"CRASH!"

Wairarapa Times-Age, 1 November 1939, Page 10

"CRASH!"

COPYRIGHT. PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT.

BY

ARTHUR APPLIN.

Author of “Adventure for Two,” “Winning Through,” “Cold Cream,” etc.

CHAPTER XXIII. (Continued) “Makato had the same chance, but refused the invitation; that doesn't necessarily mean that he’s honest, only that he's clever. If the Colonel had just brought off a big coup, one would have expected him to be too much on his guard to bother about winning a few pounds off me at bridge, and he gave himself away by saying that he never played for high points. On the other hand, he is a fool. If he did steal the pearl necklace, he won’t know what to do with it. He is sure to bungle and get found out—and that won’t help Peggy or her brother: the police will be keener that ever to get hold of them then.” “I didn’t think of that.”

“Then you ought to! The sooner she leaves him in Paris, the better. I will arrange that. She can join us when we get to Monte Carlo.” “Thanks!” Johnny said, without any heartiness in his voice—couldn't help feeling a bit jealous still. "Look here!” he added, "Do you think Phillipson’s aunt really has left him money?”

“Quite possible. Kind of foolish thing an aunt would do. But he isn’t the sort of man who'd spend a legacy on a sea voyage or a trip to the Riviera. And I must say he seemed mighty glad of the fiver I let him win. What I wanted to find out tonight was whether he knew the Garcias, and whether he connected the stolen necklace with them. He certainly was interested and took care not to show it. But how the devil did he connect Peggy with the theft, and how did he discover the exact day she redeemed it. and that it was in her wardrobe?” “He would know where she’d hidden it,” Johnny said quickly. "That's why I drew attention to the book Makato was reading. Just by chance I borrowed it from Pansy Jones, and there’s a chapter in it where one of the crooks hides some valuable documents in a similar place to the one in which Peggy hid the pearl necklace. The snag is, that everyone in the boardinghouse has read that book. They had reached the Bayswater Road and were standing opposite the cab-rank.

“It’s rather a nice little problem,” Brooke said. “You’re determined to solve it?” and as Johnny nodded. “Then you’d better start with the Colonel. Find out exactly what his movements have been during the last week or two. He didn’t seem flustered when I invented that story of the rumour at Rye, but his wife dropped a stitch in her knitting. If either of them is the thief, then they must have the necklace hidden somewhere in the boarding house. If I were in your place, 1 should give them a few days and then I should find an opportunity, when they are both out. to lock myself in their bedroom and ransack it. If you don’t find the necklace, you might find a clue. Sorry I can’t help you any more —you must work on your own now. But take my advice and go slow —haste is always dangerous." Calling a taxi he drove away. CHAPTER XXIV.

Next morning Johnny arrived early at the office, intending to ask for leave of absence for two months. If he lost his job. it couldn't be helped. He had lain awake half the night, thinking things over. Work was the most important thing in life, but without a goal it was useless. “Work for work's sake" was bunkum. It had to be creative. Love was going to be his goal, for now he was convinced that everything had been created through and by love. It might not be the ultimate, but it was a torch that lit the road of discovery. The chief of the company told Johnny he could take a couple of months' holiday if he wished —but, of course, someone would have to be found to fill his place, though he would do his best to keep it open for him when he returned. “But I can’t spare you for another eight or nine days,” he said. "I want you to leave this afternoon for Manchester to take charge of Johnson's department.” That was rather a blow, but Johnny decided he would have to go to Manchester. He hurried back to the board-ing-house, and told Miss Pearkes he’d be away for about a week. "Dear, dear, everyone seems to be leaving or taking a holiday,” she sighed. "I don’t know what I shall do. Running a boarding house these days is no joke, Mi- Harcourt—especially when your guests are always behindhand with their payments. And all that bother about poor Miss Peggy hasn't helped!" Johnny said he would try and do something to help her when he got back from Manchester, distribute her cards among his friends al the office. "It’s too bad people not paying up." tie said. "1 know old Colonel Phillipson hates parting with his money, but he'll be able to settle up now. I- suppose you know about the big win he had the other day?”

Miss Pearkes looked surprised: “Not a word! He’s always telling me he’s bound to pull off something soon, but it never happens. Why it was only on Friday that he talked me into lending him ten pounds, saying his aunt had died and left him a big legacy. 1 suppose it’s all right; he gave me all particulars, and I know how lawyers keep one waiting, but I can’t help fecljr j v'df-jpd ’te’s r * such a way with

Jones told her the Colonel had asked if she would care to lend him fifty pounds for a few months, explaining that he had just come into some money and would have to wait several weeks before getting it. He said if she could oblige him he would pay ten per cent on the loan and have a proper agreement drawn up." “She isn’t going to be fool enough?" Johnny cried. “Well, you see, we all like to make a bit when, we can, and ten per cent isn’t to be sneezed at in these days. And I'm sure the Colonel is a most honourable man. It’s just a little rash, perhaps, but there’s no chance of her losing her money.” “Of course,” Johnny said, "but I should advise her not to be in too much of a hurry to part with it.” He settled his own account, told Miss Pearkes he would send her his Manchester address so that she could let him have a line saying how things were going on. “I wish everyone was like you, Mr Johnny." she said, a faint smile illuminating her wispy face. “Dull world if they were!” he laughed. He stopped as he was leaving the room, and said: “I don't suppose the Colonel ever tried to borrow anything from Peggy Strong?” “What an idea! I'm sure he didn’t. He knew she lived more or less from hand-to-mouth, as the saying goes.” “How does he know that?”

“Everybody guessed, I expect. You mustn’t be prejudiced against the Colonel by what I've told you. When Peggy first arrived here the Colonel was interested, like the rest of us —wanted to know where she came from and all that.”

“Quite natural, I suppose," Johnny said quickly. "By the way, Miss Pearkes, I suppose the police never told you why they wanted poor little Peggy, or what she had done? Didn't find anything incriminating in her room?”

She shook her head. “No. they wouldn’t tell me anything. They were here again this morning—they had locked her room up, you see, and now they’ve brought back the key. I suppose I must make an inventory of her things—not that she had got much, poor dear! —and I'm sure I don’t know what to do with them. One gets nothing for old clothes nowadays.” “Tell me what they’re worth and I will buy them,” Johnny cried impulsively. “You know, I was fond of her, Miss Pearkes —couldn’t 'bear to think of anything belonging to her being messed about and hawked by . those dealers."

He dashed upstairs to pack. Outside Peggy's room he stopped. The key was in the lock —no harm, he thought in having a look round. He was about to open the door, when a sound from the room him—the servant clearing up. probably. But the footsteps were too heavy for the sercant’s. Then he heard the scraping of a chair. Then he waited, watching. Presently he saw the Colonel come out and cross the passage quickly to his own room. That convinced him. Everything Miss Pearkes had told him had increased his suspicions. Now he was certain that Phillipson was the thief. CHAPTER XXV. Johnny cursed his bad luck in having to dash off and lose the chance of searching the Colonel's room. But he had plenty of time in Manchester to make his plans; they depended on Phillipson’s next move. Obviously his projected holiday abroad was to try to dispose of the pearls—and now that he knew they belonged to a Senora Garcia it was more than likely he would approach her directly, with the idea of getting the reward. At the end of the first week, just as he was looking forward to getting back to London, he was told that he would have to stop another six or seven days. He was on the point of protesting, when he got a letter from Miss Pearkes telling him that the Phillipsons had not yet started on their holiday. So he faced another week in Manchester without worry. Where the Colonel was, there were the pearls; that was certain.

Before leaving, he put through a telephone call to Peggy at the Toledo Restaurant in Paris. They kept him waiting five minutes before they found her. “Everything’s all right here.” she told him. “Dick’s a little fed up; the Toledo’s getting on his nerves I think and—the uncertainty.” “Tell him not to worry—l'm returning to London tomorrow, and then things will happen quickly!" “Eve got a proper job here now. Johnny—l’ve faked one of my dances from the ‘Lovelies’: it goes quite well when there’s anyone in the restaurant —and I haven't got to partner stray beasts from Ephesus! And I've heard from Michael; I'm to join his troupe again at Monte Carlo in a week’s time.”

There was silence a moment . . and moments were so precious. Johnny said “Good place for a honeymoon, the South of France!" It wasn't fair, he knew, but it was the only way he could tell her. lie waited for her reply. "Do you want another three minutes?" the telephonist asked sharply. It had cost him over a fiver already, so he said: “Just finishing . . . Peggy, are you there? . . .1 love you!" Before she could reply—if she had heard —they were cut off. He banged down the receiver; Manchester would cut off at that moment—a French clerk wouldn't have dreamed of doing so! The sun was shining in a comparatively clear sky when he reached London early on Monday afternoon. He imagined a smell of spring in the ■ and he was almost certain 1 sight of a rn W bold

it with a thud and stood quite still staring at little Miss Pearkes. who was standing at the chest-of-drawers in the Phillipsons’ room. The bed had been stripped, the wardrobe doors stood wide open. She looked at him with her .wan smile, “ft's good to have you back. Mr Johnny. You see. they've gone after all." "Gone!" He strode into the room: “When did they go?" Miss Pearkes was busy taking out sheets of paper from the drawers and replacing them with neatly-folded clean sheets of the newspaper left by the colonel. She stopped and glanced at him with a startled expression in her pale eyes. “I didn't know —I mean, went rather suddenly, this morning." | Johnny recovered himself and. leaning againet the end of the bed, lit a cigarette. “The lawyers paids up then, 1 suppose?” ‘ • don’t know." She went on rk. Tie did give me samplin' i'ch”