Table Of Content

N this occasion Wilson has a wide and varied being called upon to deal with no fewer than s. crime problems, The first concerns an incident in. telephone cabinet, another with the case of the int: natienal socialist, and no sooner has the indefatigat Wilson disposed of an Oxford mystery than he starts ' on the investigation of the affair of the Camden To fire, Then there is a robbery at Bowden. . . and t mysterious disappearance of Philip Mansfield. ‘The best we have read for a jorg time.-—Daily News Admurably devised and written.—Genap Govtp ia the Obn Ingenious solutions hold us spellbound.—-Porkman By the Same Authors FOISON IN {Hi GARD:.4 SUBURB BURGLARS IN BUCKS “THE BLATCHINGTON TAN “THE DEATH OF A MILLIONAIRE *tHE MURDER AT CROME HOUSE THE LIFE OF WILLIAM COBBETT NAN FROM THE RIVER *THE BROOKLYN MURD "Uniform with this Volume. SUPERINTENDENT WILSON’S HOLIDAY by G. D. Hi: anp M. COLE Autivor- of * The Man from the River,” “The Murder at Crome House,” etc. LONDON 48 PALL MALL W. COLLINS SONS & CO LTD GLASGOW SYDNEY AUCKLAND 2 SUPERINTENDENT WILSON’S HOLIDAY hypothesis should break down under me and the Department get into a very awkward row. It was a stroke of luck that it turned out all right. Of course, if it hadn't been for Michael I couldn’t have brought it off at all.” “You are rather good at deriving assistance from. the brute creation, then,” Michacl Prendergast laughed. ‘I should say T was about as much help as a hibernating tortoise. 1 didn’t do anything. and what you were up to I hacn’t the slightest ideA” “YT was alluding to your substantial and in- escapable | (Presence, my dear Michael,” Wilson retorted, “and to your excellent medical degree. But as a matter of fact you were stanfling at my elbow practically the whole time and could have followed all the steps in my conclusions.” “So could a tortoise, no doubt,” said Prendergast, “if it was standing at the elbow of a man who was just preparing to convert it into tortoiseshell. For all I knew, you were going to order my arrest any moment.” “You forgot, then,” Wilson said, “ that I was the principal witness to your alibi, and that up to the present T have gencrally—-though probably without warrant—considered myself a reliable witness. Also, if you will forgive my saying so, the crime was cntircly beyond your powers. Your ingenuity dvesn’t lic in that direction.” At this point several of the company demanded that the two friends should cease talking in riddles. and should explain what the case was which pre- sented such remarkable features; and by dint of y IN A TELEPHONE CABINET 3 much cross-questioning—neither of the two having any pretensions to narrative powers—they suc- ceeded in getting out of them the following story. The Downshire Hill Murder (to give it its newspaper name) was discovered about half-past nine on a Sunday morning of May, 1920, one of those lovely mornings with which our climate tries to pretend that it really knows how to make a summer. Superintendent Henry Wilson of New Scotland Yard was walking along Downshire Hill, Hampstead, in cémpany with his friend Dr. Michacl Prendergast. It was long before the sensational death of Radlett, the millionfire,! which, as everyone will remember, covered England and America with placards, and drove Wilson, who Itad committed the unpardonable sin of detecting an ex-Home Secretary in shady courses, into the exile of private practice. He was still a C.I.D, man, liable at any moment to be called from bed and board to attend to‘public affairs, and it was not without some misgivings that he had obeyed the commands of his sister, with whom he was staying, to put himself for one day at least beyond reach of the telephone. tfowever, it was a wonderful morning ; and Michael Prendergast, one of his few intimate friends, who had spent the Saturday evening and night with him, had added his entreaties ; and the rcsult was that the two men, in flannels and tennis shirts, were now walking briskly down the road to the North London Stati6n, where they intended to catch a train for Richmond. 3 See Lhe Death of a Militenaire, by G. D. H. and Margutet Cole 4 SUPERINTENDENT WILSON’S HOLIDAY “You'd almost think you were in the country here,” Prendergast said appreciatively, noting the trees which filled the little front gardens and the young green of the Heath which closed the end of the road.“ There was an ow! hooting outside my window all night.” “They do come close to the houses here,” Wilson replied, “ but I never heard of one actually nesting in the wall of a heuse before.” “Nor I. Way?” For answer Wilson pointed to the ivy-clad wall of a little house about 4 hyndred yards farther down, which was only just visil#e through a mass of filac and young chestnut. “ Some- thing flew in and out of the ivy just thetc, between those boughs,” he said. Prendergast stared at him.‘ ‘‘ You have sharp eyes. 1 was looking at the lilac, and { didn’t see anything. How do you know it was an owl, anyway, at this distance ?” “Ldon't,” Wilsén said.‘ If may not have been. I couldn’t see it at all clearly. But it was too bis, for any other bird. Anyway, somebody else appears to have scen it too.” They were now approaching the ivy-clad house, which, though hidden from view on the west, was quite open in front, and standing by its gate on the pavement was a man to whom it appeared to be an object of enormous intcrest. As the two friends passed, he looked up at them with a dubious air, which suggested that he was wondering wittther to open a conversation; and Prendergast, who never could resist conversing with all and sundry jr.sponded promptly to the suggcstion. N A TELEPHONE CABINET > “Have you seen the owl, too?” he asked. “Owl!” said the man. “I ain’t secn no owl. But I’ve scen a man go in there,” he pointed to the house. “ What's he want to go in for, that’s what T want to know.” “ Perhaps it’s his house,’’ Prendergast suggested. “lo!” said the man. “ Then what’s he want fo go in by the window for, that’s what 1 want to know. Banging on the door fit to wake the dead, he was. When he sees me, he says, ‘ Something wrong here,’ he says. ‘Can’t get no answer,’ and he outs with a knife and gets in at the window. And what's he want to bang for, if it’s his house, and. what's wromg in there, that’s what T want to know.” Tle spat suspiciously. In a moment hfS question was answered in a sufficiently dramatic manner. There was a sound of fect within the house; the front door, which was only a matter of twenty yards from the gate, opencd suddenly, and a littl’ man, pale and frightened in appearance, looked out and yelled in a voice of surprising power to come from a person of his physique, ‘‘ Murder!” All three started ; and indced the cry had sounded as if it must reach Camden Town at least. On seeing their astonished faces the man at the door looked rather confused, and coming down to the gate, said in a considerably lower tone, “* Will you fetch the police, please, gentlemen? Mr. Carluke’s been murdered.” . He then closed the gate, and made as if to return to the house; but Prendergast, with a nud from