No. 18

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20953, 4 November 1939, Page 19 (Supplement)

No. 18

By W. Kei (Continued from last week) She was still but hall awake as she whistled, and whistling, pulled up the blind and looked out into the bright cool morning. Wagstaff was not visible—his yapping seemed to come trom round the corner of the house—but in the middle of the dewy lawn was an object which made Mrs Summerston gasp with amazement. No. 18 stood there, square, ugly and solid, utterly out of place amidst the fresh innocence of that English summer morning. She had not tim<j even to realise the strangeness of his appearance there when a series of terrifying events burst upon.her. It was as if she had awakened during a brief lull in a fearful uproar, which recommenced the moment she sleepy glance fell on No. 18. First, she "heard Wagstaff's racing feet flying upstairs, and canine gasping yelps as though he was in an extremity of fear. In a moment he was scratching frantically at the door, and she rushed to open it to admit him, while the r house suddenly trembled to a booming roar, such as she had never heard |- in her life—more formidable even \than the roars of the recently frustrated nightmare lions. As WagstafT scrambled into her room, she instinctively closed the door behind \ him; it had been open only a second, \ and yet in that fraction of time, and Iwith most of her attention on the idog, Mrs Summerston had received aki impression of something following hfm upstairs, something huge and hoVrible. Was this outbreak of terror somehow associated with No. 18? HaeJ the evil-looking thing suddenly begun to exercise demonic powers, latent until now? These thoughts flashed through her mind, but were instantly scattered by paralysing terror as a series of wild blows, accompanied by a repetition of that thundering roar, beat upon the panels of her door. They began to split and cave in, and then things happened so fast that she had no more time for fear. With rending crashes the door gave way, and through its wreckage appeared the fearsome shape of a monstrous ape, its fangs bared in fury, its eyes slaughterous, its vast arms clutching towards her. Yet even as she saw it the creature suddenly gave a choked cry and collapsed backwards as three sharp pistol reports banged out behind him and there, fully dressed, stood Joyce Tamplin with an automatic in her hand and in her eyes a snapping steely look which her employers had never seen there before. Mrs Summerston was not given to fainting; perhaps now she was too much astonished to make the occasion an exception. Miss Tamplin —a Miss Tamplin strangely transformed, as though her trim, smartly dressed form were in the possession of an entirely unfamiliar personality —gave her no time to speak, before she got her word in. It was not the light-hearted, cultivated voice uf the versatile and obliging chauffeur - secretary-companion which addressed the older woman, but a voice with a menacing edge to it. “Better stay where you are for a few minutes, Mrs Summerston,” it L said. “I’m off. Your little brute of a dog is wise to get under the bed. I’d plug him now if I had time to go after him. As it is, he’s done very by you this morning. Agatha's right, after what I gave her last Don’t say I’m not careful. "Whatever do you mean?” “I’m talking, you listen. I had shoot Jack here or he’d have tom to pieces—just because your beastly dog annoyed him when he was busy. So, you see, I can shoot

too! And if I hadn’t climbed up the

rslejt Holmes ivy and come through the landing window I shouldn’t have been in time. I’m telling you to show you how grateful you should be. Now keep quiet for a bit—l’ve a friend outside who’s hasty with his gun if you bother him. You can’t phone yet, anyhow—your wires are cut. That’s all, I think, and be grateful to your Mr Wagstaff. Good-bye, Mrs Summerston, sorry I can’t give the usual notice and daren’t say au revoir!” With that Miss Tamplin turned, and with the wicked little weapon still in her capable hand ran lightly downstairs. Another moment and Mrs Summerston heard her footsteps sprinting on the gravel of the short drive, and then from the road came the subdued sounds of a powerful car getting under way and purring offCHAPTER 111 What did it all mean? How came a dead gorilla amongst the wreckage of Mrs Sunimerston’s bedroom door, and how came No. 18 to be transported from his lofty chamber to the middle of the lawn? Also, why was the lower portion of a waterpipe which led from the roof of the keep lying broken across the flowerbed below it? Mr Summerston, accustomed like all archaeologists to making the most of evidence and putting two and two together, put forward a theory which the police accepted as the right one. One clue was a series of odd footprints, or rather handprints, on the floor of the room whence No. 18 had descended—or been carried; another was the fact that the grim ponderous idol was thickly smeared with honey, as were also the chest and enormous right arm of the dead gorilla. It seemed, then, that Miss Tamplin was one of a gang determined to steal No. 18 for the sake of'his value in solid gold, and that, knowing the idol was too heavy for a man to lift, they had made the great ape their accomplice, and trained him to play cat-burglar, teaching him to retrieve any object covered with something he liked; honey, as it happened. Unable to persuade Mrs Suftimerston to send the dog away, Miss Tamplin had probably locked him up somewhere, at a distance from Square Keep, but the elusive beast had escaped and got home in time to interrupt the gorilla before it could carry No. 18 to the waiting car. Then Wagstaff had annoyed the gorilla into a fit of fury not to be controlled even by his trainers, and knowing what might happen, Joyce Tamplin had taken a bold short cut just in time to shoot the monster. Miss Tamplin and her fellowdesperado, whoever he was, got clear away, and Mrs Summerston had to be satisfied with a far less efficient helper. She was somewhat consoled by her husband’s ungrudging appreciation of the fact that her ordeal had not caused her to “make a fool of h%rseff.” He even went so far as to say lie was te 2f2az&e *or - the whole business. “You, my love?” exclaimed his astonished better half. “Do you mean because you had that horrid golden god No. 18 in your study?” “Not quite that, my love—but because I didn’t take the trouble to contradict the idiotic newspaper story. Gold? Of course No. 18 isn’t gold. He’s chiefly lead. I’ll let the public know that now. By the way, I’ll have the gorilla sent to a taxidermist and properly set up. He’ll be No. 19—and I wager he’ll serve to keep your Mr Wagstaff from following me into my domain!” . The End.