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Show THREE SHUTTERED HOUSES I By BEN ABES WILLIAMS Copyright WNU SSV1CB CHAPTER IX Continued 9 "You'll see lots more with me," Clint promised. "This is a bum one, really." And he urged: "Let's start home. We can drive slowly and be together without so many people round. Unless you want to see the rest of this?" June a little reluctantly professed pro-fessed a complete lack of interest in the film; yet she looked back wistfully wist-fully as they went up the aisle. Upon their arrival, she had not removed re-moved her coat till they reached their seats; but now in the lobby she expected some word from him about her new gown. When he said nothing, noth-ing, merely offered to help her into her coat, she protested: "You haven't noticed my dress. Don't you think it's nice?" . Clint stood back to survey her. chuckling. "Sure, grand!" he declared. de-clared. He came close to her again. "But what you wear doesn't make any difference to me, June." "Asa gave it to me!" "Asa?" Clint echoed, frowning-faintly. frowning-faintly. "Why?" She slipped her arms into the sleeves of the coat he held. "He told me to wear it to catch a young man!" she confessed, laughing up at him over her shoulder. "He knows about you and me." Clint chuckled with pleasure. "It will be my turn to buy pretty things for you soon," he said happily; and her hand tightened on his arm as they went out to the car. They drove slowly, Clint clinging to this hour; and when they came in front of the great sprawling house at last, he stopped and turned off the lights, and said urgently: "Let's sit here a few minutes. You don't have to go right in." "I must, soon," she urged, yet made no move to leave. They found no great need of words. They were snug in the car, the windows raised against the rain. There was a light in the rear part of the Taine house; and June said, with a ripple of mirth in her tones: "Uncle Justus is still asleep in his chair. If no one wakes him up, he may sleep there all night." "Is that his room?" Clint asked, surprised. "No, he's in the kitchen." Her tone was mirthful. "He likes to warm his feet in the oven door." "Who's sitting up over there?" he asked, nodding in the other direction. direc-tion. "Aunt Evie and Asa are staying with Grandma Bowdon," she explained. ex-plained. "Rab had to go to Providence." Prov-idence." They felt, rather than heard, a low rumble of sound; and Clint said: "Hullo, that was thunder. I didn't see a flash." "I did, out of the corner of my eye," she told him. "Off through the woods that way." She pointed past the houses; and she said, and he heard her voice shake: "We had a thunder-shower the night Mother died. A terrible one. And she added: add-ed: "Uncle Justus has turned out his light. The thunder must have wakened wak-ened him." Clint saw that the Taine house was indeed dark now; and then June cried, a sudden tension in her tones: "Clint, look!" "What?" he asked, surprised; and he stared past her. There was a faint brightness, in the shape of a rectangle, against the front of the Hurder house. The brightness assumed color; and Clint reached across the girl to lower the window so that he might see more clearly. That rectangle identified itself it-self as the open front door of the house, outlined in red. And suddenly this dull red became bright; they saw the flicker of a flame. They scrambled out together; they started to race across the lawn. As they did so, a car passed along the road behind them, and Clint turned back and shouted: "Hey, fire! Ring in an alarm!" He saw the driver dimly, saw the man's head nod. Then he ran after June toward the house, toward that front door through which billows of smoke began to pour. He caught her on the steps, caught her fast; for she would have gone headlong in. And she was crying: "Grandpa! Grandma!" When Clint held her. she swung to him in terror, beseeching him. "They're in there, Clint. Oh, quick, dear!" CHAPTER X Miss Moss had never seen June Leaford, and as she watched Clint's increasing devotion to the girl, during dur-ing the fortnight after Mrs. Lea-ford Lea-ford died, this fact sometimes dis-lurbed dis-lurbed her. She said to Tope one evening: I've been asking about her, here ind Uicre. You know Lissa Thayer, 've spoken to you about her." "I know her. yes." Tope assented. "Lissa and I have become almost friends." Miss Moss explained. "She Knows about r:iint and June. He fien leaves his car there when he oes in to the cabin. And Asa and 'at buy gas there for their car he .uys Rab is unolpasantly fa miliar sometimes, too friendly, offensive. of-fensive. She doesn't say much about Asa, but I think she knows him rather rath-er well." Tope reminded her: "Asa went to see her, the morning after Mrs. Lea-ford Lea-ford died. Remember? We met him in the woods, and you saw him down there." "I remember," Miss Moss agreed. "It didn't seem to me she was glad to see him, that day . . . You know I've been trying to guess who will inherit the Bowdon fortune, now that Mr. Bowdon is dead. And Mr. Hur-der's Hur-der's money, when he dies. Mrs. Leaford would have been Mr. Hur-der's Hur-der's heir, you know." Inspector Tope stared at her. "You could outjump a kangaroo, Mrs. Tope," he said, in a deep admiration. ad-miration. "You're three jumps ahead of me." He rose. "You've given me enough to think about to keep me awake," he said. "And I had as much as I could stand already. al-ready. Let's go to bed." Hours later, however, something disturbed Miss Moss. Her eyes opened and she lay listening. Inspector In-spector Tope here in the bed beside And then Asa came her was sleeping. Then she heard again the sound which had roused her a moment ago. It was the doorbell, ringing in a long peal, shrill and imperious. In a swift haste she snapped on the shaded light beside her bed and found dressing-gown and slippers. Then the doorbell rang again, and Inspector Tope woke and asked: "What's the matter?" "Someone at the door," she said softly. She went out along the hall to the living-room, and heard the Inspector bestir himself behind her, but she did not wait for him. She came to the front door and opened it; and she uttered a low ejaculation ejacula-tion of surprise and of dismay. For Clint stood there, with a girl in the circle of his arm; and they were both smoke-begrimed, their faces sooted and dirty and streaked with water. Also, Clint's forehead was red and inflamed in a streak across above his eyes, and his eyebrows eye-brows were singed, and she saw in that first glance an angry blister on the back of his right hand. He said grimly: "Miss Moss, here's my June. I've brought her home!" "You're hurt!" Miss Moss cried. She remembered to welcome the girl too. "Come in, both of you. Miss Leaford " June whispered: "His hands are burned! I wanted him to stop and get them fixed, but he wouldn't. Oh, take care of him." Tope uttered a low ejaculation; he stood blinking in the light. There was a moment's silence; and then Clint, his arm still encircling June, added slowly: "Mr. and Mrs. Hurder we got them out; but" Miss Moss saw June shudder and tremble, and she spoke command-ingly. command-ingly. "Come in." she directed; and as they obeyed, she shut ,the door behind be-hind them. "Miss Leaford, are you hurt too?" she asked. "No, no," June told her. "You must fix Clint I'm all right." Miss Moss nodded. "Don't try to talk," she insisted. "Clint, sit down. Miss Leaford. come help me. Soda. I think, is as good as anything. any-thing. He needs .to be cleaned up, too. And you'll want to wash your face, I expect." I don't matter." June said. "But Clint's burned terribly." Clint protested with a wry smile: 'Now. sweet, it's just this blister on my hand. That's nothing at all." They found in the end that he had in fact sufTered no more than minor burns on his hands and wrists, and that flame-stroke on his brow. "1 wrapped a wet handkerchiel across my mouth." he explained "To keep the smoke out. Had my hat on. and that helped too." Miss Moss said cheerfully, you've no more eyebrows now than a baby, Clint; and not much in the way of eyelashes." She was busy tending him. Clint whispered, through get teeth: "That's a lot more comfortable." comfor-table." Miss Moss ached for him. He grinned at June, said then to the older woman: "This sweet kid has come to live with you for a while. Miss Moss. It won't be long. Just till she comes to live with me." Miss Moss looked at June, and saw in the girl's eyes something like a plea for forgiveness; and June said softly: "He's talked so much about you. I know you must be hating me." Miss Moss smiled fondly. "No, dear," she said gently. "No, I'm glad for both of you." Inspector Tope, chuckled. "Well, now that's all settled, to the satisfaction satis-faction of the womenfolks," he suggested. sug-gested. "How about me? Miss Leaford, Lea-ford, do you mind if I ask what happened? You mind telling me?" June shook her head. "No," she said in a dull tone. "No. I'd rather talk, I think, than not." She made an uncertain gesture. "I'm I feel as though I were walking in my sleep," she confessed. "It doesn't seem real to me." Miss Moss said briskly: "We'll have a cup of chocolate; all feel better. June, come help me, will you?" She led the girl toward the kitchen, called over her shoulder: "Inspector Tope, let Clint rest till we come back. I want to hear." But Clint said: "I don't want to rest." His tone suddenly was grim. "Let's go with them, Inspector," he suggested; and Miss Moss saw them come on her heels. In the little kitchen, while she was busy about the electric stove, Clint sat on the sink and drew June close beside be-side him; and these two told what there was to tell. "I'd taken June to see a picture," Clint explained. "But the picture didn't seem to mean much to us, so we left early, drove back to her house. And parked outside for a little while. "We sat there talking awhile, and then she saw that the house was on fire." Tope nodded; and June explained: "I must have left the front door open when I came out, or else I didn't latch it and it blew open; because be-cause we saw the flames in the front hall." And Clint continued: "So we started to run toward the house. A car passed, and I shouted to the driver to ring in an alarm. By that time June was on the front steps. I caught her just in time. She was going in. The smoke was pouring out of the door, and there were flames inside; but she told me Mr. and Mrs. Huraer were in there." He held June closer, and .she watched him with wide eyes. . "It was raining," he explained. "I wet my handkerchief in the rain, and wrapped it over my mouth and started to crawl in the hall. But the smoke drove me back, and then June said they slept in the wing, on the ground floor; so we ran around the house to the windows of their room." He hesitated, then went on: "The windows were shut, and the curtains were drawn, but some of the curtains cur-tains were on fire. The windows were all shut tight. I managed to climb up and break the glass, with my pocket-knife for a hammer. I reached in and sprung the catch and pushed the window open. I guess that's when I burned this hand; because when I opened the window a gush of flame came out in my face, and I let go all holds and fell." He looked at June. "I fell on her," he said. "She was right under me. I fell on top of her." "It didn't hurt," June insisted. ' "So we tried to get in through the bathroom," Clint explained. "There wasn't any fire in there, so I got that window up and climbed in; but when I opened the door into their room, it was all on fire inside. Fire was spouting out of the wall right beside the bathroom door." "The laundry-chute is there," June interrupted. "And it was roaring in the cellar," cel-lar," Clint confessed. "I could feel it hot under my feet. The smoke was pretty bad. Then a piece of the floor in front of me burned through; and then the flames licked up at me, and I had to back out and shut the bathroom door." "But you said you got them out," Tope reminded him. "Mr. and Mrs. Hurder." "I'm coming to that," Clint explained. ex-plained. "We tried another window, win-dow, right beside their bed3. I smashed it open, and smoke poured out, but no flames. So I straddled the sill and my foot hit their bed inside." in-side." He spoke rapidly, his eyes fixed straight ahead. "I felt someone, some-one, and I dragged Mrs. Hurder up and lowered her out of the window to June, and then him. The bed was all afire, little flames." ; And he said, looking at the girl beside him: "They weren't burned much, I don't think. We were just in time. The fire spread awfully fast." Inspector Tope suggested: "Fire department must have been there by then!" Clint shook his head. "No, they weren't! They didn't get there till after Mrs. Taine did. Not till after Asa did, as a matter of fact June and I had been pretty busy, but it must have been quite a while." Miss Moss echoed: "Mrs. Taine?" "You see," Clint explained, "Mrs. Taine and Asa were staying with Mrs. Bowdon last night. Mrs. Taine said they didn't hear anything tih their lights went out, and she went to look at the fuses, and saw the fire through the pantry window. She came running over, just about the time we got the old people out; and then Asa came. He and I carried car-ried them into the' Bowdon house, out of the rain. . And Mrs. Taine and June started taking care of them. But June came out again when I did." "Were they dressed?" Tope asked. "Mrs. Taine and Asa?" "Oh, yes," Clint said casually; and he went on: "By the time the fire engines came, one wing was all afire, and the other was well started; start-ed; and they couldn't get the plug off the hydrant right away. There's only one hydrant and that was three or four hundred yards down the hill. The whole thing went, before be-fore they got it checked at all." "Burn to the ground?" "The floors fell in," Clint assented. assent-ed. "And part of the roof. I don't know; maybe the walls wouldn't go." June's eyes were closed, and Miss Moss tried to sign to Inspector Tope to be still; but he asked insistently: "What about the others? Mr. Taine, and Rab? Where were they?" It was June who answered: "Rab had gone to Providence right after supper," she said. "He had a case in court there tomorrow morning. And Uncle Justus is deal He wouldn't hear anything." She remembered: re-membered: "We saw him turn out his light to go to bed, just before we saw the fire." "Saw him?" Tope echoed. "Saw his light go out," June amended. "In the kitchen. He liked to go to sleep in his chair after supper, and sometimes he didn't wake up at all. But we saw his light go out." (TO BE CONTINUED) |