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Show TWV. STOIIY THUS FAR: Adam liruce, Fill operator, and Inspector and Mrs. Tope m't while on vacation In Northeastern North-eastern wlldi. Tope discovered the body of a murdered man at the auto camp of lice Dcwaln, a friend of Itruce'f. lie called Hruce, who brought Slate Trooper Quill. Upon the arrival "I the D. A., Nat Cumberland and Dr. Medford, they decided to keep the murder a secret as long as possible. The body was moved to the home of Amasa Dewaln for further Investigation. Mrs. Tope told her bus-band bus-band that she recognized the body as that of Mr. Idiorge, head of New England utilities, flee slated that a musky smell on murdered man's hair reminded her of someone. CHAPTER V "Mrs. Priddy was busy Saturday, so I made the beds, changed the linen. I s mulled this same musky Bmell on one of the pillowslips In Little Bear. Oh, I'm sure of it." "Who were they?" Cumberland asked. "I don't know," Bee confessed. "Earl Priddy took them to the cab-In. cab-In. They came late Friday night and left very early. I didn't see them at all. But I'm positive about the smell." Tnere seemed no more to say. They moved out of doors again, and Cumberland asked heavily: "What did they do to him, Doc? How'd they kill him?" Doctor Medford said unsteadily: "I can stand most things all right; but this gets me." And he continued, without prompting: prompt-ing: "It was more or less luck that I hit It so soon. I didn't find any wounds, knife, bullet, nothing like that; so I went into the abdomen, thinking of poison. I found the answer an-swer there." He hesitated and Cumberland urged: "Go ahead, Doc." The Doctor said grimly: "All right. It's hard to believe; but this man died of peritonitis, from a ruptured rup-tured appendix. Rupture resulted from a gangrenous condition produced pro-duced by a crease in the omentus that bent a fold In an artery, the way you do a hose, and shut off the blood supply. That's how he died!" For a moment no one spoke, till Cumberland muttered: "Then it's not murder, Topel" The Inspector said impatiently: "They tied him up, gagged him, left him half-smothered with a blanket oround his head when he was running run-ning a temperature and pretty sick and needing a doctor quick. If that wasn't murder, it was the next thing to it! " "Manslaughter, maybe," Cumberland Cumber-land admitted. "Well," Tope suggested, "suppose It was you that had fetched this man to Faraway and left him there to die. Wouldn't you -be worried for fear some one had spotted you?" "It was dark," Cumberland reflected. re-flected. "I'd have kept my hat pulled down, my collar turned up." "How about the car? Wouldn't you be afraid Priddy might remember the car?" Then, putting himself in the other man's place. Tope went on: "Of course, maybe I'd steal a car to do the job. Mat, have you had any reports of a car being stolen sto-len around here?" "I wouldn't know about that Cumberland confessed. "Ned Quill would, though. The State police get all those bulletins." "Where is he?" "Asleep inside. He was up all night." "Well, send him out," Tope directed. di-rected. The District Attorney went Into the house, and after a moment Ned Quill appeared, elaborately rubbing his eyes. Tope spoke to him. "Get any rest, did you?" "Sure!" the trooper told him cheerfully. "A good three hours!" Tope nodded. "Quill, have the State police had any reports of a car being stolen around here, the last few days?" "Sure, cars are stolen all the time." "You go find out whether any cars have been reported stolen within fifty fif-ty miles of here since Friday," Tope directed. "Or since Thursday, for that matter." Quill assented. He started away; but Tope detained him. "Wait minute." he said. "Something else. You know the country around here?" "Lived here all my life up to now. Yes, I guess I do." "Well then," Tope asked, "suppose "sup-pose you had a car on your hands that you had to get rid of. somewhere some-where around here, where would you put it?" The trooper considered. "I'd run it into the woods," he decided. "There are a lot of old roads that nobody uses except to park in, on moonlight nights; and nobody would notice one more car among so many." Tope shook his head. "That's not good enough! Some one mighi spot it the first day. Is there any place where a car could be sunk in deep water?' "Well, there are some old lime stone quarries, above Ridgcomb. I haven't been up there since I was a kid; but there's always water in the quarries, a. id it's gray with Ume, so you can't see down into it." "Any other place that would do the trick?" "Nary a one that 1 know of. ' Tope nodded. "All right." he agreed. "Now you ro find out whether there's been a car stolen, and let me know." When Quill was gone, Tope turned to Adam. "Son, you know where these quarries are?" "I can find them." "Get Miss Dewain to drive you up there," Tope directed. "That way, you can enjoy yourself and help me too. Take a flshingline and a sinker and make some soundings sound-ings see 17 you can locate anything in the quarries that might be a car. Look for tire tracks on the road." "I came up to get some fresh vegetables for dinner," Bee remembered. remem-bered. "Adam, come help me. Then we can go." So she and Adam departed toward thf; garden, and the Inspector and Mrs. Tope got under way; at once he proposed: "Now ma'am, we'll drive down to Ledforge's summer place and see what they say there!" She assented; but first tie bade her stop at the Mill; and he went to talk with Priddy for a while. p jlj'i "They put him under the bed In Faraway." When he returned to the car, there was a deep excitement in his eyes; but he only said: "All right, let's go along." Not till they were on the road did he explain. Then he told her: "Some one else is oh this trail we're running." "Who?" "Those two men last night. Whit-lock Whit-lock and Beal! Whitlock told Priddy Prid-dy he was an insurance agent, said he was trying to trace a stolen car a Chevalier coupe, pale gray with blue trim. Earl told him a car like that was here Friday night." "Is that the one with the Englishman?" English-man?" "Yes!" "Did Earl get the number of the car?" "No, but he says it was a coupe, light gray. He didn't see the man's face, or the woman's. They drove in late, and Priddy had to get out of bed. He took them to Little Bear. The man gave him the money for the cabin without getting out of the car, and Priddy went back to bed; but he says the man was small, and that he talked like an Englishman whatever that means! And Priddy says the car had blown out an exhaust ex-haust gasket. He heard it puffing." He added: "I had to go at Priddy easy, so he wouldn't realize I was asking questions. That's what took me so long." For a while, then, he said no more. For several hours the Topes were busy . . . The District Attorney's office was in North Madderson, a dozen miles from Ridgcomb. Quill had preceded preced-ed the Topes to announce their coming. com-ing. Mat Cumberland and another man were here to greet them a brisk young man, sure beyond his years. "This Is Joe Dane, Inspector," Cumberland said. "Heard Mat speak of you," Tope said courteously, his hand extended. extend-ed. "Says he couldn't get along without you." And he went on: "Late last Friday night, a little man who talked like an Englishman, and who had a woman wom-an with him, drove up to Dewain's Mill in a gray Chevalier coupe with blue trim. They had this man that's dead now under the rumble seat. Priddy put them in the cottage called Little Bear. During the night they carried this man down to Faraway Far-away and put him under the bed there." "How can you know that?" Dane demanded. "Well, I'm guaranteeing It," Tope assured him mildly; and he went on: "They put him under the bed In Faraway, and sonieume before daylight they pulled out. 1 figure that they'd want to get rid of the car. I've a notion it's in an old ' quarry Ned Quill here told me about. Adam Bruce has gone to I see." The District Attorney looked at Joe Dane yYnn ;imm me wouldn't have thought of that, Joe," he said. But Dane retorted: "We don't know the car's there! That's Just a stab in the dark." "Why, that's right," Tope agreed readily enough. "But I tried another anoth-er stab," he continued. "Quill helped me on this too. I asked him to find out whether any car had been stolen around here. Well, there was one, belonged to a man named Hol-dom, Hol-dom, has a summer place down near Ridgcomb. It was taken Friday night, out of the garage. Nettie Pineyard she's Holdom's housekeeper house-keeper says Mrs. Kell, the chauffeur's chauf-feur's wife, drove it away." He hesitated; but no one spoke, and he went on: "Saturday morning, Holdom telephoned tele-phoned from New York to the police po-lice in Ridgcomb that the car had been stolen." He turned to Quill. "Ned you go call up your friend, the Insurance man see if he had insurance insur-ance on that car and whether Holdom Hol-dom reported the theft to him too." Quill disappeared and Tope spoke more softly: "Didn't want Quill to hear what I'm telling you now," he said. "But Mrs. Tope here saw Led-forge, Led-forge, the Utilities man that lives down below Ridgcomb, at a meeting once, and she saw the dead man this morning. She thought he was Ledforge!" Cumberland leaned forward, and Dane leaped to his feet. "Ledforge!" he whispered hoarsely. "By Godfrey! God-frey! Say, if that's so " His eyes shone. But Tope said mildly: "Wait a minute, Mr. Dane. I only said that Mrs. Tope thought the dead man was Ledforge. But Ledforge is In New York. He was at a bank directors' di-rectors' meeting there this morning." morn-ing." Dane made an exasperated gesture. ges-ture. "Well, for heaven's sake, If it's not him, why set off a skyrocket here?" But then Quill returned. "Charley Fay had the insurance on the coupe," he said. "But he hasn't any report about its being stolen." Tope nodded, and gently he dismissed dis-missed the trooper. "You've been a lot of help, Ned," he said. "I wish you'd drop in at Dewain's Mill and see If Adam's there. Tell him I'll be there soon." So Quill departed; and Tope looked at Cumberland. "Now, I want to do a little telephoning, tele-phoning, Mat," he said. "Mind if I use your name?" Cumberland assented as-sented silently; and Tope put in a call for Police Headquarters in New York. While they waited, "There are two or three things we ought to know," Tope explained. "Kell was at Holdom's Hol-dom's Friday night; but he left, and Mrs. Kell hasn't been back since she drove the car away. I'd like to know where they are. And there's another anoth-er thing: There was a man named Whitlock at Dewain's Mill last night, said he represented the insurance insur-ance people, trying to trace a stolen sto-len car. The way he described it, it was this car. But if Holdom hasn't reported it to the insurance peo-pie-" "Where is Whitlock?" Dane demanded. de-manded. "He sounds fishy!" "He got away before I found out what he was up to," Tope confessed; and Dane made a disgusted gesture. Then the phone rang, and Tope took the instrument. "Hello, Pat?" he said In friendly tones. "Tope speaking. Tope! Tope, you young whelp! How are you, Pat? Haven't seen you in five years . . . Sure, you heard right! I was married a year ago. Still on my honeymoon." He became serious. "But Pat, listen. lis-ten. I'm speaking from Mat Cumberland's Cum-berland's office. He's the D.A. .up here in Highland County. Massachusetts, Massa-chusetts, yes. North Madderson is the town. He wants some information. informa-tion. O.K.? All right, take this down." And he gave careful instructions: To find out whether Ledforge was in New York; to check his recent movements. move-ments. What kind of hair-oil did he use? Was he in New York over the week-end? Check up on Holdom, where he had been, where he was now. "And Holdom's plane crashed Saturday morning," Tope explained. "Pilot, named Bob Flint, was killed. Down on the Sound somewhere. Find out what made the plane falL" He finished, hung up the receiver; Joe Dane started to speak, and Tope looked at the young man, a certain sympathy in his eyes. "Son," he said, "I know just about how you feel you're itching to get action. I'm too old to run around in circles; but if you want a job, here's something you can do: A week ago, Mrs. Kell drove down to Middleford and met Ledforge at the train there. Where did they go? See if you can find out, Joe." And he added: "We'll know a lot more when we hear from New York. You know pretty near as much as I do, right now." Then the phone rang, and Joe Dane took the call. "It's for you. Tope," he said, surrendtring the instrument. in-strument. And they heard Tope say: "Hello . . . Oh, Adam . . . Good, glad you did . . . It's there. Is itt Fine . . . Fine . . . Adam, did you notice whether there were heelplates heel-plates on his shoes? . . . Good." He returned the receiver to the hook. "The car's in the quarry," he ' said. "Adam located it. You'll want to get it out. Mat" (TO BE CONTINUED) |