Newspaper Page Text
Thursday, December 19, 1946
4 J
Synopsis:
Sgt. Michael O’Hara, of the
Mounted, is struck with the
beauty of a young woman at a
dance hall. Her expression be
trays grave trouble. While stu
dying her features, O’Hara re
ceives a summons to appear
before his chief, Inspector
Macdonald. “Got a case for
you, O’Hara,” says the chief.
“Looks like double murder, but
unfortunately the trail is al
ready five days old.” Macdon
ald outlines to O’Hara the
known details of the crime and
give him two mink tails which
one of the victims pulled from
the slayer’s coat. O’Hara calls
on Johnson, who had been as
signed to the case at first but
who had quit because of an ac
cident, O’Hara hoped to get
more information from John
son, but Johnson seemed to be
holding something back.
* ♦ »
CHAPTER 111
O’Hara searched his face keen
ly, but there was no sign of
wavering, only the glassy look
of fever about his eyes. The
nurse, returning, signalled for
the sergeant to leave. He obeyed,
but a glint of sternness narrow
ed his eyes. Johnson could not
lie, and he was as clumsy as a
walrus on land when he attempt
ed evasion.
It had begun to snow again, a
few big white flakes drove before
a rising gale, whirling about like
feathers. O’Hara took no heed of
them. He was quartering the
ground eagerly, like a blood
hound on the scene, every nerve
in his lithfe, active body taut,
every instinct alert. He was
hunting for a clue, and the ex
citement of the quest was like
the flavor of vintage wine.
He had ccme a long way by
dog team, left the animals at the
Cree hut, and broke trail afoot
for hours. He had found the spot
where Gharian and the girl had
fallen, pushed aside a new snow
blanket and confirmed Johnson’s
measurements in the hard ice
crust below.
To follow the trail was more
difficult, but he chose to leave
the cabin until last. He traced,
with infinite pains, the third set
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of footprints, and, trusting again
to Johnson’s notes, came to the
spot below the willows where the
trail showed a swift slide to the
ice of the frozen stream. O’Hara
dropped to his knees here, exam
ining every inch of the ground;
something in his predecessor’s
face had marked this spot for
him.
“The key to the mystery’s here,
unless old Johnson’s made a mis
take. I don’t think he did. Ho!”
He stopped, and dug his fingers
in the snow, much as a dog digs
for a bone. He bad found some
thing. a small object, and, after
inrinite effort, he got it up out
of the ice whole, stared at it
dumbly for an instant—an in
stant that gave him certainty of
one thing. Johnson purposely
had shot up his own arm!
O’Hara thrust his find care
fully into an inner pocket and
began to go over the ground inch
by inch. He was transformed
into the passionless man of the
law. Johnson had failed but
O’Hara registered a vow that he I
would not! Grimly, relentlessly
he searched but he found little
more; a broken branch, a cre
vice in the smooth ice of the I
creek, where someone might!
have stumbled badly, one place
—fifty yards farther down—
where the same footprints had
tried to scramble up a high bank
of snow and slipped back to the
ice again, and here, where
the snow was softer, there were
two sets of prints, one of which
was set in webs. Os this, he was
certain, though Johnson had
made no note of it.
. By this time. ,jt was snowing
heavily, and though he finally
found the spot where the care-;
ful retreat over the ice had be-!
come fight, he lost the trail in
soft new drifts. However, it was
not. difficult to reconstruct the
rest of it. A dog train must have
been waiting somewhere near; |
and the usual trail for such
teams was scarcely twenty yards
from the place where he finally
lost the tracks. The person,
woman or boy, who had made
the smaller prints in the snow,
must have had help near at
hand, help that came over the
ice of the river. No one but a
Cree would have had the hardi-
hood to face alone and afoot
the wilderness that lay between
this place and the nearest set
tlement.
“If Nicky Creuse seems to be
the only suspect bring him in.”
O’Hara smiled grimly. He
turned back now upon his
tracks. The wind, that had been
rising steadily for the last hour,
was blowing a gale from the
northeast, and the snow drove
in his face, almost blinding him.
Farther search would be fruit
less.
It was lucky that he had saved
Gharian’s deserted cabin until
the last, for he could take shel
ter there now and pursue in
vestigations at his leisure.
Strong as he was, he had to
battle with the tempest as he
turned in the direction of the
cabin, guided more by instinct
than by sight. He was in a white
world that was turning gray, it
was all gray, and full of fantas
tic shadows and piercing, terri
ble cold, when he stumbled up
the last drift and saw suddenly
a thing that brought him to a
stand in sheer amazement. A
light shone keenly in the gath
ering gloom, the eternal twilight
of the Arctic winter —a light in
Gharian’s deserted cabin!
O’Hara stood staring at it. Un
til now—save for one moment
when he recalled the sensation
of premonition—he had believ
ed himself alone in the wilder
ness; yet someone must have
been before him, and, in the
storm, found shelter in the
house. A thin curtain was drawn
across the window. Through its
filmy folds he could see a lamp
on the table. There is a strange
fatality that draws a murderer
back to the scene of his crime,
and O’Hara knew it. Something
keen and merciless leaped up in
his stern eyes, and he felt quick
ly for the holster of his pistol,
loosened it, and strode through
the driving snow up to the closed
door of the cabin. The howling
wind must have made his first
summons a puny sound, but he
put his shoulder against the
door and, using his full strength,
broke the feeble fastenings. It
banged open.
At first, the sudden rush of
light blinded his eyes. Then he
MERVILLE NEWS: SUMMERVILLE, GA.
THE SU
saw a face white and startled,
wide eyes, a remulous mouth.
The woman he had seen sitting
apart from the fiddlers at
French Pete’s!
For a long moment they stared
thus at each other, and he saw
her trembling hands clasped
close against her bosom as if to
still a tumultuous beating of
her heart; but she uttered no
sound, and, after that first start
of terror, did not blench. O’Hara
turned and shut the door, find
ing a rusty bolt which, after
some fumbling, held against the
wind. A moment later he had di
vested himself of the heavy coat
which hid his uniform, shaken
off the snow and ice and stood
before the primitive stone fire
place that Gharian had built
when the cabin was new. A few
logs were burning there now
under a smother of charred pa
pers. The sergeant stooped, pick
ed up the tongs and tried to res
cue one half-burnt piece, but the
flame was too quick for him and
licked it up. He straightened up,
acing the woman. All this while
she had neither moved nor spo
ken, and her eyes met his stead
ily.
“You’ve been burning papers
here!” he accused harshly. “You
had no right to burn anything
in this house!”
She caught her breath and her
white face glowed with a sud
den flush that made it beauti
ful. “I had a right, M'sieur Po
lice,” she replied in a low voice.
“I’m Gharian’s wife.”
O’Hara nodded. He felt a
strange tightening in his throat,
but his words were sharp. “I
know. You took the train north
that nigh A—after Gharian and
Ninon Creuse were buried at the
post.”
She started at that, but met
his eyes bravely. “I was at my
husband’s funeral, m’sieur.”
“You were aware your husband
loved the nurse, and yet you
came—-a long way just to attend
his funeral, Mrs. Gharian?” His
tone was grave now, though it
held an edge of disbelief.
She raised her head proudly.
“You’re wrong, M-sieur Police.
I came north to visit—my child’s
grave!” As she spoke, she lifted
one hand with a poignant ges
ture toward the window. Even
in the whirl of snow it seemed
to O’Hara that he saw that lit
tle black cross which he knew
was there. But the woman’s eyes
were clear now as she added,
coldly, “Os my husband —I will
not talk of him: he is dead!”
There was a thrill in her voice,
passion in it; for an instant she
lost her marvelous self-control
and her face quivered in a new,
unguarded loveliness. O’Hara, in
defatigable tracker of the bar
rens, man called efficient, dead
ly and soulless, experienced the
surge of a curiously foreign im-i
pulse to spare her, to shield her
even from herself! But the mer
ciless instinct of his kind made
him thrust his hand into his
pocket and draw out a blood
stained paper.
“There’s his last letter to Ni
non Creuse, the girl who lost her
life because of coming through
this frozen wilderness to nurse
him in his fever.”
Laure Gharian turned deathly
pale. She scarcely seemed to
and her profile was like
a white cameo against the flame
light on the hearth. For the
briefest moment she faltered and
shrank away from the blood
i stained letter. Then she seemed
to nerve herself for the ordeal,
put out an unsteady hand, took
I the paper and, moving to the *
fire, averted her face from O’-1
Hara while she read it.
O’Hara could see only the per
j feet arch of her brow and hair, |
its rich tints, and the supple
grace of her slender figure—the I
ligure of a girl rather than a
woman. But he could see that
her emotion w’as shaking hei
now from head to foot. Involun
tarily he turned away and
glanced about the room that he
had never seen before.
It was a bare place, devoid of
any womanly touch except the
curtain across the window. An
old violin lay on a bench in the
cornei 1 , and the sergeant sudden
ly remembered that he had once
heard the dead man played won
derfully well, with a touch that
only love of music gives. There
were a few worn books, well
thumbed, on the shelf, and a
woman’s coat and furs lay on
the heavy chair that helped bar
ricade the door into the only
other room, the bedroom of the
cabin. It was closed, and against
it were piled all the miscellan
eous articles in place. The door
opened toward them and was
bolted, the fastening being re
inforced by this strange barri
cade.
O’Hara stared at it in amaze
ment. That a woman might
shrink from the cabin where her
murdered husband had spent his
hours was not unnatural, but
that she should come there
alone, in this terrible weather,
face the hardships and the hor
ror of it, to barricade one room!
against herself, was a new and I,
strange development. He still
was staring at it when he heard
her voice again, tremulous and
sweet.
(To Be Continued) I<
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PAGE NINE
No Difference
Gob . "I love you as no one ever
loved you before.”
Gal: “I can’t see any differ
ence.”