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$ * - HasittvgsM Bradleyfj WKU SEHVICs£t| jflSSfcft>.A,,v C. ,J CHAPTER XI—Continued ——10— Even Mitchell didn’t sit In on that He walked out beside me, looking very grave. “Tea, Leila r They were serving tea. The Oc tober afternoon had darkened swift ly; I saw the butlers drawing the curtains and lighting the lamps. It p seemed strange to me that one of those butlers should be Elkins. El kins, his face drawn, going about his tasks so unrevealingly. Mo time out for his private grief. I In a few moments be was serv ing us tea. Mitchell and I took It In silence; he was preoccupied, and I know 1 felt Inexpressibly forlorn. Oh, If I had only known what to say that morning to win the girl’s confi dence! I was haunted by the lost opportunity, by the vision of Anson as I had first seen her down the hall, so pretty In her black and White, her arms laden with those j| gay colored towels. I thought craz ily, “Colors for each room, each room of death," for It was to the rose room and to the orchid room that death had come, and then something In my mind brought me 1 up short. If I could find out—If I were not too late— I turned what must have been a very pale and excited face on the lawyer beside me. “Oh. wait a mo ment 1” I said Incoherently. “I want to find out something—" I literally ran towards the stairs. ' Ten minutes later I was In my room, feeling as stunned and bewil dered as if I had Just run, racing, full tilt against a wall. The thing that I bad found out in those last p, ten minutes, the thing that my flash of inspiration had led me to, simply did not fit In. Sheer accident must have Intervened. Another maid . . . I felt as lfTWere sinking in one (. of those morasses where everything you lay hold on slips out from un der your clutching fingers. The death of A,nson had so filled my mind that I had been forgetting the menace of all that had gone be fore, but now It repossessed me very completely. I was not so fright ened for myself as I ought to have been; I knew my own Innocence so well that I was naively sure I could make it clear, but my forebodings deepened when I thought of Deck, high strung, defiant, confronting Donahey’s hard, slow-focusing dis trust, and Harriden's outspoken bate. x wonaerea tr tney naa aeciaea to arrest him. The finding of that dia mond must have seemed to them conclusive. The; might have ar rested him at once, I thought, but for the finding of Anson’s body. That death had bewildered and dis ’ traded them for a time, but now they must be all the keener for some decisive action. I could see Deck held up before the public as an unscrupulous spend thrift making love to a rick woman, trying to trade on her affections, ilrunkenly threatening her when she refused some sum, then murdering ter for the possession of the big diamond that might, more easily, escape a search. It all fitted together. Now that the diamond 'was found Harriden must be surer than ever that his suspicions bad been right ... He would make everybody else sure. I was glad I bad spoken to Dona hey about Raneinl and Anson. Per haps I bad roused enough suspicion In Donahey’s mind to delay his ac tion against Deck. If only my clue had not failed me—if only I had found what I expected to find . . . Well, I hadn’t All right then, I thought determinedly. I’d see what sort of case I could build up, any way! . ' Nora Harriden had been quarrel ing with a man in her room about seven-thirty. Raneinl might have been the man for all his wife’s testi mony that be had been in bis own room .. . Later, after Harriden bad gone down, be bad stepped into. y Nora’s room again. Nora had been stabbed. Raneinl had a. cane, with a stabbing knife concealed In one end. He bad wiped It off with a handkerchief— Not bis own. His own did not ; match that blood-stained one. He had picked up one of Dan’s to wipe off the blood. He had locked Nora In the closet, fled back to his room, washed out the handkerchief and spread It on the radiator to dry. Then, seized with the thought of making the murder appear a sui cide, he bad slipped back again, thrust her out the window, after stufling the diamonds In bis pocket, and hurried dowp to dinner. During the search, tor Mrs. JBar later, and stuffed it In bis pocket with the diamonds. That night, he had torn np the Initials and stolen up with the diamonds to my room. He had chosen me, I thought, because if he were discovered there his fertile imagination would con ceive the idea of saying that it was a rendezvous. If I, alone, discov ered him, he would try to make love to me ... It would be just what he would think of ... As for the big diamond, he had hidden that, but after Anson’s death—and my suspicion Insisted that he had killed her — he had realized the danger he was In, with that body In his closet, and so he had hur ried to get rid of the pendant and at the same time to throw more of the suspicion upon Deck. Some things I could not explain to myself. Why had Letty Van Alstyn fainted at Harrlden’s dread ful words? If she were guilty, then I could credit her with a moment’s fainting weakness as she saw the fate'she whs bringing upon an Li nocent man, but if she were not guilty, if she had no reason to know Deck Innocent— I could hardly believe, after Mitchell’s words about her, that she would faint out of sheer com passion. And what about that crescent? Wby had she wanted it back from Anson? And how had Anson come to have It again in her hand? But these did not seem to me the essential questions. The thing was to establish my suspicions of Ran clnl. A knock came on my door. One of the butlers, Graff, it was, stood there with a note on the bouse note-paper. I came back Into my room, pressed on the lights and tore open the stiff paper. Scrawled across the sheet was a single line, written in Italian! “Please be In the picture gallery in ten minutes.” Some of those minutes I spent In brightening up that scared look ing girl I saw in the glass. “You’re not afraid,” I told her. “He Isn’t going to choke you to death.” Before I left the room 1 wrote In English, below that scrawl on the letter, “I have gone to the gallery to meet Ranclnl,” and signed my name with the time. Then I went to the picture gallery. CHAPTER XII r\ ARKNESS and emptiness greet ed me; the curtains hung closed against the light, their heavy folds forming black oblongs along the shadowy reaches of the walls. The darkness played on my nerves, and I reached hastily for the elec tric switch. The opening of a door at the far end of the gallery made me straighten and whirl about and started my heart to hammering. I told myself to be wise and wary ... I- told myself that this was my chance to learn something. It was not Ranclnl who came In that door. It was Alan Deck. He was the apparition of the first night I had seen him there, his handsome face marked wUh tormented bitter ness. Impulsively I started toward him; we met in the middle of that vast room. He murmured, a wry smile on his lips, “I was afraid you might not come in answer to my note." I stammered my surprise. "Oh, did you—did you send that note?” “Who else?” “But—in Italian?" “Did you think it was Ranclnl?" he grinned. “I wrote In Italian be cause I knew you knew It, and I didn’t want the servants to read It . . . However, that police fellow tagged me. He’s Just outside." I said In a low tone, “Well, he knows we are here together. That can’t be helped . . . But he can’t hear what we say If we stay away from that door.” So we began to walk np and down that huge gallery. I expect It isn’t very helpful for yon to be seen with me—but I had to see yon somehow.” "They’ve linked us so In suspi cion that It would be only natural for us to talk things over,” I said stoutly. “Not that the suspicion can do you any real barm,” he declared. “Tbey can’t do anything to you simply because the diamonds were found pinned In your dress. They’ll have to believe your story. The publicity may be deucedly annoy ing for you, but that's alL” I hoped be was right "Tbey may end by proving that I pinned them there I" His laugh was ragged- He groaned out “It’s son seeing me outside Nora's door —coming oat of It, as a matter of fact, but she can't tell that now— then the diamond hidden In mjr cigarette case, and now Anson’s be ing choked off, In an empty room, while I was conveniently at hand, around the corner. Ood, I almost believe In my guilt, myself I” "But who did It?” I demanded desoeratelv. “How do I know? I don’t give a damn who killed either of them,” he said, his voice roughening, “Just so Harrlden stops riding me. . . . He came downstairs again when 1 was with Donahey. . . . Those let ters have driven him crazy.” “Letters?” “My letters," he said with Inde scribable bitterness. “The fool love letters that I wrote —oh, months and months ago. The letters that she threatened to show him.” I was stupid with surprise. "To show him—? Why—what for—” “She wanted to play hell with me! That was what for.” He re membered to lower his voice to a hard undertone. “To make me marry her. To make Dan divorce her. I was through, but she wasn’t going to let me ofT.” Well, I knew then. I had al ways known, but I had been wil fully trying to hold truth away from me, to Imagine a hopeless, romantic Infatuation. . . . But It was a curious sort of shock that he had been “through.” In a more guarded voice he went on. “She’d made a scene that aft ernoon—that was what Elkins ov erheard. Swore she’d get a divorce and make me marry her. Said Dan would divorce her like a shot If he found out, and she was going to tell him. I told her I'd give her the lie, and she said she’d show* my letters. That was the first time I knew she hadn’t burned them, as she had said. “She showed then) to him all right,” Deck muttered. “He was quoting from them downstairs when - II So We Began to Walk Up and Down That Huge Gallery. he went crazy—when they found the diamond. There were phrases that he’d gotten from them. About having compassion on my lovesick soul—about drowning myself in her eyes I” "They were beautiful eyes,” I said stonily. Suddenly I remembered some thing. I remembered those slow, blunt fingers of Harrlden's mov ing about In his wife’s dressing case, searching the key to the jew el case. I remembered their pause, their feeling over and over the silk lining, and the queer, indefinable look that had passed over the man’s face. ... I had thought him recollecting some association. Quickly I spoke. “I don’t believe she showed them. I believe that be found them where she kept them hidden—under the lining In her dressing case.” I told him, in a carefully lowered voice, all the details. He nodded. "That might be. More likely than for her to show them. Telling him about me would be enough. He’d see red. Anyway It’s the same thing now. He’s read them. Probably been reading them all these nights." I felt sorrier for Harrlden than I had ever felt for any person In my life. “He loved her—terribly," I said. “Oh, be was a fool about her. I was a fool, too. In my time," he ac knowledged grimly. “The damned est fool alive. I always am about beauty. You know that thing of Cecil John’s—‘Oh, I am Beauty’s fool T I thought her Aphrodite herself, all love and loveliness.” Harshly he pronounced, “And she was a cheat and a wanton—and a domineering devil. What's worry ing me is that one of those let ters. the very last, was written In a rage. I’d been breaking away and she’d started threatening—she might have known she couldn't make me come to heel I I told her I’d see her In hell before I married her. I wrote her that That would supply the motive, wouldn’t It? All that th'te case lacks now. Doing away with her be fore she made the scandal." I couldn’t speak for a moment “It was—definite,” I said then, a little shakily. After a minute ha brought out: “She might not have kept It Her pride might have been too great And Owe Pride mei^keen him. from aging It He’d bate the world to know I chocked his wife.” “I like him for that" Something In my tone must have stung him, for he said quickly, “Don’t think any worse of me than yon have to. I saw him first as a jealous brute and she as a love ly martyr. I thought we were en titled to our love. ... I didn’t know her.” ne went on laiEing in bis tense undertone, the pent - up emotion seething out in him. “I was mad with worry that first night I met you here. I’d come up to try and cool off—to plan a way out . . . I was wondering how to get hold of those letters . . . Wondering if I could play a game with her . . . Then I saw you and I thought, ‘Damn it, there’s a girl that’s real —a girl I want to know,’ and I knew if I made a move to you that Nora would rip the roof off. 1 felt tied hand and foot That made me hotter than ever.” “But you asked me to go up to her—” “I know. There was something about you—” He broke off and added, “It would have been all right—coming with that message. And I was desperate.” He broke out now, "If Dan thought that letter would send, me to the electric chair, he’d sink his pride and nse it He’d show me up, first as the seducer of his wife, then as the abandoner. If that last letter got to a Jury I wouldn’t have a Chinaman’s chance.” He turned on me his bitter, des perate eyes. “I must get those let ters. That’s my only way. . . . He can’t be carrying them about with him, they’re too bulky. They must be somewhere in the room.” I suggested that they were prob ably still in the hiding place in the case. “That’s right . . . Look here— can you think of any way of get ting hold of them for me?” He stopped short, gripping hold of my arm. “The funeral ts tomorrow— he’ll leave In the morning and take all the stuff with him. My only chance is now. ... Do you think you could work on your maid?” “To do what? To steal them?” “I’d pay anything I could.” I knew it was folly to imagine bribing that sensible maid of mine. . . . But there must be some way. I could see that his very life might depend upon getting hold of them. I said again that the thing to do was to find out who really had done it, then the letter wouldn’t matter. At the look in my face he flung out, not unreasonably, “How can I find out—overnight?” And then, “I don’t give a damn who did It, I tell you, so I get out from under. Once I’ve got that letter—I’ve got to get that letter! If I thought I could knock him out and get away—” CHAPTER XIII IT WAS a thoroughly shaken Lei la Seton who went back to her room, to the tray of dinner waiting on a little table drawn close to her rose cushioned chair. The soup had chilled, the food cooled, but the coffee In the thermos pot was hot, and I drank It gratefully. My mind was just a sounding board for the words and phrases of that past hour. “I’ve flung myself into your hands. ... I thought her Aphro dite herself. ... I was sick of her. . . . r don’t give a d—n who killed either of them. ... I told her I’d give her the lie. ... It was more pique than passloa ... To play hell with me. . . . And I thought that Nora Harri den, dead, had continued to play hell very thoroughly with the liv ing man. I wanted to see Monty Mitchell. He, at any rate, was concerned with the problem of finding the real killer, and I hoped he had made some discoveries that would bolster my suspicions against Ran dnl. Down the stairs I started, pausing on the second floor, to glance along the main hall to that closed door behind which Nora Harriden lay. Tomorrow the door would open and her body would be carried to Its last resting place. Harriden had decided against hav ing It moved to their home. He wanted no ceremony except at the grave. There she would be left, under her mound of costly flowers. Finis for Nora Harriden. Finis, too, for Sonya Anson. There would be an Inquest for her tomorrow, and afterwards a simple funeral service In some undertak er’s chapel, probably. * Fewer flow ers on her grave—fewer headlines In the press. Elkins for chief mourner. I went on downstairs. The house there was a blaze of lights. In a a few minutes Monty Mitchell came down. The very sight of him was reas surance; be looked so competent, so unintlmldated. "I wanted to see you,” I con fessed. “I’ve been hoping that you'd found out something.” He put his hand through my arm. leading me over to the deep divan where we had first talked It over. (TO BE CONTINUED) Westminster Abbey’s Flag In 1931 Westminster Abbey adopt ed Its own flag as the official en sign of the dean. It Incorporates the red and white roses of the To dors, the cross and five gold imart lets of £L Edward the Confesgoi Hate Campaign Is Spreading Vengeful Feeling Prevails in High Social Circles; Slander First Lady By EARL GODWIN WASHINGTON.—I am going to tell you this week of a single episode of the » spreading campaign to hate Roosevelt out of office. This hatred campaign Is some thing new In American politics. It appears to me to be the royalist type of distrust of an administra tion which tries to slice a little off the top and hand It out on the bot tom—to do something for the less fortunate. I find this hatred be ing breathed with a venomous and vengeful feeling In the high social circles; among the Duponts of the munitions trust and their friends this anti-Roosevelt hatred Is as thick as a London fog. The bitterest of these haters have reached the low point where they do not hesitate to slander Mrs. Roosevelt, first lady of the land, who has been active in the matter of pointing out bad social condi tions and suggesting a way to im prove them. But there Is a certain area of high social activity In which it is looked upon as some sort of a crime to make wide plans for un derprivileged folks—if It costs any thing to the country. The Liberty league and all of its allies feel that way. Personallj, the Duponts and all their kind are fine, pleasant peo ple who do a great deal of charity work; who make life pleasant and profitable for many others In a grand selgnorial manner. As long as they can control the thing they are strong for doing something for the underdog—but they’ve got to boss the job. Just let a beneficent government take over the Idea of improving the entire national fam ily and then these royalists exhibit the symptoms of having swallowed the season’s output of Mexican jumping-beans. , Theteplsode of which I speak of was the startling discourtesy offered Mrs. Roosevelt by Senator Daniel Hastings of Delaware, who has been a great Dupont spokesman and who Is about to retire from public life. I cannot understand how the senate permitted Hastings’ words to go without some sharp action. Time was when such things would have been met with something more ef fective than words. Hastings, unmindful of the mis eries of women in America under the depression, unleashed that bit ter tongue of his In ridicule of re lief money spent for “women’s projects.” These are something to uplift women; give them work to do and restore their morale. Hast ings’ argument against these proj ects was worthy of the madcap Zion check. He spoke slightingly of Mrs. Roosevelt in her efforts to im prove the social conditions of Amer ica ; then he argued that a woman’s project must be something that comes from a woman’s mind—that If It did not, It came from her hus band’s mind first—and that in such a case it should not be within the law. If the woman happened to be Mrs. Roosevelt, bellowed Mr. Hast ings, It would be a dangerous so cialistic experiment and ought to be thrown out. The whole relief program of the administration is unconstitutional, he roared, and should be discarded. If it Is consti tutional, he said, “We ought to tear up the Constitution.” There you have it. Hastings ade quately expresses the feeling of the Bourbons of th. Liberty league and the Antl-Roosevelt hatred cult. If we can’t do It our way let’s de stroy the government. Never, since the days of the rule or ruin dynasty of pre-revolutionary France has there been a more telling expres sion of the aristocracy of big busi ness. • * • “THE QU0Df3Y" PROJECT Passamaquoddy dam, a long, month-filling phrase which is short ened into the blunt term “Quoddy,” stands, an Incomplete project in the far northeast comer of the Unit ed States of America, while politi cians and engineers engage- in an ear splitting contest of noise to see Who can yell the loudest In an ef fort either to stop or continue this dam—depending upon whether or hot thej are on the side of the pow er trust. Down in the southeastern corner of.the United States a sim ilar loud-mouthed screeching is go ing on over the merits and demer its of the Florida ship canal—a pro posed $20,000,000 ship carrying ditch from the Atlantic to the gulf across Florida. In the Northwest the engineers are building on Grand Coulee and Bonneville dams which will, it is alleged, produce more power than the entire Northwest ?an use in years to come; while the southwest corner Is marked by the enormous Boulder dam which will turn that desert into green farms, ship water hither and yon over an area of empire size I have not mentioned the Tennessee valley project, which is another empire in itself, and for .his week’s letter I wUl try to clarify tha situation an* rounding these northeast and south east projects In Maine and Florida, which can have either Important or tragic results. A great deal depends upon the right decision In the case of these two tremendous dams—for either one or both may be a night mare or a vision of a much greater day. Quoddy” Is the result of the de termined effort of an engineer named Cooper, who says the tremendous rise and fall of the tides In the Bay of Fundy can be made to turn wheels that will generate enough power to fill the state of Maine and some of the rest of New England with new enterprises. These tides rush in and out of narrow gorges, and there Is a 27-foot rise and fall; certainly enough power for great purposes if It can be harnessed. The problem lies in the engineering diffi culties to be overcome. All sorts of things have to be considered. One is the fact that ordinary dams have to withstand pressure from one side, whereas the “Quoddy" dam would have to take it going and coming. Ebb and flood tides will hammer the dam ceaselessly. Then, there is a question of the action of salt water on a lot of the metal work and fine machinery, also the possible effect of freezing salt water In the long, cold northeasterly winters. There are engineers who say the thing just will not work—that power generated by these tides will be too expensive to be practicable. Roosevelt, forward-looking, made relief projects out of both Quoddy and the Florida ship canal. To me, the Idea that we can turn the action of the ocean's waves and tides into power is fascinating, and I believe it Will be accomplished some time. However, there was so much fuss about it that Roosevelt put It up to congress, and that eccentric body turned down the long step ahead possible by the Quoddy enterprise, thus stopping the work. But con gress OK’d the Florida ship canal. Meanwhile there is a large fac tion in Florida bitterly opposed to the canal, though everybody in Maine (excepting the power trust crowd and its friends whose motive is easily understandable) is for Quoddy. The Florida anti-canal crowd says the salt water will kill the fruit and that there is every danger that the artesian well system of that state will be completely ruined by cutting through the rock. • • • WAR FOR FARM VOTE There will be a desperate battle for the farm vote. In the glamorous presentation of the G. O. P. bid for support I fear that many farmers will lose sight of the facts; and one of the main facts is that the much vaunted foreign market for Ameri can farm produce Is still In the glimmering distance. It was ruined, devastated—knocked flat as a pan cake by the Smoot-Hawley tariff. The Democrats, I take it, will again proffer strong federal control of agricultural products, with bene fit checks for complying farm own ers; an artificial and temporary measure, but it seems to be the only present plan which guarantees any thing to rural America. That is all there Is to it. By every test agriculture has come back and is still coming back. Gross farm income has increased from that low point In 1932 when farm ing was as flat as the prairies to more than eight billion dollars . . . It has stepped up more than five billions in four years. The farm real estate market Improves all the time. This administration’s friend ly policies with respect to farm finance have helped a lot. The In crease in farm commodity prices has stepped along with a reduction of interest rates on farm mortgage loans. Not only has the farm price of corn tripled since 1932, but in terest rates on federal land bank loans are at all time low point. It is impossible in a brief space to re view the whole work of the Farm Credit administration. It would take us into contact with 2,300,000 mort gaged farm homes . . . and three years ago half of them were in dan ger of foreclosure. That was a desperate situation. Farmers were losing their homes, their farms, their morale. But in the main the country was saved from the debacle of millions of farm families working like peasants on land they no longer owned. In money and in figures the story is told by the fact that the Farm Credit administration received 1 ap plications from half the mortgaged farms in the country, and as a re sult loaned two millions dollars to 750,000 farmers. SPEAKERS WORK TOO HARD The sudden death of Joseph W. Byrns of Tennessee, speaker of the house. Is further evidence that speakers work too hard. The job is a man killer. Twelve speakers died—three recently — and Byrns was the only one to die during a session of congress. Byrns made the speakership of the house of representatives a con structive party Job. He had more to do than sit there and keep the house In order with a gavel. With his two party aides, Bankhead of Alabama, floor leader (elected speaker Immediately after Byrns’ death), and O’Connor of New York, rules committee chairman, Byrns drove through the administration’s program in this session of congress, and it was no easy task with every other interest palling and tugging in opposite directions. He worked TEA TOWELS BRING GAYETY TO KITCHEN | PATTERN M4T No “afternoons off” for this ored Mammy, for she must the cups and saucers up, and the clothes away.” But you < an afternoon oft and embroider pa self a set of tea towels with amusing Mammies, for the work | very quickly, it’s cross Stitch, line, running and single stitch, gay bandana and checkerboard suggest themselves for the hr floss you can find. A set's nloe to < nate when Fair time comes around. In pattern 5547 you will And transfer pattern of seven mot for each day of the week 6 by 8 inches; material requ and color suggestions; illustrate of all stitches needed. Send 15 cents in coins or (coins preferred) to The Sewing ' cle. Household Arts Dept, 258 H Fourteenth St, New York, N. Write plainly pattern number, name and address. 105 Years’ Difference in Ages of Bride and Gr An Egyptian man of one hu and thirty has recently married t —for the nineteenth time. His br is twenty-five His other wives are dead, but 23 children objected to his again because of the one hn and five years between him girl.—London Answers. , Lots Gives AU Love stops not to think bow must be given and what must be kept j it gives all.—H. W. Webb-Peplot. STOP PAIN QUICK WITH CAPUDINE * Headache, neuralgic, and pe pains and other nerve pains almost instantly to Capudine. — is because Capudine is liquid, and_ ingredients are already dissolved— all ready to act. Capudine relieves pain by soothing the tense muscles and nerves. That is why it is so gentle and effective. It is approved by physicians and druggists. Capudine contains no opiates. At all drug stores; 60c, 30c, 10c sizes. (AOVJ. So We’ve Noticed None of the pleasant episodes life seem to be called “experience." CARDUI Cardui is a purely vegetable medi cine for the relief of functional ^ periodic pain, nervousness and weak* ness due to poor nourishment. “1 have used Cardui and had good results from its use,” writes Mrs. W. E. Barnett, of Taylors, S. C. “I suf fered with cramping and headaches and would have a chilly feeling. Sometimes I would feel miserable and have pain more than a day, and I would be nervous. After taking six bottles of Cardui, I had less pain and was regulated. I feel much better." Of course, if Cardui does not seem, to relieve your trouble, consult a physician. Blemishes Made Her Old L< Face Clear Again with Cuticura Soap andOintmmm Here is a letter every skin i should read. Its message in “There were blemishes on my of external origin, and they i look old and haggard. They i red, hard and large. They hurt, and when I scratched f‘ skin would become Irritated, would lie awake at night digging at my face. “But after using two Cuticura Soap and one r cura Ointment my face ' again.” (Signed) Mrs. 2nd St, Floreffte, Pa* Physicians can letters. The Cutkmm l proved their effect half a century. Baa Soap i
The Wallace Enterprise (Wallace, N.C.)
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June 25, 1936, edition 1
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