OCR Text |
Show RED HOUSE iJ,iiJ I BEGIN HERE TODAY Who had shot and killed the ne'er- 1 do-well I ROBERT ABLETf, within two minutes min-utes after his arrival at The d i Hottfee, the country estate of his wealthy bachelor brother, MARK A B LETT? Roberts' body was on the floor of the locked office, Hark was missing and, In the opin-i ion of Inspector Birch, it was clear' that Mark, who had looked forward1 to Robert's return from Australia' with annoyance, had Bhot him and disappeared. But there were myetorious circum- I stance The shot was fired a few mo-j rrients before A.VTuNY GILLTNGHAM. gentleman' adventurer and friend of BILL bEV'KRLEy. one of Mark's guests, had entered the hall where hu found MATT CAYLF.Y. Mark's constant companion, pounding on the door and demanding admittance The two men enter tho loom through a win-I win-I dow and find the body, j Antony and Bill continue investigations investiga-tions and become convinced that Cay-lev Cay-lev knows something about the crime. They discover a secret passagt load Mng from the Red Houw to th bowl ing green and then Anton., questions the maid, Elsio. who overheard Mark 'speaking to Robert in tho office. . OS FTH THE stdk . I "It was you who heard Mr. Mar!, yesterday, wasn't it?" Antony asked I the maid "Yes. sir." ""It's my turn now. You wait.'"' murmured Anton:- to himself. Tfes, sir. Nasty-like. Meaning to sa' his chance had come." "I wonder. " "Well, that's v hat 1 heard, sir. I Truly." j Antony looked at her thoughtfully and nodded. ! "YSB I wonder I wonder why"' "Why, what, str?" "iih, lots of things. Elsie." He hod found nis pipe and went' ' downstairs again Antony was glad to have spoken to her, because h hud recognized at i once the lmme:iue importance of her I evidence To thl inspector no doubt! lit had seemed only of Importance ill ! that it had show n Mark to have adopt-J Jed something of a threatening attitude atti-tude toward his brother. To Antor7j I It bad much moro significance. It wSSi the only trustworthy evidence that ; Mark had been In the office at all that afternoon. For who saw Mark go into the of-1 if only Cayley. And if Cay ley had I l.e,en hiding the truth about ihe keys,, w h should ho not be hiding the I I truth about Mark's entry into the of-1 f ir ( n Obviously all Cayley's evidence went f-T nothing. Some of it no doubt was true; but he was irlvlng it both truth ind falsehood, with a purpose hat the purjnse was Antony did no' It. iov as yet; to thield Mark, to shir Id himself, evon to betray Mark it might be any of these. Elslo's evidence however, seemed to settle the point Mnrk had gone Into the office to .see his brother. Elsie had heard ihem l oth talking and then Antony and Cayley had found the body of Robert and the In spector was going '" drag the pond But certainly F'sle's evidence did not prove anything more than the mere presence ot Mark In the room "It's my turn now; you wait That was not an immediate threat. It was a threat for the future. If Murk had shot his brother immediately afterward after-ward It munt have been an accident, the result of a struggle, say. provoked by that "nasty-like" tone of voice Nobody No-body would say. "You wait." to a man who was Just rfolng to be shot. "You jWa'.t' meant 'Yon wait and see what's The conversation Elsie had ove hoard couldn't have meant murder I Anvway not murder of Robert by Mark. "It's a funny business." thought Antony "The on obvious solution is so easy and yet uu wrong." He found Kill itj the hall and pro-I pro-I posed a stroll. Bill was only lov ready. "Where do you want to go?' he u;.ked. "1 don't mind much Show me the park.' "Righto " They walked out together. "Wlatson. old man." said Atnony. as soon as they Were away from the h0Ufi ' you really mustn't talk so loud indoors. There iras s gentleman out- I.Ia l...,f KV.i.... . ll. .11 Ik.. lm.t OIll . JUn I'l IMIIU jOU. Uli llll- 111" ' h, I say," ald Bill, going pink "I'm awfully sorry. &0 th..ts why you were talking such rot." ' Partly, yes And partly because I do feel rather Qright this morning. We're going to have a busy day." Are we really? What are we go-IpS go-IpS to do?" "They're going to drag the pond be its pardon, the lake." We're on ihe way to it now if OU d like to see . What are they ii gging it for? ' Qh, rot," said Bill uneasily He was silent for a little, and then, eagerly. "I say. when are as aolnsr to look for that passage0" 'We can't do very much while Cayley's Cay-ley's In the housi " ha1 about this afternoon when they're dragging the pond" He's sum to be there.'' ntony shoo'c his head. "There's something i must do this afternoon," he said. "Of course we might have time for both." "Has 'ayle got to be out of the house for the oilier thing, too?" "Well I think he ought to be." "1 say. Is It anything rather ex-clting?" ex-clting?" "I don't know It mlpht be rather Interesting. I daresay I could do it at snme other time, but I rattier fancy it nt 3 o'cluock, somehow, i ve benn specially keeping It back for then They had come to the pond Mark's lake and they waiKed silently iuutiu ii w non rney mui made the Circle, Antony sat down on the prasa and relit his pipe Bill followed his umple "Well. Mark isn't there," said Antony An-tony No." said Bill. "At least. I don't quite see why you know he isn't " "It isn't 'knowing. It's 'guessing.' 'guess-ing.' " said Antony rapidly "It's much easier to shoot yourself than to drown yourself, and If Mark ha I waDted to shoot himself in the watt wa-tt r, with some idea of not lettinM the body be found, he'd have put blk' stones in his pockets, and the onlv big stones are near the water's edge and they would have left marks, and they haven't, and therefore he didn't, and oh. bother tho pond that can wait till this afternoon. Bill, where does the secret passage begin?" 'Well that's what we've got to find out. Isn't It?" ' Yes. You see. my Idea Is this," He explained his reason for thinking think-ing that tho secret of the passage was concerned In some way with the secret of Robert's death. and went on : "My theory is that Mark discovered discov-ered the X'assage about a year ago the time when he began to got keen on croquet. Well, then, wnen Miss Norris was going to dress-up. Cay- f ley gave it away Probably h told hSr that she could never get down to tho bowling-green without belna discovered and then perhaps showed j that he know there was one way in ! which she could do It. and she ill He's Rot Such a. Frightful it. Hasn't He?" wormed the secret out of him some- But this was two or three day H before Robert turned up." "Exactly I am not suggesting that there was anything sinister about tho passage in the first place It was just u little private bit of romance and adventure for Murk three days ago He didn't even know that Robert was coming But some-how some-how the passage has been used since. Ir connection with Robert Perhaps Mark escaped that way. perhaps he's hiding there how And if so. then the only person nrho COUld give him away was Bliss Norris. And she of course would only do it In-noccntly In-noccntly not kndwing that lh passage had anything to do with II "So it was safer to have her out o tho way?" "But. look here. Tony why do you want to bother about thi end of it.' We can always get in at the bowling- : green end." "I know but if we do that we shall have to do it openly it will mean breaking open the box, and letting Cayle; know that we've done CH kPTER XI "There's one thing, which we have K ' ' ' LU m:uii&i; ai uii'a1 ouiu iiiiuii . ,"and that is that if we don't find it easily, we shan t flrul It at all." You mean that we shan't have lime?" 'Neither time lor opportunity Which is rather a consoling thought to a lazy person like m. ' "You i an wash out the kitchen and till that part of the house." said Dail. after some thought. "We can t go I .. Whal we -cant, to consider la which La the most likely place of j tli" fen places in which we can look ji safely. The library for choice." Bill got tin eagerly. "Come along." he said, "let's tr ' t h librar: H ' s ley comes in w e ican always pretend we're choosing a book Antony got up slowly, took his arm and walked back to the house I With him. LH The library was 7orth going into, j passages or no passages. Antonv 'could never resist another person's .' lelves AS soon as he went Into 'M th( room, he found himself wander ing around it to see what books the owner read, or (more likely) did not read, but kept for the air which . lenl to the h.mse Mark had prided himself on his library. It was la mixed collection of books Old edi- tions. new editions, expensive books, cheap books p library In which JH overybody. whatever his taste, could ho sure of finding something to suit him. whl b Is your particular -m fancy. Bill?" Bald Antony, looking from one shelf to another "Or are vou always playing billiards ?" i I luce a look at Badminton ' sometimes. 1 said Bill. "It's over in that coiner there" He waved a ii,,.. here?" said Antony, going tO HBH "Yes." corrected himself sud- bbbbb uli, no. it's not. Mark had a grand I e-arrangement of his library about a oar ago. It took him mere than a week, he told us He's got such a frightful lot, hasn t "Now that's very interesting. BBBBBj said Antony, and he sat down and filled his pipe again There was Indeed a "frightful lot BBBBBj of books- The four walls of the library were plastered with them from floor to celling. save only Where tho door and the two windows BBBBB m.iuto.1 on llvinsr their own life even BBBJ ; though an illiterate one To Bill it seemed the most hopeless room of BBBBB any in which to look for a secret opening. .... BbbI (Continued In Our Next issue) |