Picture-Play Magazine (Sep 1928 - Feb 1929)

59 A Gi omes to Ho oo a Our heroine makes a startling discovery in the lonely, dismantled bungalow, and reveals the tragic cause of her presence in Hollywood, as her quest for the criminal takes on added impetus in this exciting installment of our mystery serial. By Alice M. Williamson Illustrated by Xena Wright CHAPTER XXV. Madeleine's great discovery. GALLING up all her reserve of courage, Madeleine walked through the glass-walled passage and opened a door at the other end. The rose perfume of incense was stronger. Jones hadn't mentioned it. He couldn't have a strong sense of smell ! No doubt — no doubt at all was left in the girl's mind now, that this had been the woman's room. It had only one window, a wide one, which was door and window both, opening onto the small garden court. No wonder Lopez had been able to conceal the existence of a second occupant of this house. No wonder the bungalow had suited his purpose so well, that he had spent an inconvenient sum of money in order to buy it. This room had been almost completely stripped of its furniture. , "Too much like a woman's room, for Lopez to dare leave any traces," Madeleine thought. "Even the walls tell the story of a woman's presence. But he wouldn't have worried too much about such trifles. No one can prove anything definite from a wall paper of one kind or other. He doesn't dream that somebody here in Hollywood is on the track of the woman. If he did, he'd have been extra careful, even in his hurry to get her away. As it is, he's almost sure to have for Synopsis of Previous Chapters. Malcolm Allen, a young British novelist in Hollywood, goes to the rescue of a beautiful girl who attempts to leave the fashionable Restaurant Montparnasse without paying for the dinner she has eaten. He is impressed, and later, dazzled by her beauty, offers her a chance in the movies. He is dum founded when she tells him she prefers to be a cigarette girl at Montparnasse. Lady Gates, Malcolm's aunt, is struck with the possibility of entering the gay life of the movie capital. Soon after her arrival she falls under the influence of Marco Lopez, a professional dancer, who is attracted by the wealth of the new arrival. He causes her to visit a certain seeress, his confederate, who tells Lady Gates she can have youth and beauty again by undergoing scientific rejuvenation. Upon leaving the hospital, Lady Gates sends for her nephew, who disapproves of her appearance. "Angered, she severs relations with him, and becomes more devoted to Lopez. "Miss Smith," the strange beauty for whom Malcolm has procured the position of cigarette seller" in the restaurant, admits that she came to Hollywood because of Marco Lopez. Though naturally mystified and jealous, Malcolm knows that he loves her. Lopez, with the seeress, plans greater inroads, and even marriage to Lady Gates, in order to have her will changed in his favor. Lady Gates receives an anonymous letter warning her against the dancer. She accuses Malcolm of writing it, but he succeeds in quieting her and, at her request, prepares a drink for her. A . few minutes later she is carried out of the restaurant, dead. Lopez accuses Malcolm of having murdered his aunt, and the young author is arrested. Miss Smith, whose real name is Madeleine Standish, prevails "upon a noted lawyer to take the case. Together they set about to solve the mystery of Lady Gates' murder, which the"" girl is sure was committed by the same persons who brought tragedy into her own life some time before. Unknown to Lopez, she and the lawyer purchase the bungalow the dancer is eager to sell at a sacrifice, and Madeleine goes there alone, under cover of darkness, to run down a secret clew. gotten something — something for me to find. Whatever there is, will be in the studio, or more probably here in this room where she must have lived." The wall paper had a dull-gold ground splashed irregularly with black, and was thickly patterned with huge roses of every shade from palest pink to deepest red. The floor was painted black, but it was easy to guess from the brighter, cleaner patches here and there that several rugs had been removed. Sockets in the wall revealed the fact that there had been two portable lamps ; but the one remaining lamp hung from the ceiling— a basket of alabaster, stained rose color. * Copyright, 182S. by Alice If. Williamson. "He studied her beauty in his whole scheme of decoration !" Madeleine thought. "And her name, too !" The girl had never seen the woman whom, with that woman's lover, she had followed to Hollywood, but she had in her possession a torn photograph found by the side of a dead man, and she could picture such a face as had brought about the fall of Troy. Pale it would be, and faded perhaps by illness, but lovely to look on still, in the rosecolored dusk of this hidden room. In the soft, rosy light Madeleine walked about, searching the walls for any sign" of a secret safe, masked by the pattern of the paper. But there was no such sign, and the woodwork, modern and new, apparently had no concealments. The girl was not surprised at this. She had . told herself that the man and woman who lived ha this house would have been wise -to keep their valuables in something portable, something that could be snatched up -and run away with -at an instant's notice^ " "And now it has been snatched up and run away with !" she said, half aloud, startled yet relieved to hear the sound of her own voice. When she had peeped into the bathroom and looked out into the patio, Madeleine returned to the dismantled bedroom. No furniture was left in it except a large divan stripped of its cover, a card table and an armchair also stripped. In this chair, wheeled to the center of the room, Madeleine sat down to think. She had made up her mind before coming into the bungalow that some very urgent motive had prompted Marco Lopez to move. And what motive could be more urgent than the hidden woman's sudden illness? She had been out x>f health for months. That was why the two had come to California. Lopez had planned their flight from the East cleverly, so that, in case the theft of the jewels and maybe even a murder should be traced to the woman, she should be safe from pursuit. But no crime ' had been traced to her. The proof had not been clear. enough except to the mind of a girl ; and after so long a time the pair must have felt themselves comparatively safe. They might have continued to live