Hidden Chambers and What-Nots
“Oh!” said Alec carefully, when Roger had finished.
“You see? I carefully refrain from drawing any deduction. Aloud, at
any rate. All I say is that it _looks_ funny.”
“Lots of things seem to look funny to you, Roger,” Alec remarked
tolerantly.
“About this case?” Roger retorted. “You’re quite right. Lots of things
do. But let’s put all these side issues behind us for the moment.
There’s one thing that I’m simply aching to set about.”
“Only one?” said Alec nastily. “And what’s that?”
“To find out how the murderer got away from the library last night. If
we can solve that little problem, we’ve cleared up the last remaining
difficulty as far as the committing of the murder goes.”
“Yes, I suppose we have,” Alec replied thoughtfully. “But it seems to
me that we’ve rather got our work cut out there, haven’t we? I mean,
it’s pretty well impossible for a man to get out of a room like that
and leave everything locked up behind him, you know.”
“On the contrary, that’s just what it isn’t; because he did it. And
it’s up to us to find out how.”
“Got any ideas about it?” Alec asked with interest.
“Not a one! At least, I can think of one very obvious way. We’ll test
that first, at any rate. The library’s empty now, and I expect
Jefferson will be pretty busy for the rest of the afternoon. We can
sleuth away in peace.”
They turned their steps in the direction of the library.
“And what is the obvious solution to the library mystery?” Alec asked.
“I’m blessed if I can see one.”
Roger looked at him curiously. “Can’t you _really_?” he said.
“No, I’m dashed if I can.”
“Well—what about a secret door, then?”
“Oh!” Alec observed blankly. “Yes, I didn’t seem to think of that.”
“It’s the only obvious way. And it’s not outside the possibilities by
any means in an old house like this. Especially in the library, which
hasn’t been pulled about so much as some of the other rooms.”
“That’s true enough,” said Alec, quite excitedly. “Roger, old sleuth,
I really do believe you’re on the track of something at last.”
“Thanks,” Roger returned dryly. “I’ve been waiting for a remark like
that for some hours.”
“Yes, but this really is interesting. Secret passages and—and hidden
chambers and what-nots. Jolly romantic, and all that. I’m all in
favour of unearthing it.”
“Well, here we are, and the scent ought to be strong. Let’s get down
to it.”
“What shall we do?” asked Alec, staring curiously round the walls as
if he expected the secret door to fly suddenly open if he looked hard
enough.
“Well, first of all, I think we’d better examine this panelling. Now,
let’s see; this wall where the fireplace is backs on to the drawing
room, doesn’t it? And this one behind the safe on to the storeroom and
a little bit of the hall. So that if there is a door or anything, the
probability is that it will be in one of those two walls; it’s not
likely to be in either of the outside ones. Well, I tell you what we’d
better do. You examine the panelling in here, and I’ll scout round on
the other side of the walls and see if I can spot anything there.”
“Right-ho,” said Alec, beginning to scrutinise the fireplace wall with
great earnestness.
Roger made his way out into the hall and thence to the drawing room.
The dividing wall between that room and the library was covered with
paper, and one or two china cabinets stood against it. After a cursory
peep or two behind these, Roger mentally wrote that wall off, at any
rate, as blameless. The storeroom, similarly, was so full up with
trunks and lumber as to be out of the question.
Roger returned to the library, to find Alec industriously tapping
panels.
“I say,” said the latter, “several of these panels sound hollow.”
“Well, there’s no way through either into the drawing room or the
storeroom, I’m convinced,” Roger remarked, closing the door behind
him. “So that I don’t think it’s much use trying those walls
haphazard.”
Alec paused. “What about a secret chamber, though? That wouldn’t
necessarily need a way straight through. It might come out anywhere.”
“I thought of that. But the walls aren’t thick enough. They’re only
about eighteen inches through. No, let’s go and have a look at it from
the outside. There might possibly be some way into the garden.”
They went out through the open windows and contemplated the red-brick
walls attentively.
“Doesn’t look very hopeful, does it?” said Alec.
“I’m afraid not,” Roger admitted. “No, I fear that the secret-door
theory falls to the ground. I thought it would somehow.”
“Oh? Why?”
“Well, this house doesn’t belong to the Stanworths, you see, and
they’ve only been here a month or so. I don’t suppose they’d know
anything about secret passages, even if there were any.”
“No, but the other fellow might.”
“The murderer? It isn’t likely, is it?”
“I hate giving up the idea,” said Alec reluctantly. “After all, it’s
the only possible explanation of his disappearance, as far as I can
see.”
Roger suddenly smote his hands together. “By Jove! There’s one hope
left. Idiot not to have thought of it before! The fireplace!”
“The fireplace?”
“Of course! That’s where most of these old houses have their secret
hiding places. It will be there if anywhere.”
He hurried back into the library, Alec close at his heels. There he
stopped suddenly short.
“Oh, Lord, I was forgetting that the blessed place had been bricked in
so very thoroughly.” He gazed at the modern intrusion without
enthusiasm. “That’s hopeless, I’m afraid.”
Alec looked thoughtfully round the room. “I don’t think we’ve examined
these walls enough, you know,” he remarked hopefully. “There’s plenty
of scope in this panelling really.”
Roger shook his head. “It’s just possible, but I’m very much afraid
that——” He caught a sudden and violent frown from Alec, and broke off
in mid-sentence. The door was opening softly.
The next moment Jefferson entered.
“Oh, hullo, you two,” he said. “I’ve been looking for you. Can you
manage to look after yourselves for the afternoon? Lady Stanworth and
Mrs. Plant are in their rooms. Both naturally rather upset. And I’ve
got to go into the town to see about a few things.”
“Oh, we’ll be all right,” Roger said easily. “Please don’t bother
about us.”
Jefferson glanced round.
“Looking for a book?” he asked.
“No,” said Roger quickly. “As a matter of fact, I was studying this
overmantel. I’m rather interested in that sort of thing—carving, and
panelling, and old houses. This is really rather a wonderful room.
What’s the date, do you know? Early Jacobean, I should say.”
“Somewhere about that,” Jefferson said indifferently. “I don’t know
the actual date, I’m afraid.”
“Very interesting period,” Roger commented. “And there’s usually a
priest-hole or something like that in houses built at that time.
Anything of the sort here? There ought to be, you know.”
“Can’t say, I’m afraid,” Jefferson replied, a little impatiently.
“Never heard of one, at any rate. Well, I must be getting along.”
As the door closed behind him, Roger turned to Alec.
“I didn’t expect anything, but I thought I might as well try it. He
didn’t give anything away, though, whether he knew or not. On the
whole, I should say that he didn’t know.”
“Why?”
“He was far too off-hand to be lying. If he wanted to put us off, he’d
have elaborated somewhat, I fancy. Well, if we can’t find our secret
door, we must try other means of providing an exit for our man. That
leaves us with one door and three windows. We’ll try the door first.”
The door proved to be a massive piece of wood, with a large and
efficient lock. Except where the socket in the lintel had been torn
away in the efforts to force an entrance, it was still undamaged.
“Well, that’s out of the question, at any rate,” Roger said with
decision. “I don’t see how anybody could possibly have got out through
that and left it locked on the inside, with the key still in the lock.
It might have been done with a pair of pliers, if the end of the key
projected beyond the lock on the other side. But it doesn’t; so that’s
out of the question. French windows next.”
These were of the ordinary pattern, with a handle which shot a bolt
simultaneously at the top and bottom. In addition there were small
brass bolts at the bottom and top, both of which had been fastened
when the window was opened that morning.
“It looks out of the question to me,” Roger muttered. “It _is_ out of
the question. Even if he had been able to turn the handle (which he
couldn’t possibly have done), he couldn’t have shot the bolts as
well.”
“I’m blessed if he could,” said Alec with conviction.
Roger turned away.
“Then that leaves these two windows. I don’t see how anyone could have
left this little lattice one closed behind him. What about the sash
one? That looks more hopeful.”
He climbed up on the window seat and examined the fastening
attentively.
“Any luck?” asked Alec.
Roger stepped heavily on to the floor again. “I regret to have to
confess myself baffled,” he said disappointedly. “There’s an
anti-burglar fitting on that window which would absolutely prevent the
thing being fastened from the outside. I’m beginning to think the
fellow must have been a wizard in a small way.”
“It seems to me,” said Alec weightily, “that if the chap couldn’t have
got out, as we appear to have proved, then he could never have been in
here at all. In other words, he doesn’t exist, and old Stanworth did
commit suicide, after all.”
“But I tell you that Stanworth _can’t_ have committed suicide,” said
Roger petulantly. “There’s far too much evidence against it.”
Alec threw himself into a chair. “Is there, though?” he asked
argumentatively. “As you put it, it’s certainly consistent with
murder. But it’s equally consistent with suicide. Aren’t you rather
losing sight of that in your anxiety to make a murder of it? Besides,
don’t forget that your motive has fallen to the ground since the safe
was opened. There wasn’t a robbery here last night, after all.”
Roger was roaming restlessly about the room. At Alec’s last words he
paused in his stride and looked at his companion with some irritation.
“Oh, don’t be childish, Alec,” he said sharply. “Money and jewels
aren’t the only things that can be robbed. The motive still holds
perfectly good if we’ve got to have a motive. It was robbery of
something else; that’s all. But why stick to robbery? Make it revenge,
hatred, self-protection, anything you like, but take it from me that
Stanworth _was_ murdered. The evidence is _not_ equally consistent
with suicide. Think it over for yourself and you’ll see; I can’t
bother to go through it all again. And if we can’t find the way the
chap got out, that’s because we’re a pair of idiots and can’t see what
must be lying under our noses, that’s all.” And he resumed his stride
again.
“Humph!” said Alec incredulously.
“Door, window, window, window,” Roger muttered to himself. “It must be
one of those four. There’s simply no other way.”
He wandered impatiently from one to the other, trying desperately to
put himself in the place of the criminal. What _would_ he have done?
With some ceremony Alec filled and lighted his pipe. When it was in
full blast he leaned back in his chair and allowed his eyes to rest
approvingly on the cool greens of the gardens outside.
“Life’s too short,” he remarked lazily. “If it really was a clear case
of murder, I’d be on the trail as strenuously as anyone. But really,
old man, when you come to consider—calmly and sanely, I mean—how
extraordinarily little you’ve got to go on and how you’re twisting the
most ordinary things, why I think even you will admit in a few weeks’
time that when all’s said and done we——”
“Alec!”
Something in Roger’s tone caused Alec to turn round in his chair and
look at him. He was leaning out of the lattice window, apparently
intent on the garden outside.
“Well?” said Alec tolerantly. “What is it now?”
“If you come here, Alec,” said Roger, very gently, “I’ll show you how
the murderer got away last night.”