It was a queer little gathering in the drawing-room of Market Burnham
Hall, queer and in a sense ominous. Two soldiers guarded the door.
Another one stood with his back to the wide-flung window, the sunlight
flashing upon his drawn bayonet. Granet, although he looked about him
for a moment curiously, carried himself with ease and confidence.
“How do you do, Sir Meyville?” he said. “How are you, Thomson?”
Sir Meyville, who was in a state of great excitement, took absolutely no
notice of the young man’s greeting. Thomson pointed to a chair, in which
Granet at once seated himself.
“I have sent for you, Captain Granet,” the former began, “to ask you
certain questions with reference to the events of last night.”
“Delighted to tell you anything I can,” Granet replied. “Isn’t this a
little out of your line, though, Thomson?”
Sir Meyville suddenly leaned forward.
“That is the young man,” he declared. “I took him to be the officer
in command here and I showed him over my workshop. Quite a
mistake--absolutely a wrong impression!”
“It was a mistake for which you could scarcely hold me responsible,”
Granet protested, “and you must really excuse me if I fail to see the
connection. Perhaps you will tell me, Major Thomson, what I am here
for?”
Major Thomson seated himself before the desk and leaned a little back in
his chair.
“We sent for you,” he said, “because we are looking for two men who
lit the magnesium light which directed the Zeppelin last night to this
locality. One of them lies on the lawn there, with a bullet through his
brain. We are still looking for the other.”
“Do you imagine that I can be of any assistance to you?” Granet asked.
“That is our impression,” Major Thomson admitted. “Perhaps you will be
so good as to tell us what you were doing here last night?”
“Certainly,” Granet replied. “About half-past ten last night I thought
I heard the engine of an airship. We all went out on the lawn but could
see nothing. However, I took that opportunity to get my car ready
in case there was any excitement going. Later on, as I was on my way
upstairs, I distinctly heard the sound once more. I went out, started my
car, and drove down the lane. It seemed to be coming in this direction
so I followed along, pulled up short of the house, climbed on the top of
the bank and saw that extraordinary illumination from the marshland on
the other side. I saw a man in a small boat fall back as though he were
shot. A moment or two later I returned to my car and was accosted by two
soldiers, to whom I gave my name and address. That is really all I know
about the matter.”
Major Thomson nodded.
“You had only just arrived, then, when the bombs were dropped?”
“I pulled up just before the illumination,” Granet asserted.
Thomson looked at him thoughtfully.
“I am going to make a remark, Captain Granet,” he said, “upon which
you can comment or not, as you choose. Was not your costume last night
rather a singular one for the evening? You say that you were on your
way upstairs to undress when you heard the Zeppelin. Do you wear rubber
shoes and a Norfolk jacket for dinner?”
Granet for a moment bit his lip.
“I laid out those things in case there was anything doing,” he said.
“As I told you, I felt sure that I had heard an airship earlier in the
evening, and I meant to try and follow it if I heard it again.”
There was a brief silence. Granet lounged a little back in his chair,
but though his air of indifference was perfect, a sickening foreboding
was creeping in upon him. He was conscious of failure, of blind,
idiotic folly. Never before had he been guilty of such miserable
short-sightedness. He fought desperately against the toils which he felt
were gradually closing in upon him. There must be some way out!
“Captain Granet,” he questioner continued, in his calm, emotionless
tone, “according to your story you changed your clothes and reached here
at the same time as the Zeppelin, after having heard its approach. It
is four miles and a half to the Dormy House Club, and that Zeppelin must
have been travelling at the rate of at least sixty miles an hour. Is
your car capable of miracles?”
“It is capable of sixty miles an hour,” Granet declared.
“Perhaps I may spare you the trouble,” Thomson proceeded drily, “of
further explanations, Captain Granet, when I tell you that your car was
observed by one of the sentries quite a quarter of an hour before
the arrival of the Zeppelins and the lighting of that flare. Your
statements, to put it mildly, are irreconcilable with the facts of the
case. I must ask you once more if you have any other explanation to give
as to your movements last night?”
“What other explanation can I give?” Granet asked, his brain working
fiercely. “I have told you the truth. What more can I say?”
“You have told me,” Major Thomson went on, and his voice seemed like the
voice of fate, “that you arrived here in hot haste simultaneously with
the lighting of that flare and the dropping of the bombs. Not only one
of the sentries on guard here, but two other people have given evidence
that your car was out there in the lane for at least a quarter of an
hour previous to the happenings of which I have just spoken. For the
last time, Captain Granet, I must ask you whether you wish to amend your
explanation?”
There was a little movement at the further end of the room. A curtain
was drawn back and Isabel Worth came slowly towards them. She stood
there, the curtains on either side of her, ghastly pale, her hands
clasped in front of her, twitching nervously.
“I am very sorry,” she said. “This is all my fault.”
They stared at her in amazement. Only Granet, with an effort, kept his
face expressionless. Sir Meyville began to mutter to himself.
“God bless my soul!” he mumbled. “Isabel, what do you want, girl? Can’t
you see that we are engaged?”
She took no notice of him. She turned appealingly towards Major Thomson.
“Can you send the soldiers away for a moment?” she begged. “I don’t
think that they will be needed.”
Major Thomson gave a brief order and the men left the room. Isabel came
a little nearer to the table. She avoided looking at Granet.
“I am very sorry indeed,” she went on, “if anything I have done has
caused all this trouble. Captain Granet came down here partly to play
golf, partly at my invitation. He was here yesterday afternoon, as my
father knows. Before he left--I asked him to come over last night.”
There was a breathless silence. Isabel was standing at the end of the
table, her fingers still clasped nervously together, a spot of intense
colour in her cheeks. She kept her eyes turned sedulously away from
Granet. Sir Meyville gripped her by the shoulder.
“What do you mean, girl?” he demanded harshly. “What do you mean by all
this rubbish? Speak out.”
Granet looked up for a moment.
“Don’t,” he begged. “I can clear myself, Miss Worth, if any one is mad
enough to have suspicions about me. I should never--”
“The truth may just as well be told,” she interrupted. “There is nothing
to be ashamed of. It is hideously dull down here, and the life my father
has asked me to lead for the last few months has been intolerable. I
never sleep, and I invited Captain Granet to come over here at twelve
o’clock last night and take me for a motor ride. I was dressed,
meaning to go, and Captain Granet came to fetch me. It turned out to be
impossible because of all the new sentries about the place, but that is
why Captain Granet was here, and that,” she concluded, turning to Major
Thomson, “is why, I suppose, he felt obliged to tell you what was not
the truth. It has been done before.”
There was a silence which seemed composed of many elements. Sir Meyville
Worth stood with his eyes fixed upon his daughter and an expression of
blank, uncomprehending dismay in his features. Granet, a frown upon his
forehead, was looking towards the floor. Thomson, with the air of seeing
nobody, was studying them all in turn. It was he who spoke first.
“As you justly remark, Miss Worth,” he observed, “this sort of thing has
been done before. We will leave it there for the present. Will you come
this way with me, if you please, Captain Granet? I won’t trouble you,
Miss Worth, or you, Sir Meyville. You might not like what we are going
to see.”
Granet rose at once to his feet.
“Of course, I will come wherever you like,” he assented.
The two men passed together side by side, in momentous silence, across
the stone hall, out of the house, and round the back of the garden to a
wooden shed, before which was posted a sentry. The man stood on one side
to let them pass. On the bare stone floor inside was stretched the dead
body of Collins. The salt water was still oozing from his clothes and
limbs, running away in little streams. There was a small blue hole in
the middle of his forehead.
“This, apparently,” Thomson said, “is the man who lit the magnesium
light which showed the Zeppelin where to throw her bombs. The thing was
obviously prearranged. Can you identify him?”
“Identify him?” Granet exclaimed. “Why, I was playing bowls with him
yesterday afternoon. He is a Glasgow merchant named Collins, and a very
fine golf player. He is staying at the Dormy House Club.”
“He has also another claim to distinction,” Major Thomson remarked
drily, “for he is the man who fired those lights. The sergeant who shot
him fancied that he heard voices on the creek, and crept up to the
wall just before the flare came. The sergeant, I may add, is under the
impression that there were two men in the boat.”
Granet shook his head dubiously.
“I know nothing whatever of the man or his movements,” he declared,
“beyond what I have told you. I have scarcely spoken a dozen words to
him in my life, and never before our chance meeting at the Dormy House.”
“You do not, for instance, happen to know how he came here from the
Dormy House?”
“If you mean did he come in my car,” Granet answered easily, “please let
me assure you that he did not. My errand here last night was indiscreet
enough, but I certainly shouldn’t have brought another man, especially a
stranger, with me.”
“Thank you,” Major Thomson concluded, “that is all I have to say to you
for the present.”
“Has there been much damage done?” Granet inquired.
“Very little.”
They had reached the corner of the avenue. Granet glanced down towards
the road.
“I presume,” he remarked, “that I am at liberty to depart?”
Thomson gave a brief order to the soldier who had been attending them.
“You will find the car in which you came waiting to take you back,
Captain Granet,” he announced.
The two men had paused. Granet was on the point of departure. With
the passing of his sudden apprehension of danger, his curiosity was
awakened.
“Do you mind telling me, Major Thomson,” he asked, “how it is that you,
holding, I presume, a medical appointment, were selected to conduct
an inquiry like this? I have voluntarily submitted myself to your
questioning, but if I had had anything to conceal I might have been
inclined to dispute your authority.”
Thomson’s face was immovable. He simply pointed to the gate at the end
of the avenue.
“If it had been necessary, Captain Granet,” he said coldly, “I should
have been able to convince you that I was acting under authority. As it
is, I wish you good-morning.”
Granet hesitated, but only for a moment. Then he shrugged his shoulders
and turned away.
“Good-morning, Major!”
He made his way down to the lane, which was still crowded with villagers
and loungers. He was received with a shower of questions as he climbed
into the car.
“Not much damage done that I can hear,” he told them all. “The corner of
the house caught fire and the lawn looks like a sand-pit.”
He was driven in silence back to the Dormy House. When he arrived there
the place was deserted. The other men were lunching at the golf club. He
made his way slowly to the impromptu shed which served for a garage. His
own car was standing there. He looked all around to make sure that he
was absolutely alone. Then he lifted up the cushion by the driving-seat.
Carefully folded and arranged in the corner were the horn-rimmed
spectacles and the silk handkerchief of the man who was lying at Market
Burnham with a bullet through his forehead.