, shifting a sceptical gaze from Bucky ,o Nancy and back again. "Met several cars,” Bucky answered. "But with the headlights on it was impossible for anybody in them to have recognised us.” "What time did you leave the picture show?” “About a quarter to ten. That right, Nancy?” “Yes. I looked at my wrist watch to decide if we had time to run up'Buckhorn. "And you got back when?” "At one.” Bucky asked for no confirmation of this. “Exactly.” "Yes. The clock in the Johnson Building struck as we passed.” "Obliging of the clock.” the chief said, with obvious sarcasm. “Will you explain this, Miss Graham? You looked at your watch to find out whether you had time to make the run up Buckhorn. 1 can do the canyon and back by the Ledge road in an*hour and a half, and it took you over three hours. If you were pressed for time “We weren’t going to.a fire,” Nancy explained. "Sometimes a girl makes excuses about doing something she knows she means to do. I didn't really care how late we were." “There was a swell moon, Chief," added Bucky with a grin. “Got any witnesses as to the exact time you got back?” "One of my brothers got home just before I did,” Nancy said. "We went to 'the ice-box and made a sandwich.” Cameron have a sandwich too?” "No. He didn’t go into the house." "So your brother didn’t see him and can’t prove you two were together till one o’clock.” “No.” Nancy gave the chief a confident smile. "Mr Cameron proves that by me.” "You two engaged?" . O’Sullivan blurted. "Not to each other, if that’s what you mean." Nancy’s voice held an ironic little sting. "1 don’t know about Mr Cameron, but 1 am quite free.” “I’m not satisfied with your alibi. Cameron,” the officer said bluntly. “Well,-it’s the only, one I have,” Bucky said amiably. "You’ll have to lake it or leave it'” “Did you have an engagement to meet Clem at. his home late last night?” (To be Continued.)