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Show STORY FROM THE START Defying all efTorts to rapture him, after a long series of murders mur-ders and robberies, a siper-crook siper-crook known only as "Th, Bat" has brought about a veritable reln of terror. The chief of police po-lice assigns his best operative. Anderson, to ret on the trail of The Bat With her niece, Dale OK'len, Mlsa Cornelia Van Gorder Is living in the country home of the late Courtleigh Fleming, who until his recent death had been president of the Union bank, wrecked because of the theft of a large sum of currency. Miss Van Gorder receives a note warning her to vacate the place at once on pain of death. Dale returns from the city, where she had been to hire a gardener. The gardener arrives, giving his name as Brooks, lie admits he Is i not a gardener, but needs work Miss Cornelia tells Doctor Wells of the threatening note. They are Interrupted by the smashing I of a window In the house. They find another warning note. The detective. Anderson, arrives. Is told of the situation, and announces an-nounces he will stay on watch that night. Miss Van Gorder tells Anderson she has an idea Courtleigh' Fleming robbed his I own hank and concealed the money In the house, but the detective de-tective believes the hank's cash-' cash-' ier, Bailey, who Is missing. Is the guilty one. Brooks (who Is j really Bailey, the sought-fot cashier, and Pale's fiance) tells the girl he knows there Is a hid- den room In the house. Dale tel-' tel-' ephones Richarfl Fleming, Court-lelgh's Court-lelgh's nephew, asking him to come over. Dale tells Richard Fleming of her V nowledge of the hidden room. He gets rid of her while he seeks nnd finds blueprints blue-prints of the house. CHAPTER VI Contmued 9 Dick Fleming's lips sot in a thin line. "Just n moment," lie said, put-tins put-tins the table between tliem with a swift movement. Once more lie stole a glance at tbe scrap of paper in bis hand by the flickering light of tbe candle. Then he faced Dale boldly. "Do you suppose, if that money is actually here, that I can simply turn this over to you and let you give it to IVuiley?" he said. "Every man has Ins price how do I know that Bailey's Isn't a million dollars?" Dale felt as if be had dashed cold water in her face. "What do you mean to do with it, then?" she said. Fleming turned the blue-print over In his band. "I don't know," he said, then tentatively. tenta-tively. "What is it you want me to do?"' ' Hut by now Dale's vague distrust in him had grown very definite. "Aren't you going to give it to me?" He put her off. "I'll have to think ; about that." He looked at tbe blue- ! print again. "So the missing cashier Is in tli is house, posing as a garden er?" he said, with a sneer in his tones. Dale's temper was rising. "If you won't give it to me there's a detective in this bouse," she said, with a stamp of her foot. She made a movement as if to call Anderson then, remembering Jack, turned back to Fleming. "Give it to tbe detective and let him search," she pleaded. "A detective?" said Fleming, startled. star-tled. "What's a detective doing here?" "People have been trying to break in." "What people?" "I don't know." Fleming stared out beyond Dale. Into the night. "Then it is here," be muttered to himself. Behind his back was It a gust of air that moved them? the double doors of the alcove swung open just a crack. Was a listener crouched behind be-hind those doors or was it only a trick of carpentry a gesture of chance? Tbe mask of the clubman dropped from Fleming completely. His lips drew back from his teetli in the snarl of a predatory animal that clings to Its prey at the cost of life or death. Before Dale could stop him, he picked up the discarded blue-prints and threw them on the fire retaining retain-ing only the precious scrap in his hand. The roll blackened and burst into flame. He watched it, smiling. 'I'm not going to give this to any detective," he said quietly, tapping the piece of paper in bis hand. Dale's heart pounded sickeningly. hut she kept her courage up. "What do you mean?" she said fiercely. "What are you going to do?" He faced her across the fireplace, his airy manner come back to him just enough to add an additional touch of the sinister to the cold self-revelation of his words. "Let us suppose a few tilings, Miss Ogden," he said. "Suppose my price Is a million dollars. Suppose I need money very- badly and my uncle has left me a house containing that amount In cash. Suppose I choose to consider that that money is mine then It wouldn't he hard to suppose, would it, that I'd make a pretty sincere sin-cere attempt to get awry with il?" Dale snmuintK'd all her fortitude. "If you go ont of Ibis room with that paper I'll scream for help!" she said defiantly. Fleming made a Utile mock-bow of courtesy. He smiled. "To carry on our little came of supposing,"' he said easily. "Suppose Ibcre Is a detective In this bouse mel that, if I were cornered, I should (; l',tr where to lay his hands on A Novel From the Play By Mary Roberts Rinehart and Avery Hopvvood WNU Service "The Bat." copyright, 19 20, by Slary Roberta Itinetiart and Avery Hopwood. Jack Bailey. Do you suppose you would scream?" Dale's hands dropped, powerless, at her sides. If only she hadn't told him too late! she was helpless. She could not call the detective without ruining Jack and yet, if Fleming escaped with the money how could Jack ever prove his Innocence? Fleming watched her for an instant, smiling. Then, seeing she made no move, be darted hastily toward the double doors of the alcove, flung them open, seemed about to dash up the alcove stairs. The sight of him escaping escap-ing with the only existing clew to the hidden room galvanized Dale into action. She followed him, hurriedly snatching up Miss Cornelia's revolver from the table as she did so, in a last gesture of desperation. "No! No! Give it to me! Give it to me!" and 'She sprang after him, clutching tbe revolver. II e waited for her on the bottom step of the stairs, the slight smile still on his face. Banting breaths in the darkness of the alcove a short, furious scuffle he had wrested the revolver away from her, but in doing so bad unguarded un-guarded tbe precious blue-print she snatched at it, desperately, tearing most of it away, leaving only a corner cor-ner in his hand. He swore tried to get it back she jerked away. Then suddenly a bright shaft of light split tbe darkness of the alcove stairs .like a sword a spot of brilliance bril-liance centered on Fleming's face like the glare of a flashlight focused from above by an invisible band. For an instant it revealed him his features distorted with fury about to rush down the stairs again and attack the trembling girl at their foot. A single shot rang out. For a second sec-ond the fury on Fleming's face seemed to change to a strange look of bewilderment bewil-derment and surprise. Then the shaft of light was extinguished extin-guished as suddenly as the snufling of a candle, and he crumpled forward to tbe foot of the stairs struck lay on his face, in the darkness, just inside in-side the double doors. Dale gave a little whimpering cry of horror. "Oil, no. no, no," she whispered from a dry throat, automatically stuffing her portion of the precious scrap of blue-print into the bosom of her dress. She stood frozen, not daring to move, not daring even to reach down with her hand and touch the body of Fleming Flem-ing to see if be were dead or alive. A murmur of excited voices sounded sound-ed from the ball. The door flew open feet stumbled through the darkness "The noise came from this room !" that was Anderson's voice "Holy Virgin !" that must be Lizzie Even as Dale turned to face the assembled as-sembled household, the house lights, extinguished since the storm, came on in full brilliance revealing her to them, standing beside Fleming's body with Miss Cornelia's revolver between them. She shuddered, seeing Fleming's arm flung out awkwardly by his side. No living man could lie in such a posture. "I didn't do it! I didn't do it!" she stammered, after a tense silence that followed the sudden reillumining of the lights. Her eyes wandered i (W. -,. ill. The Mask of the Clubman Dropped From Fleming Completely. from figure to figure idly, noting unimportant un-important details. Billy was still in his white coat and his face. Impassive Impas-sive as ever, showed not the slightest surprise. Brooks and Anderson were likewise completely dressed but Miss Cornelia had evidently begun to retire for the flight when she had heard the shot her transformation was askew and she wore a dressing-gown. dressing-gown. As for Lizzie, that worthy shivered in a gaudy wrapper adorned with incredible orange flowers, with her hair done up in curl-papers. Dab; saw It all, and was never nfUT to forget for-get one single detail of It. The detective was beside her now, examining Fleming's body with pro fessional thoroughness. At last he rose. "He's dead," he said quietly. A shiver ran through the watching group. Dale felt a stifling hand con-; con-; strict about her heart. There was a pause. Anderson picked up the revolver beside Fleming's Flem-ing's body and examined it swiftly, careful not to confuse his own fingerprints finger-prints with any that might already be on the polished steel. Then he looked at Dale. "Who is he?" he said, bluntly. Dale fought hysteria for some seconds sec-onds before she could speak. "Richard Fleming somebody shot him!" she managed to whisper at last. Anderson took a step toward her. "What do you mean by somebody?" he said. The world to Dale turned into a crowd of threatening, accusing eyes a multitude of shadowy voices, shouting shout-ing "Guilty! Guilty! Prove that you're innocent you can't !" "I don't know," she said wildly. "Somebody on the staircase." "Did you see anybody?" Anderson's voice was as passionless and cold as a bar of steel. "No but there was a light from somewhere like a pocket-flash " She could not go on. She saw Fleming's face before her furious at first then changing to that strange look of bewildered surprise she put her hand over her eyes to shut the vision out. Lizzie made a welcome interruption. interrup-tion. "I told you I saw a man go up that staircase !" she wailed, jabbing her forefinger in the direction of the al-' al-' cove stairs. Miss Cornelia, now recovered from the first shock of the discovery, supported sup-ported her gallantly. "That's the only explanation, Mr. Anderson," she said decidedly. The detective looked at the stairs at the terrace door. His eyes made a circuit of the room and came back to Fleming's body. "I've been all over the house," he said. "There's nobody there." A pause followed. Dale found herself her-self helplessly looking toward her lover for comfort comfort he could not give without revealing his own secret. Eerily, through tbe tense silence, a sudden tinkling sounded the sharp, persistent ringing of a telephone bell. Miss Cornelia rose to answer it automatically. au-tomatically. "The bouse phone!" she said. Then she stopped. "But we're all here." They looked at each other aghast. It was true. And yet somehow somewhere one of the other phones on the circuit was calling the living room. Miss Cornelia summoned every ounce of inherited Van Gorder pride she possessed and went to the phone. She took off the receiver. The ringing ring-ing stopped. "Hello hello " she said, while the others stood rigid, listening. Then she gasped. 'An expression of wondering won-dering horror came over her face. "Somebody groaning!" gasped Miss Cornelia. "It's horrible!" The detective stepped up and took the receiver from her. He listened anxiously for a moment. "I don't hear anything," he said. "I heard it! I couldn't imagine such a dreadful sound! I tell you somebody some-body in tills house Is in terrible distress." dis-tress." "Where does this phone connect?" queried Anderson practically. Miss Cornelia made a hopeless little gesture. "Practically every room in this house!" The detective put the receiver to his ear u-.dn.. "Just what did vou bear?" he said, stolidly. Miss Cornelia's voice shook. "Dreadful groans and what seemed to he an inarticulate effort to speak!" Lizzie drew her gaudy wrapper closer about her shuddering form. "I'd go somewhere," she wailed in the voice of a lost soul, "If I only had somewhere to go !" Miss Cornelia quelled her with a glare and turned back to the detective. detec-tive. "Won't you send these men to Investigate In-vestigate or go yourself?" she said, indicating Brooks and Billy. The detective thought swiflly. "My place is here," he said. "You two men." Brooks and Billy moved forward to take his orders, "take another an-other look through the house don't leave the building I'll want you pretty soon." Brooks or Jack Bailey, as we may as well call him through the remainder of tills narrative-2 started to obey. Then his eye fell on Miss Cornelia's revolver, which Anderson had taken from beside Fleming's body and still helil clasped in his hand. "If you'll give me that revolver " he began In an offhand tone, hoping Anderson would not see through Ids little ruse. Once wiped clean of fingerprints, fin-gerprints, tlie revolver would not be such telling evidence against Dale Ogden. But Anderson was not to be caught nupping. "That revolver will stay where It is," he said with a grim smile. Jack Bailey knew better than to try and argue the point. He followed Billy reluctantly out of the door, giving giv-ing Dale a surreptitious glance of encouragement en-couragement and faith as he did so. The Japanese and he mounted to the second floor, as stealthily as possible, prying into dark corners and searching search-ing unused rooms for any clew that might betray the source of the startling star-tling phone call from nowhere. But Bailey's heart was not in the search. His mind kept going back to the figure fig-ure of Dale nervous shaken undergoing un-dergoing the terrors of the third degree de-gree at Anderson's hands. She couldn't have shot Fleming, of course and yet unless lie and Billy found something some-thing to substantiate her story of how the killing had happened It was her own, unsupported word against a damning mass of circumstantial evidence. evi-dence. He plunged with renewed vigor into his quest. Back in the living room, as he had feared, Anderson was subjecting Dale to a merciless interrogation. "Now I want the real story!" he began, with calculated brutality. "You lied before !" "That's no tone to use! You'll terrify ter-rify her," cried Miss Cornelia indignantly. indig-nantly. The detective paid no attention atten-tion his face had hardened he seemed every Inch the remorseless sleuth-hound of the law. He turned on Miss Cornelia for a moment. "Where were you when this happened?" hap-pened?" he said. "Upstairs in my room." Miss Cornelia's Cor-nelia's tones were Icy. "And you?" badgeringly, to Lizzie. "In my room," said the latter pertly, pert-ly, "brushing Miss Cornelia's hair." Anderson' broke open the revolver and gave a swift glance at the bullet-chambers. bullet-chambers. "One shot has been fired from this revolver !" Miss Cornelia sprang to her niece's defense. "I fired it myself, this afternoon," she said. The detective regarded her with grudging admiration. "You're a quick thinker," he. said with obvious unbelief in bis voice. He put the revolver down on tbe table. Miss Cornelia followed up her advantage. ad-vantage. "I demand that you get the coroner here," she said. "Doctor Wells Is the coroner," offered of-fered Lizzie eagerly. Anderson brushed their suggestions aside. "I'm goir,'; to ask you some questions!" ques-tions!" be said menacingly to Dale. .But Miss Cornelia stuck to her guns. Dale was not going to be bullied into any sort of confession, true or false, if she could help it and from tbe way that tbe girl's eyes returned with fascinated horror to the ghastly heap on the floor that had been Fleming, she knew that she was on the edge of violent hysteria. "Do you mind covering that body first?" she said crisply. The detective eyed her for a moment in a rather ugly fashion then grunted, ungraciously, ungra-ciously, and, taking Fleming's raincoat from the chair, threw It over the body. Dale's eyes telegraphed her aunt a silent message of gratitude. "Now shall I telephone for the coroner?" persisted Miss Cornelia. The detective obviously resented her interference with his methods but he could not well refuse such a customary custom-ary request. "I'll do. it," he said, with a snort, going over to the city telephone. "What's his number?" "He's not at his office he's at the Johnson's," murmured Dale. Miss Cornelia took the telephone from Anderson's bauds. "I'll get the Johnsons." Mr. Anderson," Ander-son," she said firmly. The detective seemed about to rebuke her. Then his manner recovered some of Its former suavity. He relinquished the telephone tele-phone and turned back toward his prey. "Now, what was Fleming doing here?" he asked Dale in a gentler voice. Should she tell him the truth? No Jack Bailey's safety was too Inextricably Inex-tricably bound up with the whole sinister sin-ister business. She must lie and lie again while there was any chance of a lie's being believed. "I don't know," she said wcukly, trying to avoid the detective's eyes. Anderson took thought. "Well, I'll ask that question another way," he said. "How did he get Into the house?" Dale brightened no need for a lie here. "ne had a key." "Key to what doorT "Thyt door over there." Dale Indicated Indi-cated the terrace door of the alcove. The detective was about to ask another an-other question then he paused. Miss Cornelia was talking on the phone. "Hello is that Mr. Johnson's residence? resi-dence? Is Doctor Wells there? No?" Her expression was puzzled. "Oh all right thank you good night " She rang off, and hung up the phone. Meanwhile Anderson had been listening lis-tening but thinking as well. Dale saw his sharp glance travel over to the fireplace rest for a moment, with an air of discovery, on the fragments of the roll of blueprints that remained unbumed among the ashes return She shut her eyes for a moment, try-, ing tensely to summon every atom of shrewdness she possessed to aid her. He was hammering at her with questions again. "When did you take that revolver out of the table drawer?" "When I heard him outside on the terrace," said Dale promptly and truthfully. "I was frightened." Lizzie tiptoed over to Miss Cornelia. "You wanted a detective!" she said in an Ironic whisper. "I hope you're happy now you've got one !" Miss Cornelia gave her a look that sent her scuttling back to her former HP, il. MUM. Jff" rr m IP Mil WWM I 1J-. . a TV I "1 Think She Knows More Than She's Telling." post by the door. But nevertheless, Internally, In-ternally, she felt thoroughly in accord with Lizzie. Again Anderson's questions pounded at the rigid Dale striving to pierce her armor of mingled truth and falsehood. false-hood. "When Fleming came in, what did he say to you?" "Just something about tbe weather," weath-er," said Dale weakly. The whole scene was still too horribly vivid before be-fore her eyes for her to furnish a more convincing alibi. "You haven't had any quarrels with him?" Dale hesitated. "No." "He just came In that door said something about the weather and was shot from that staircase. Is that It?" said the detective in tones of utter incredulity. in-credulity. Dale hesitated again. Thus baldly put. her story seemed too tlmsy for words she could not even blame Anderson An-derson for disbelieving It. And yet what other story could she tell that would not bring ruin on Jack? Her face whitened. She put her hand on the back of a chair for support. sup-port. "Y'es that's it," she said, at last, and swayed where she stood. Again Miss Cornelia tried to come to the rescue. "Are all these questions necessary?" she queried sharply. "You can't for a moment believe that Miss Ogden shot that man!" But by now, though she did not show it, she, too, began to realize re-alize the strength of the appalling net of circumstances that drew with each minute tighter around the unhappy girl. Dale gratefully seized the momentary mo-mentary respite and sank into a chair. The detective looked at her. "I think she knows more than she's telling. She's concealing something I" he said, with deadly Intentness. "The nephew of the president of the Union bank shot In his own house the day the bank has failed that's queer enough " Now he turned back to Miss Cornelia. "But when the only person present at Ills murder Is the girl who's engaged to the guilty cashier!" he continued, watching Miss Cornelia's face as the full force of his words sank into her mind, "I want to know more about It !" (TO BE CONTINUED.) |