slowed to a walk and reached the elms and the drive with heartfelt
thankfulness. Exactly how she should break in upon Dick she did not
know. She hoped he would be in his study, and that she could call him
out from the lawn.
Nearer and nearer she came to the house, and then, of a sudden, she
whipped round. Somebody was behind her: she was sure of it now. She
heard the sound of feet upon the gravelled road.
“Who is there?” she called.
There was no answer, but the footsteps stopped. They might be walking
on the grassy verge, she thought, and, turning, ran up the drive.
Whoever followed was running, too. She heard a sibilant whisper and
her blood turned cold. Then, as she emerged from the trees, she saw a
figure against the gray sheen of the round pound, saw the shape of
it--the long habit and the heavy cowl. With a scream she flew.
The drive continuing past the window would bring her to Dick’s study.
She saw with a gasp of relief that the door was open and a light
shining inside. Over her shoulder she saw the queer shape again, and
screamed. In an instant Dick was out of the study and had caught her
in his arms.
He listened to her breathless story, then, almost carrying her to his
room, he put her in a chair and ran out into the night. In a few
minutes he came back.
“I saw nothing,” he said. “It was the Black Abbot, you say?”
“I don’t know; something in a cowl and habit: I’m sure of that.”
It was a bad introduction to the story she had to tell; indeed, in her
terror, she almost forgot the object of her visit.
“Did Arthur come with you?”
She shook her head.
“Dick, I know,” were the first words she said when she had recovered
her breath.
“You know what?”
“About Lady Chelford’s money.”
She saw his face change.
“Did he tell you?” he asked, the red coming into his face.
“Not Arthur, no. It was Gilder.”
“Mr. Gilder told you? I knew he had been and I knew he had called. Was
that why he came?”
She nodded.
“For nothing else?”
“Yes; he came to offer me the money.”
She saw his eyes narrow.
“He did? At a price, of course?”
She nodded.
“And you--what did you say?”
She found a difficulty in breathing; speech for the moment was
impossible without making a fool of herself.
“You agreed?”
She nodded again.
“I have just posted the letter to him,” she said.
She saw him bite his lip and a red spot of blood showed. If he had
stormed at her, cursed her, she could have borne it; but he did no
more than look at her. There was nothing in his gaze that was
uncharitable.
“Oh, Dick, Dick!” She was sobbing on his breast and his arms were
about her, comforting her.
“You can’t do it, my dear. Anything is better than that.”
She shook her head, incapable of speech.
“I tell you anything is better than that.” His voice was hard,
uncompromising. “Better Arthur go down for five years than that you
should live in hell all your life! I know that man--I know his
kind--it isn’t his years, it’s his mind and his evil heart. If he were
twenty I would say, ‘No, you can’t do it, Leslie.’”
She pushed herself gently away from him and dried her eyes.
“I must, Dick; I have given my word. I cannot trick him. The last
thing I said to him was ‘If I tell you I will marry you, you can make
the arrangements about the money--I will not fail you.’ I cannot fail
him; I cannot fail myself.”
His face was drawn and haggard.
“This can’t be!” he said. “Something will happen. I don’t know
what----”
He stopped.
“What’s that?” she gasped, terrified.
From somewhere in the grounds came a shrill shriek that was hardly
human. Again it came: a sobbing, blubbering shriek that turned her
heart to ice.
“Stay here,” said Dick, as he made for the open window, but she flung
herself upon him.
“You sha’n’t go! You mustn’t go!” she cried wildly. “Dick, something
dreadful is happening. Oh, God! listen, Dick!”
This time the shriek was shriller, and died away into a thin wail of
sound.
He pushed her aside and ran out on to the lawn.
“From which way did it come, do you think?”
“Over there.” She pointed ahead to the drive.
“Let me come with you--do, please do!” she begged. “I dare not be left
alone.”
He hesitated.
“Come,” he said roughly, and took her arm with a grip that made her
wince.
Together they ran toward Elm Drive, and then he stopped.
“Go back and get my hand lamp. It’s on my writing table,” he said. “I
will wait here for you.”
She fled back to the room, took up the lamp with fingers that trembled
so violently that she could scarcely hold it, and rejoined him.
“It was over there. I heard something a second ago. If I hadn’t
promised to wait…”
He turned on the light, swinging its rays over the ground before him,
and going ahead of her. Presently she saw him stop and a circle of
light focus on something black that lay huddled on the grass.
“Stay where you are,” he commanded, “and turn your back.”
A voice hailed him in the distance: it was Puttler, and, guided by the
lamp, he came on the scene.
“Who is it?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” said Dick in a low voice.
At his feet was the huddled figure of a man. He was lying on his face,
and was attired from head to foot in a long black habit around which a
rope was girdled.
“The Black Abbot?” said Puttler incredulously. “Is he dead?”
“Look,” said Dick, and pointed to the wet shoulder and the horror of
the throat.
Puttler knelt down, and, putting his arms under the figure, turned it
on its back.
The face was covered by a black cowl, and this he gently raised.
“Merciful God!” said Dick, in a hushed voice.
He was looking into the gray face of Thomas, the footman.
XL
“Thomas--the Black Abbot!”
Dick looked at the pitiable thing, bewildered; and then he remembered
the girl and, with a low word of instruction to Puttler, went back to
her.
“Is he--dead?” she asked fearfully.
“Yes, I’m afraid he is.”
“Who--who is it?”
“One of the servants,” he said evasively.
“Not Thomas?”
Why she should think it was Thomas she could not for the life of her
tell.
“Yes--Thomas.”
She made no inquiries, and they walked back without a word to his
room. He rang the bell, and, to the footman who answered:
“Ask Mr. Glover to come to me,” he said.
The old butler came apprehensively. All the servants had heard the
scream in the park.
“Where is his lordship?”
“He went up to bed about five minutes ago, Mr. Alford.”
“Had he heard--anything?”
“No, sir. He’s so particular about our talking of the Black Abbot----”
“How do you know it was the Black Abbot?” asked Dick sharply, and the
butler explained that somebody had seen the figure in the grounds.
“He was trying to open a window. One of the maids looking out of her
window saw him walking on the paved path below, and raised an alarm.
Has he hurt anybody, Mr. Richard?”
“No, he has hurt nobody,” said Dick.
He drew the butler out into the hall and closed the door behind him.
“A man has been found in the grounds in the dress of a black
abbot--and he is dead--murdered!”
“Good Lord, sir!” said the startled servant. “Is it anybody we know?”
“Thomas,” said Dick laconically, and the old man staggered back
against the panelled wall.
“Not our Thomas? Thomas Luck, the man who was dismissed?”
Dick nodded.
“Get the servants to bed. Tell them that the scream came from somebody
who was skylarking and that we caught him--anything you like.” Then,
catching a glimpse of the man’s ashen face: “First of all you’d better
go down into the dining-room and help yourself to a good stiff glass
of brandy and water; you look a corpse, man!”
“Thomas!” muttered the old man. “It’s terrible! Do you think----”
Dick cut short his question.
“Do as I tell you; get the servants to bed. The police will be up here
soon enough, but I’ll arrange that your staff are not questioned till
the morning.”
He went back to the girl.
“As for you, young lady,” he said, with a grim smile, “I seem to spend
my life taking you back to your home.”
“Couldn’t I stay?” she asked timidly.
Dick shook his head.
“We shall have to call in the police, and I want to keep your name out
of the business. Arthur is at home?”
“Yes, Arthur is at home,” she said listlessly.
At that moment the telephone bell rang and he took up the instrument.
“Is that Lord Chelford’s house?” said an unfamiliar voice.
“Yes,” said Dick shortly.
“I’m speaking from the sub post office. That isn’t Lord Chelford
speaking?”
“No, it’s Mr. Alford,” said Dick.
“Well, listen, Mr. Alford. Have you sent anything very important from
the local post-box?”
“Why?” asked Dick quickly.
“Because our roundsman reported that the box had been tampered with.
He couldn’t get in his key, so the letters that had been posted
between six and ten have not yet been collected.”
Dick uttered an exclamation.
“Right! When it’s cleared, will you ask the postman to bring the
letters up to the hall? There are one or two that I want to withdraw.”
The man at the other end of the wire hesitated.
“Why, in the special circumstances, yes,” he said, and Dick hung up
the receiver and turned slowly to the girl.
“The letter box hasn’t been cleared.”
Slowly the significance of the words dawned upon her.
“What shall I do?” she whispered.
“Give me authority to withdraw your letter to Gilder. There are six
more days.”
She held her breath. For a second a vision of her brother in convict’s
garb came to her eyes, and then she looked at the man before her.
Something of his vitality, his confidence, passed to her soul.
“I will do as you tell me,” she said, in a voice little above a
whisper. “But, Dick, what will happen?”
“I am going to do my duty,” said Dick.
And all that sleepless night, as she tossed from side to side in her
bed, she pondered those words but could find no solution to their
mystery.
XLI
Puttler, unshaven and weary-eyed, dragged himself to the study and
poured out a large cup of tea that the butler had brought in, and
drank it at a gulp.
“Scotland Yard has given me charge of this case, for which you may
thank your stars!” he said. “Considering we’ve had to do all our work
between eleven and four, I think I’ve set up a record in
investigation. Thomas’s monkish attire was hired, as you thought, from
a theatrical costumier’s in Wardour Street----”
“I saw him coming out with a bundle under his arm and wondered what
use he could find for fancy dress,” interrupted Dick.
“That is fact No. 1,” counted Puttler. “Fact No. 2 is that he was
making ready for a getaway. He even tried to open your local letter
box, probably earlier in the evening. Do you send money by post?”
“My brother does, frequently. It’s a habit I’ve tried to cure, without
success.”
“That is fact No. 2,” said Puttler. “He couldn’t open the box, but we
found the key on him. He had moved everything of value from Gilder’s
house. I found his portmanteau packed and cached in the field where
you say Gilder parks his car. And obviously he was coming to relieve
your brother of any loose cash he might find in the library. I found
his tools scattered on the flower bed under one of the library
windows.”
“How was he killed?” asked Dick.
Puttler scratched his head.
“By a regiment of soldiers, to judge from the appearance of him!”
They talked till the sleepy-eyed Mr. Glover staggered in and asked
permission to go to bed, and then they walked out into the cold
morning and joined the party of police that were searching the
grounds.
“I suppose the best thing we can do is to go to bed also,” said Dick,
and at that instant Puttler stooped and picked something from the long
grass.
It was a long dagger, its steel hilt black with age, the blade coated
with something that was still wet. They looked at one another.
“Do you know this?”
Dick nodded mutely.
“What is it?” asked Puttler.
“It is the dagger that once belonged to the Black Abbot’s slayer,”
said Dick.
The man’s jaw dropped.
“Where does it come from?”
Dick shook his head.
“The last time I saw it,” he said slowly, “it was hanging in the hall
of Arthur Gwyn’s house.”
XLII
“Curiouser and curiouser,” said Puttler, who had literary leanings.
Dick heard his name shouted in an agitated voice, and, looking round,
saw the butler running toward him, no longer sleepy-eyed, but very
alert and white.
“What is the matter, Clover?”
“The maid… foolish girl only just told me… frightened!” gasped the old
man, and pointed to the open study windows.
Dick walked quickly back, followed by Puttler. Drooping in his study
chair was a plain-looking girl, wearing over her coarse nightdress a
man’s overcoat; her lank hair falling over her shoulders, she
presented a sight which at any other time would have moved Dick Alford
to laughter.
“Now, Alice, tell Mr. Alford what you told me,” said the old butler,
beside himself with anxiety.
It was some time before she could speak coherently, and then she told
her amazing story. She had gone to bed in the servants’ quarters soon
after eleven, with a sick headache. She had heard nothing of the
scream, but at some time--which she placed with accuracy, having an
alarm clock with a phosphorescent dial by her bedside, at 1.45--she
heard “a terrible commotion” downstairs. Her room was immediately
above Lord Chelford’s. She heard shouts and screams, the smashing of
glass and the sounds of a struggle.…
“Hurry, hurry, woman!” said Dick, frantic with anxiety. “Downstairs,
in his lordship’s room--are you sure?”
“Yes, sir,” whimpered the girl. “I simply dared not get up for fear I
was murdered. I simply laid there and fainted and come to again.…”
Before she had finished, Dick was across the hall and running up the
stairs two at a time. He tried the door of Harry’s room but it was
bolted. He called him by name, and hammered on the panels, but there
was no answer.
“We’d better break in the door,” said Puttler. “Have you got an axe?”
Mr. Glover went downstairs in search of the tool and returned with an
axe and a case-opener. In a second the panel of the door was smashed
and Dick peered in.
All the blinds save one were drawn, and the exception afforded
sufficient light to enable him to examine the room. He gave one glance
and his heart sank. The room was in hopeless confusion; the bedclothes
were thrown on the floor, two mirrors, one a cheval glass, had been
smashed; the uncurtained window was open. Dick put his hand through
the hole in the panel and unbolted the door, and the two men ran in.
There were signs as of a terrible struggle. The wreckage of two chairs
lay scattered about the floor. The table which had held the medicines
was overturned and the floor was littered with broken glass and wet
with the spilt medicines.
Puttler walked over to the bed. The mattress had been half dragged to
the floor but the pillows were still in their place, and one of these
and a part of the under sheet were smothered with blood.
Dick examined the open window. Three or four of the leaded panes were
broken, and the steel rod that kept the windows open was bent as
though a heavy weight had rested upon it. The ground was about fifteen
feet below, and immediately under the window a large rhododendron bush
had been broken as though by some heavy weight thrown upon it. Without
hesitation, Dick threw his legs across the window sill, poised himself
a moment, and dropped to the ground. There was blood on the leaves of
the bush; he could find no footprints. Searching the ground, he came
upon a smudge of blood against one of the buttresses of the wall.
By this time Puttler, who had chosen a more sedate method of descent,
had joined him, and the two men went on, keeping to the paved path,
and searched the ground for a further trail.
“This happened when we were in the grounds with the local police,”
said Puttler.
He had been full of self-reproaches all night, and now Dick silenced
him.
“It can’t be helped,” he said. “The fault is as much mine as yours. I
ought to have expected this, after the killing of Thomas. Knowing what
I know, I should have gone up to his room and stayed there with him,
or at least outside. Poor old Harry! Poor old boy!”
His voice broke, and for a second there were tears in his eyes.
“What is this?”
The paving ended abruptly and was continued with a rolled gravel path,
and there were marks here of something heavy being dragged along.
These ceased as suddenly as the paving.
“Wait,” said Dick, as the solution dawned upon him.
He ran back along the wall of the wing, turned the corner, and stopped
before the first of the library windows. It was open, and, drawing
himself up, he dropped into the darkened room and pulled back the
curtains. So far he had not examined the library; his practised eye,
familiar with almost every book on the shelves, told him that somebody
had been here. One section of the shelves had been almost cleared. A
drawer in Harry’s desk had been broken open, and on the floor he found
an empty cash box.
He made a brief and hurried survey, and, returning to the open by the
window, he rejoined the detective and told him of his discovery.
Beyond the gravelled path and the dragging marks, all trace of Harry
was lost. Ahead of them, at a distance of four or five hundred yards,
was the river. To the left, and at this point out of sight, the Abbey
ruins.
An hour’s search brought them no nearer to discovery, and Dick went
back to his room to find the first of the dishevelled reporters
stepping from his hired car.
XLIII
Mr. Gilder rose at six o’clock that morning. He had spent a restless
night and welcomed the dawn. The first post did not arrive until eight
o’clock, and he met the postman at the door. There were half a dozen
letters for him, and he carried them into his room and examined them
eagerly. Only one bore a familiar postmark and that was in a hand
which he recognized. He tore it open and found a few scrawled lines.
If I don’t see you again, thank you for your kindness, and don’t think
too badly of your old friend.
So Thomas had gone! With a curse he threw the letter into the
fireplace and went back, accosting the postman as he descended from
the upper floors of the apartments.
“No, sir, there’s no other letter.” The man went through his bundle
carefully. “There is another post at half-past nine. The country post
doesn’t usually get into town in time for the first delivery.”
Gilder slammed the door and went back to sulk in his room. By this
time his servants were about. At nine o’clock they called him to
breakfast, but a glance at the contents of the dishes did not tempt
him.
His newspapers were placed folded at his hand. He opened the first,
and on the centre page a paragraph arrested his eye.
STRANGE HAPPENING AT HAUNTED MANOR HOUSE
By telephone, Chelfordbury, 2 A. M.
There has been a tragic sequel to the appearance of the Black Abbot in
the grounds of Fossaway Manor. At eleven o’clock last night, Mr.
Richard Alford, hearing screams, ran out from the house and discovered
the dead body of a man in the habit of a monk. He had been terribly
injured, there being no less than nine wounds. The man has been
identified as Thomas Luck, a former footman in the employ of the Earl
of Chelford.
Gilder uttered an exclamation and put down the paper. Thomas! His
first thought was for himself. Suppose it were known that this man had
been staying at his cottage, he would be dragged into the affair;
inquiries would be made, and he would figure at a coroner’s inquest,
if not in a murder trial. Cold-bloodedly he cursed the dead man for
his folly.
Gilder had no doubt in his mind what had occurred. Thomas had gone
back to Fossaway Manor to get the remainder of the cash out of the box
in Chelford’s room. And then--was Thomas the Black Abbot, after all?
It was quite possible that he had used this disguise on other
occasions, and he was in a position very favourable to such a
masquerade.
It was nine o’clock; the next editions would be out in an hour. He
could, if he wished, have called up a tradesman he knew in
Chelfordbury, but that would associate his name with the crime, and
these villagers gossiped.
For the time being, all thought of the expected letter went out of his
mind. But as the tragedy became familiar to him, his thoughts came
back to Leslie Gwyn. The country post would bring the letter, and he
would act generously, munificently. There should be no higgling, no
bargaining, no balancing of accounts to the last penny. Her word would
be sufficient. Overnight he had written his letter, prepared the grand
gesture which should break down the last barrier of mental resistance;
and, with his knowledge of women, he did not doubt what form the
reaction would take.
He went into the little library where he did his work, opened a
combination wall safe and took out the letter. He had read it again
and again after it had been written, and with every reading he had the
warm glow of complacency which men derive from the contemplation of
their own generosity.
My dear Leslie:
Thank you for your letter. I did not doubt that you would keep your
word. My answer you will find enclosed herewith--a blank check. I make
no stipulations, I extract no conditions. Draw the check for as much
money as your brother requires to clear himself from his dreadful
situation. I have given instructions to the bank that the check is to
be honoured without question.
Fabrian.
It was characteristic of the man, who kept three banking accounts,
that the check was drawn on a branch where his balance was exactly the
amount required to liquidate Arthur Gwyn’s liability. It would have
been a simple matter to fill in the form for the amount required, but
there was a certain nobility, a magnificence, in the blank check. It
was a carte-blanche upon his fortune. He replaced the letter in the
envelope, put it back in the safe and pushed the door close, as the
telephone bell rang.
The caller was the man who had taken his place at the office. Had he
heard anything about Gwyn?
“We haven’t seen anything of him since you left, and the letters we
have sent down for him to sign haven’t been returned.”
Gilder comforted the anxious man with the assurance that Arthur would
put in an appearance some day that week. At the back of his mind there
was still a great uneasiness about the tragedy at Chelfordbury. He
sent his maid out to get a copy of the sporting editions, but they had
not arrived at Regent’s Park, and he decided to take a taxi to
Piccadilly Circus, and, if necessary, to Fleet Street, to get an early
copy. Such a journey would serve the purpose of filling in the time
until the country post arrived.
It was at Oxford Circus that he saw the first newspaper contents bill.
The first said “Terrible Tragedy in Sussex Village”; the second made
him sit bolt upright in the car: “Well-known Earl Kidnapped and
Murdered.”
XLIV
Gilder stopped the taxi and, springing out, grabbed at a paper. A
flaring headline met his eye.
LORD CHELFORD CARRIED OFF BY UNKNOWN MURDERER.
FEARED DOUBLE TRAGEDY IN A
SUSSEX VILLAGE
There were other sub-headings, but his eye ran down to the story.
At 11 o’clock last night screams were heard in the grounds of Fossaway
Manor, the fine old Tudor mansion which has been the country seat of
the Earls of Chelford for hundreds of years. The Hon. Richard Alford,
the only brother of Lord Chelford, ran out, accompanied by
Detective-Sergeant Puttler, who was staying at the Manor as Mr.
Alford’s guest. They were horrified to discover, lying on the grass,
the dead body of a man dressed in the habit of the famous Black Abbot.
The local police were immediately called in, and hardly had their
investigations begun when, unknown to them, a second tragedy occurred.
A maid in the employ of the Earl of Chelford, Alice Barter, who sleeps
in a room over that occupied by Lord Chelford, states that at
one-forty-five o’clock in the morning she heard sounds of a terrific
struggle in his lordship’s room. In terror, she did not report the
occurrence till four o’clock in the morning. Lord Chelford’s door was
broken open and a terrible scene met the eyes of the police officers.
The room was in confusion: mirrors and furniture were smashed; and it
was evident from the indications that a terrible struggle had taken
place, and, either stunned or killed, Lord Chelford was pulled to the
window and thrown out. A search of the grounds left no doubt that his
body was dragged for some distance along the ground. At the moment of
telephoning, says our correspondent, no trace of the body has been
found, but from certain indications there can be little doubt that the
unfortunate peer has been a victim of foul play. Certain of his
property is missing, whilst a cash box which he kept in the drawer of
a desk in his library has been found empty. Detective-Sergeant Puttler
of Scotland Yard is in charge of the case.
The newsboy was still waiting for payment. Mr. Gilder put his hand in
his pocket mechanically and, giving him a shilling, reëntered the
cab.
“Drive me round the Outer Circle,” he said. He wanted time to think.
In a dim, uneasy way he realized how deeply he was involved in this
tragedy. Fabrian Gilder had a lawyer’s mind. He saw the connection
between Thomas, himself, and Chelford. Thomas, a known thief,
harboured in his cottage, goes out, with or without associates, and is
killed. Chelford, lately engaged to the girl whom Gilder himself was
pursuing, disappears in circumstances which leave no doubt as to his
death.
Round and round the Regent’s Park Circle the cab moved slowly, and all
the time he was piecing together a version which would sound
plausible. He had known Thomas; was aware that the man was dismissed,
but did not know his criminal connections. The man had asked for
shelter for a few days, and in charity Gilder had given it to him. He
himself was in London when the crime was committed; had
unchallengeable alibis if necessary.
Perhaps he was exaggerating the seriousness of the situation, he
thought. Putting his head out of the window, he directed the driver to
take him to Regency Mansions. He had forgotten his key; had to ring
the bell, and the maid who opened the door handed him the post, which
had arrived a few minutes before. He examined the three letters
carefully: none was from Leslie. But at the moment he was too occupied
with the happenings at Chelfordbury to be disappointed.
And then came a thunderbolt.
“Mr. Arthur Gwyn is waiting for you in the library,” said the girl.
“Mr. Gwyn!” he said in astonishment. “When did he come?”
“Ten minutes ago, sir.”
“Oh!” said Gilder blankly.
Had she sent her brother instead of a letter? Had she told him… well,
it was a situation that had to be faced.
He walked carelessly into the little library and found Arthur Gwyn
sitting in one of the easiest chairs, a book in his hand, a
half-smoked cigar between his teeth.
“Good-morning, Gilder.”
His voice was cheerful and almost amiable, and for a moment Mr.
Gilder’s heart leapt. This was a friendly ambassador sent by the girl
to make the necessary arrangements.
“I think we’d better forget all that’s passed,” said Arthur. “We both
lost our temper, and there’s no sense in keeping the old trouble
alive. You don’t mind my smoking?”
He replaced the book he had taken from one of the shelves, dusted his
knees carefully, and then laughed.
“You’re thinking of marrying Leslie, I understand?”
Gilder nodded, watching his visitor closely.
“Expecting a letter from her? Well, I’m afraid you won’t get it.”
“Why not?” asked the other, with a sudden tightening at his heart.
“Because friend Thomas, who spent the evening in wholesale
robbery--incidentally, he stole a very ancient dagger from my hall, a
silver teapot, and a few other etceteras--added to his infamy by
attempting to rob a letter box. He didn’t succeed in opening the box,
but he put the lock out of order.”
Gilder breathed again.
“So there was no collection, eh?” he said huskily. “Well, that is
rather a relief.”
There was a quizzical smile in Arthur Gwyn’s eyes; the discolouration
on the left cheek had faded to a pale green.
“I understand you’re going to help me?”
“I am going to get you out of your trouble, yes.”
“It occurred to me”--Arthur leaned sideways and very carefully dusted
the ash of his cigar into a silver tray on the library table--“it
occurred to me that you might care to give me proof and evidence of
your good feeling.”
“I don’t understand you,” said Gilder.
Arthur hesitated.
“I wondered whether you would write me a letter, to the effect that
you are lending me this very large sum. You see, Gilder, although you
plan to marry my sister, I am vain enough to wish that it should not
be regarded as a gift or the price--the price of her marriage--but as
a loan to me.” He laughed. “Don’t look at me like that, my dear
fellow. I am not asking you for money, I am seeking a salve to my
conscience. I don’t want people to say ‘Leslie Gwyn was sold for fifty
thousand pounds.’ I want to produce evidence that you did no more than
lend me the money.”
A slow smile dawned on Gilder’s face.
“There’s no objection to that,” he said. “I’ll give it to you now, if
you like. Do you mind if I address you as ‘Dear--Arthur’?”
“Charmed,” murmured Arthur.
“One has to keep up the pretence of friendliness,” said Gilder as he
wrote rapidly; “and really, I’ve no strong feeling against you, Gwyn.
You’ve been a useful man to me.”
“Damned useful,” said Arthur, without heat.
The man blotted the letter, brought it across, and Arthur Gwyn read it
carefully.
“Thank you,” he said, folded and put it into his pocket. “You may
think I’m rather weak--which of course I am--and vain. I’m afraid
there’s no doubt about that! You will hear from Leslie when the mail
box is cleared--that is, if the letters are intact. There is some
suspicion that our friend Thomas, baffled in his attempt to open the
box, and inspired with that instinct for destruction which is one of
the characteristics of the unbalanced criminal, threw in a couple of
lighted matches. I had the curiosity to smell at the letter slot, and
I think it is very likely that the police theory is correct.”
He rose, took up his silk hat, and stifled a yawn.
“We’ve had rather an exciting night in my part of the world. You’ve
probably read all about it in the newspapers?”
“Has Chelford been found?”
Arthur shook his head.
“Not at the time I left,” he said. “Unfortunately Leslie was a
witness, if not to the murder, to the finding of the first body. The
poor little girl was knocked all to pieces. Don’t bother her for a day
or two--do you mind?”
He held out his hand and Gilder took the soft, cool palm in his.
“I think we shall get on together, Gwyn.”
“I’m sure we shall,” said Arthur. “Do you mind showing me the way out?
Your flat is rather like a box of tricks, and I’m never sure which is
a door and which is a cupboard.”
Arthur dispensed with his car. A taxicab took him into the City, and
another cab to a small flat in Gray’s Inn where he slept when he was
in town. He changed into a plain blue suit, carefully and reluctantly
shaved off his moustache, and took from his pocket a pair of newly
purchased horn-rimmed pince-nez. Surveying himself in the glass with a
certain amount of satisfaction, he sat down and wrote a letter to his
sister, then, taking a final survey of the little flat where he had
spent many a happy bachelor evening, he locked the door, went out and
posted the letter in the Holborn post office.
Another taxicab took him to Croyden aërodrome, where he arrived in
the early afternoon. He showed the officer his brand-new passport.
“That’s in order, Mr. Steele,” said the official. “Your taxi is
waiting.”
His “taxi” was a sturdy two-seater aëroplane. Five minutes after his
arrival he was zooming up to the blue, and was soon a speck in the
hazy sky, heading for France, possibly for Genoa, as likely as not, by
an Italian liner, for Rio de Janeiro. Everything depended on how Mr.
Fabrian Gilder swallowed the pill which Arthur had administered.
XLV
“Burnt,” said Dick, with considerable satisfaction. “The poor brute
did some good in his life--Heaven forgive me for speaking ill of him.
Where is your Arthur?”
“My Arthur went to town very early,” said Leslie. “There is no news of
Harry?”
He shook his head.
“None,” he said.
He looked dreadfully tired and broken, she thought.
“I’m so sorry!”
He took her hand and patted it.
“I wish you would go away somewhere, Leslie,” he said. “Couldn’t you
take a long voyage?”
“Why?” she asked.
“I want you out of the way. I don’t exactly know why, but I’m rather
worried about you. Get Arthur----”
He stopped. It was quite possible that Arthur would not be a free
agent at the end of the week; and, reading his thoughts, she smiled
sadly.
“What am I to do about Mr. Gilder?”
“Let him write. He is hardly likely to leave you in peace. But you
understand, of course, that until Harry is found there is no danger to
your brother. Until he appears, no action can be taken.”
She looked at him pityingly.
“Do you think he is alive?” she asked.
“Yes,” he replied shortly. “Puttler doesn’t think so, but I do. We are
dragging the Ravensrill to-day, but it is not deep enough to hide--a
body.”
He covered his face with his hands.
“I wish I were a million miles away, perched on some solitary star,”
he said wearily.
She slipped her hand through the crook of his arm.
“You’d be very hot,” she said, with a pathetic attempt at gaiety,
“unless I have forgotten all my astronomy.”
He put his arm about her shoulder and hugged her. It was an
affectionate brotherly hug, and no more.
“You’ve got to go away, my dear. What about the prosaic Bournemouth?
Or the vulgar but wholesome Margate?”
Again she shook her head.
“Or London, which I am told is a health resort?”
“You’re very anxious for me to go really?”
“Very,” he said, with an emphasis that betrayed his concern.
She drew back from him and faced him.
“Dick, will you tell me something without any evasion?”
He nodded.
“Do you think that I am in any personal danger?”
“I am sure of it,” he said. “It would be cruel not to tell you the
truth. The shot that was fired the other day was intended for you. It
was fired by a man who is as brilliant a shot as any in England, and
the height of the bullet mark told us that it was aimed directly at
your heart.”
She listened, stupefied, unbelieving.
“But why?” she asked, bewildered. “I have no enemies, Dick; I have
wronged nobody. Who could do such a wicked thing?”
“If I told you, you would perhaps be no wiser,” he said. “There is a
man in this world who hates you and hates me, and has good reason from
his point of view. Now that I’ve told you the truth, will you go?”
She thought awhile.
“I’ll wait until Arthur comes back,” she said, “and ask him to take me
to London.”
And with that he was satisfied.
He was leaving the house when Puttler’s cycle swung into the drive.
“Anything wrong?” asked Dick quickly.
“I don’t know. Look at this.”
He took from his pocket a large sheet of foolscap paper; roughly
printed in pencil were the words:
Lord Chelford is safe. Don’t search for him, or he will be killed.
The Black Abot.
The word “Abbot” was printed with one “b.” The placard had been found
hanging to the twig of a tree, the jagged hole at the top showing
where the mystery man had threaded the paper.
“We found it halfway between the ruins and the house,” said Puttler.
“Curiously enough, we had only been searching that part of the grounds
a quarter of an hour before.”
Dick handed the warning back to him.
“Is that a bad joke or do you believe this paper?” asked Leslie
anxiously. “And, Dick, couldn’t I be some help? I know Fossaway Manor
so well, and I am sure there must be places where the police haven’t
looked. Do you know there are tiny caves in the banks of the
Ravensrill?”
“They’ve all been searched, and they’re not big enough to hold a
large-sized dog,” said Dick. “If you want to be helpful you can come
up to the Manor and put my correspondence in order. I am afraid it has
been neglected in these days, and there are a whole lot of bills and
things to be entered up.”
He had no real need for her, he thought, but whilst she was in the
neighbourhood he was anxious that she should be under his eyes. She
may have suspected something of this, but she gratefully accepted the
offer.
“Drive up,” he warned her; “keep to the main road and the main drive.
Don’t stop for anybody, however well you know them, and take no notice
if you hear somebody shout at you.”
In spite of her anxiety she laughed.
“How very alarming that sounds!”
After he had gone she busied herself with the affairs of the house,
arranged the dinner for that night, and was on the point of leaving,
when somebody rang the front-door bell. She was putting on her hat
before the mirror in her bedroom when the maid came up.
“Miss Wenner?” cried Leslie, aghast, and only then did she remember
that at Arthur’s request she had written inviting the girl to spend
the week-end with them.
Here was a complication she had not foreseen. And yet, in the space
between her room and the hall, she had made up her mind, that, if
there was one thing she welcomed at this moment, it was the society of
a woman.
Mary Wenner was in the hall and greeted her as effusively as if they
had been bosom friends, though in truth Leslie scarcely knew the girl.
“My dear, I’m so glad to be back in this lovely old country!” she
said. “I couldn’t help thinking, as I was driving past dear old
Fossaway Manor, how perfectly peaceful everything is!”
Leslie could have screamed! Peaceful!
“Perhaps it isn’t quite as peaceful as it looks, Miss Wenner,” she
said drily.
“Call me Mary,” begged the girl. “I do so dislike formalism and
standoffness! It will be so awkward if Arthur calls me by my name and
you call me Miss… I mean…?”
“Well, I’ll call you Mary with pleasure,” said Leslie. “I think you
know my name?”
“A beautiful name,” said the ecstatic Miss Wenner. “The only thing
against it is, you can’t tell whether it’s a boy’s or a girl’s, can
you? Don’t you sometimes find that very embarrassing?”
“I’ve never found it so yet,” said the girl, leading the way up to her
room.
She waited till Mary had taken off her hat before she gave her news.
“Arthur is in town, but he’ll be back to-night,” she said. “Have you
seen the newspapers?”
Miss Wenner shook her head vigorously.
“I never read the newspapers,” she said reprovingly. “They’re always
full of lies, and after the way they roasted me over my breach----”
She coughed.
For a moment Leslie had a wild idea that the reference was an
indelicate one, and then the truth came to her.
“Did you ever have a breach of promise action?” she asked, in
astonishment.
Mary was very red, and her embarrassment was painful to witness.
“I did have a little trouble with a young gentleman I went to business
with,” she admitted. “I was a mere girl at the time, young and silly
as it were, and I must say that I felt that I had to stand up for my
rights. A lot of people think it was unladylike, but I say that a girl
who is an orphan without parents must look after herself. I got fifty
pounds, and it wasn’t worth the trouble and the nuisance.”
There was something about the girl that Leslie liked. Unconsciously
she was amusing, but there was a sterling value in her, she thought,
and Leslie had an uncanny knowledge of women.
“No, I never read the papers, Miss Gwyn. After being told by the
_Daily Megaphone_ that I had a curious mentality--I shall never forget
those words--I’ve given up the papers.”
“Then you haven’t heard what has happened at Fossaway Manor?” asked
Leslie.
The startled girl listened, her mouth an O of amazement and horror.
“Thomas? Why, I was only talking with him the other day! You don’t
think Harry is killed?”
Leslie shook her head.
“I don’t know what to think. Mr. Alford is very confident that he is
still alive, and they have just received a strange message which seems
to bear that out.”
The girl was shocked, and Leslie could not help feeling that she was
hurt, too.
“Harry Chelford was the best fellow in the world,” said Mary quietly.
“He was a little irritable and difficult to get on with--you don’t
mind me talking about him?”
“No,” said Leslie. “You probably do not know that our engagement was
broken off?”
This seemed to be a greater shock still.
“Broken off? I’ll bet that was Dick Alford’s doing----”
“Mr. Alford had nothing to do with it,” said Leslie, and Mary made a
rapid reëstimation of Dick Alford’s character, and she was eminently
adjustable.
“Dick Alford is not a bad fellow really,” she said diplomatically.
“There is a great deal about him that I like. And he is _so_
good-looking!”
She was a shrewd, discerning gamin, who had won through by her ability
to adjust her views at a moment’s notice. And in a fraction of a
second she had realized that perfect harmony with Arthur Gwyn’s sister
could be ensured only if her views on Richard Alford underwent a very
thorough reorganization.
“I didn’t get on very well with him; I used to think he was a bit
overbearing. But it must have been rather a trial for him, poor
fellow!” A pause, and then: “I seem to have come at a pretty bad time,
Miss--Leslie. Would you like me to go back to London?”
“Wait,” said her hostess, and, running downstairs, called Dick on the
’phone. He had just returned to the house as she rang.
“Surely,” he said. “Bring her up. I think that would be rather a good
idea. And, Leslie, perhaps you would like to stay here the night.
Arthur can come along, too--you might leave him a note or wire him.”
The idea was so appealing that she put no obstacles in the way, and
returned to carry Dick’s invitation to her guest. Miss Wenner accepted
with an alacrity that was almost indelicate.
“I may be able to be of some help,” she said. “I know the ins and outs
of that place, and all the nooks and crannies. It is the treasure
that’s done it all, Leslie! He was always after that silly Life Water,
and I shouldn’t be surprised if he hasn’t got into bad company.”
“But Harry never went out.”
“Oh, yes, he did,” was the surprising reply. “He often slipped off to
London when Mr. Alford was away. And there was something queer about
it, because Harry made me promise I would never tell Mr. Richard, as
he called him.”
“How often did that happen?” asked Leslie.
“Sometimes once a month, sometimes twice or three times a month. He
never went to the front drive; he followed the field path through the
cutting, and I used to arrange for a Horsham motor cab to meet him. He
used to go from Horsham and come back the same way, and I’ve known him
to ring me up before he came back, to ask me if Mr. Richard had
returned.”
Leslie wondered if Dick knew this.
“I’ve known him to go as many as three times a week when Mr. Richard
was up in Yorkshire, looking after the Doncaster estate,” added Mary,
and, virtuously: “I hope I have not let any cats out of the bag: all
young men are a bit wild.”
XLVI
The adaptability of Miss Wenner was never more strikingly
illustrated than in her greeting of Dick Alford. There was a coyness,
a shy friendliness in her glance, which might have deceived an
uninitiated spectator into believing that they were old lovers, parted
by cruel circumstances and meeting after an absence of years. Dick,
weary and heartbroken as he was, found in her the first cause for
amusement he had had in twenty-four hours.
He had had rooms prepared for them in the east wing, which was
opposite to that in which his own room and Harry’s were situated.
There were two small apartments with a connecting door, which he had
assigned to Leslie and her guest. The next room had been prepared for
Arthur, and was adjoining.
“I’ve moved Puttler to this wing, too,” he explained, “though I don’t
suppose the poor fellow will get very much sleep for a night or two.”
After he had shown them the rooms he took his departure, and Leslie
followed him along the corridor and overtook him at the head of the
stairs.
“There is really nothing I can do, I suppose, Dick?” For she had
accepted the story of the disordered accounts as being a plausible
excuse on his part to get her to Fossaway Manor.
To her surprise he said, “Yes,” and took her below to the study.
“Here are the estate accounts. I haven’t touched them for three or
four days. Do you know anything about figures?”
She nodded wisely.
“Will you start in by checking these wages sheets? You’ll find the
books on the shelf, and you will be able to get the hang of my rather
simple system.”
He gave her instructions how to deal with the bills that had
accumulated, and left her very contented. It was half-an-hour before
she remembered that she had left Mary Wenner in her room, and hurried
upstairs to apologize. She was to find Mary a very capable assistant,
for not only was the girl efficient in her work, but she knew all the
domestic mysteries of Fossaway.
The two girls lunched alone, for Dick had sent a message to say that
he would not be back in time.
“The place gives me the creeps,” said Mary with a shudder, and her
nervousness was not affectation. “The whole thing is frightful! Poor
Thomas killed, and Harry taken away heaven knows where---- Oh!” She
sprang to her feet, and her face had gone pale. “I know where Harry
is,” she said, quivering with excitement. “I know, I know!”
“Where?” asked the wondering Leslie.
The girl ran out of the room into the hall.
“Where is Mr. Alford?” she asked quickly. “I must see him at once.”
“He telephoned from Red Farm,” said Leslie. “Perhaps we can get him.”
She turned the handle of the old-fashioned instrument and gave the Red
Farm number.
“Is that you, Dick? How lucky!”
“I expected it was you. Is anything wrong?” he asked anxiously.
“No; Mary Wenner has something she wants to tell you.” She lowered her
voice. “She thinks she knows where Harry is hidden.”
There was a silence at the other end.
“She’s not----”
“No, no, no.” With Mary within earshot, it was impossible to assure
Dick that the girl was not trying to make a sensation.
“I’ll come over right away,” he said.
They went out to the head of the drive to meet him, and Mary offered
her theory.
“I must have been mad not to have told you about this before. I don’t
know where my wits have gone,” she said. “After all my
treasure-hunting and the horrible experience I had that night with
Gilder, and not to think of it now, when I practically came down to
show Mr. Gwyn the place--well, I’m surprised at myself!”
Dick listened with growing impatience to this preliminary.
“Where do you think my brother is?”
“Where?” said Miss Wenner triumphantly. “Why, under the Abbey--that’s
where. I’ll show you.”
They walked side by side across the meadow, and as they went Miss
Wenner related the startling story of her adventures after treasure.
“Of course, I always knew that it didn’t belong to me, even if I found
it,” she said virtuously; “but Mr. Gilder was so very pressing that I
couldn’t very well refuse him, especially after what he’d written in
vanishing ink, though I’ve got the ink back again, as he’ll find out
one of these days.”
Leslie listened, scarcely crediting her ears. Yet, unless Mary Wenner
had an imagination of a particularly inventive nature, it was hardly
likely that she could have made the story up.
Dick examined the great corner-stone of the tower. He stood by,
watching curiously, whilst, with a pair of scissors which she took
from her bag, the girl pressed back the catch and sent the
corner-stone turning noisily on its invisible hinge.
The opening was between twelve and fifteen inches wide. A stout man
could never have entered by that way, as Dick pointed out.
“You had better stay here; I’ll go down,” he said.
“You’ll want a light,” warned Mary.
There was a lamp in his pocket. He had spent the morning peering into
impossible dark places. In a second he had disappeared down the
moss-grown stairs, and Leslie waited with palpitating heart for his
reappearance. Presently they heard his voice.
“Come down.”
“Not me,” said Mary hastily. “I’ve been there once, thank you!”
And Leslie went alone guided by the light he showed from step to step.
Now she was standing with him in the vaulted room. He tried first one
and then the other of the two doors leading from the antechamber, but
neither yielded to his touch. It was pitch dark save for the
fan-shaped ray of the lamp. He swept the light along wall and floor,
and presently she saw the focus halt upon a broken flagstone.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he said quickly. He had moved the light to the narrow
entrance of the room. “Up you go; there is nothing here but mice and
memories. I have always known there were underground vaults in the
Abbey. In fact, I think there was a report on them by one of my recent
forbears.”
Although he was immediately behind her, his voice seemed to come from
a distance. She was walking, and he gave her no help with his lamp, so
that she had to feel her way up. Turning her head, she saw that he was
ascending the stairs backward, keeping the light covering the stairs
below.
“Hurry,” he said tersely, and she stumbled up the remaining steps and
emerged into the blessed daylight.
It was some time before he joined them, and when he came out she saw
that he was white to the lips.
“What did you see, Dick?” she asked.
He shook his head.
“Nothing,” he said, and slammed the stone door tight.
Of the little party, only Miss Wenner was unaffected by the atmosphere
which Dick Alford brought from that vaulted room.
“… so far as Mr. Gilder said--and I don’t trust the man entirely, as
you can well understand, Leslie--there were only pieces of music in
lead cylinders--that was the word, ‘cylinders.’ To me they looked
rather more like rolls. And this Black Abbot must have cleared them
out whilst we had gone. Mr. Gilder _was_ disappointed. In fact, he was
quite rude to me over the telephone. I do think a gentleman should
keep his temper in all circumstances, don’t you, dear?”
Leslie agreed mechanically.
What had Dick seen? What object was it that showed for a second in the
light of his lamp?
Near to the house he made an excuse to them. He had to go back to Red
Farm to finish his interview with the obstinate Mr. Leonard; but he
did not take his car. He said he would take the short cut, and Leslie
thought it was not the moment to question him. She watched him until
he disappeared in the fold of the ground. He was heading for the
Abbey. The other girl had gone in to finish her lunch, and Leslie
hesitated. The thought of his going back to that dark room again
filled her with blind panic. She wanted to call out to him and bring
him back, but he was out of hearing now, and she obeyed an impulse and
went after him.
He was not in sight until she climbed the second of the gentle slopes.
Here she stopped; he might resent being overlooked, and she lay down
on the grass, watching him. She saw him come to the square tower,
pause at the corner, and disappear apparently into space. From such a
distance, the effect of his entry was eerie. The entrance was so small
that he seemed to melt into the solid stonework. Ten minutes passed, a
quarter of an hour, and then a long, interminable wait; she heard the
village clock strike two. A lark in the blue was singing his
passionate song; over by Red Farm a donkey was braying--a ludicrous
accompaniment to what might be stark tragedy.
She was on the point of rising and running across to the ruins, to
follow him into the depths, when he appeared again. He came slowly
forth, turned and closed the stone door and leaned against it, his
head on his arm, a picture of tragic despair.
She stopped and sank down on her knees, the better to escape
observation, and presently he walked slowly away, and it was the gait
of a broken man.
XLVII
Hurrying back the way she had come, she joined Mary in the study.
Puttler she had not seen since the early morning, when he cycled to
Willow House to bring the notice he had found.
“My dear,” said Mary, “I’m not so sure I shall stay here to-night.
This place is full of shocks! I’d like to see your brother very much
indeed, but you can tell him all about the room under the Abbey, can’t
you? That’s where the gold is--you mark my words!”
“The gold?” Leslie for a moment did not understand. “Oh, you mean the
Chelford treasure?”
The horrible thing! It was behind all this misery; behind the killing
of Thomas and the disappearance of Harry. She said as much, and Miss
Wenner, not pausing in her typewriting, calmly expressed the view that
it was very likely.
Shock followed shock indeed! At half-past four Leslie’s maid brought a
letter which had come by special delivery. It was in Arthur’s writing;
she tore it open and read:
Dear Leslie:
You are under no circumstances to marry Gilder. I refuse to allow you
to sacrifice yourself for me, now or at any time. I am going away to
France for a few months, and will return when things have blown over.
Ordinarily quick-witted, it was a long time before Leslie could
understand the significance of this message. When she did, she took
the letter to Dick, and he read it without comment and handed it back
to her.
“What does that mean, Dick?”
“It means that Arthur has taken the line of least resistance,” he
said. “To put it vulgarly, he has bolted!”
Her heart sank, and in that moment she felt terribly alone. As if he
read her thoughts, he went on:
“He has certainly precipitated the crisis, but I don’t see exactly how
it will affect you. There was nothing else in the letter?”
She shook her head and opened the envelope, and then saw a slip of
paper which she had overlooked. It was an authority to sell his
business, drawn up in legal form, and had evidently been added as an
afterthought.
“If there are no further defalcations that ought to be worth
something,” said Dick. “I’ll see what I can do.”
But on this point she was firm.
“I think you’ve enough trouble without mine,” she said quietly. “Did
you find anything in the ruins?”
He started.
“Why--no,” he said, a little unconvincingly. “Did you see me go back?”
“I’m afraid I spied on you,” she said, with a pathetic little smile.
“Dick, I’m so worried about you; I wish you wouldn’t go into these
places alone.”
“There was nothing to fear,” he said. “I thought I saw something on
the floor which gave me a clue to Harry’s fate, but it was
nothing--nothing.”
He changed the subject abruptly. She had a feeling that he was not
telling her all that he had seen.
Mary and she had dinner alone, and Mr. Glover, the butler, free from
the restraining presence of Dick Alford, was inclined to be talkative.
“There’s no doubt Mr. Alford looks after the policemen. I have had to
get a food basket ready--thermos flask and everything the heart can
desire. Personally, miss, I don’t believe in pampering the police.
They’re only dissatisfied when they go back to their own homes. He
won’t have anybody take the basket down to them either. ‘No,’ he said,
‘I’ll take it myself. You have it ready at nine o’clock, put it just
outside the servants’ door.’ My own opinion is that they’d be much
more pleased with bread and cheese and a bottle of beer. What’s the
good of making chicken sandwiches for policemen? And having a bottle
of the best wine up from the cellar! It’s a waste of good food!”
Leslie listened, petrified. Now she understood!
The food was not for the police--it was for Harry! Harry, held
prisoner in Chelford Abbey--by whom?
XLVIII
The bane of life that day had been the London reporters. The Red
Lion Inn at Chelfordbury was already filled with them, and not an hour
passed that one did not make his way to the house in a vain endeavour
to interview the Second Son. One intercepted him in Elm Drive, and to
him, as to the rest, he gave the same reply.
“You boys can’t expect me to tell you any more than I already know,”
he said, at bay. “My brother has disappeared, but I believe he is
still alive.”
“Who do you think is responsible for these outrages, Mr. Alford?”
asked the reporter.
Dick shook his head.
“If I knew, it isn’t reasonable to suppose that I should be discussing
the matter with you.”
“Is it the Black Abbot?”
“The Black Abbot has nothing whatever to do with this crime,” said
Dick shortly. “Unless I credit you with being so foolish as to believe
in ghosts, it is unnecessary for me to tell you that there is no such
thing as a Black Abbot, and the figure that has been seen in these
grounds was somebody masquerading for his own purpose.”
“A practical joke?” suggested the newspaper man.
Dick shook his head.
“I don’t think it was a practical joke; indeed, I am sure there is
something very serious behind it. But I can’t tell you any more.”
“Mr. Alford,” said the reporter, “I’m going to ask you a very delicate
question, and I hope you won’t think it an impertinence. If your
brother is dead, then the title comes to you, does it not?”
“Yes,” said Dick.
“You won’t be offended if I tell you that there is a little talk in
the village of some antagonism between your brother and you. I am told
there have been frequent quarrels.”
Dick mastered his anger with a great effort, realizing that the
reporter was not intending to be impertinent, but simply epitomizing
the gossip of the countryside.
“My brother was very nervous and quick-tempered,” he said, “but I’ve
never had a serious quarrel with him in my life.”
“Is it true that Lord Chelford’s fiancée, Miss Leslie Gwyn, recently
broke off her engagement with your brother?”
“Perfectly true,” said Dick, stifling his impatience.
“And yet she is staying at Fossaway Manor as your guest?” The keen
eyes of the reporter were watching him closely. He saw the blood mount
to his victim’s cheeks and hastened to add: “I’m merely telling you
what other people will tell you, Mr. Alford. I have a much wider
experience of the uncharity and suspicion that surround every man
associated with a crime like this. If you are annoyed with me I can
understand it, but I can assure you that I only want to help you.”
“That I quite believe,” said Dick with a smile. “But you can
understand just how embarrassing your questions are. I will tell you
the truth and you may put it into your paper. I am satisfied there is
a very terrible danger overhanging Miss Leslie Gwyn, and it is for
that reason, and that reason alone, I have asked her to stay at the
hall, which is under police protection and where I know she will be
safe. Her brother has gone abroad, and I cannot allow her to stay at
Willow House alone.”
“You mean she is in danger from the same person that killed Thomas the
footman, and who is responsible for the disappearance of Lord
Chelford?”
Dick nodded, and the newspaper man made a mental note.
“Thank you,” he said. “You will find that this little talk has cleared
the air. In cases like this, if you clear up the minor mysteries as
you go along, it makes for everybody’s comfort.”
Dick, who had been trembling with anger through the interview, had to
agree, in the calm moments which followed, that the reporter had taken
a sane view of the matter. When he met Leslie a few minutes later, he
told her of the interview. She was in the study alone, and had just
finished writing a letter, which lay face downward on the
blotting-pad. She saw him glance at the envelope and turned it up. It
was addressed to Fabrian Gilder.
“What have you said?” he asked.
“I’ve told him that I’ve considered the matter, and I’ve decided that
I could not marry him--in any circumstances it would be impossible
now, so soon after Harry’s disappearance.”
He picked up the letter and, taking out his pocket case, tore off a
stamp and affixed it.
“I’ll see that this goes,” he said grimly. Then, seeing her tired
face: “Poor old girl, you’re having a bad time.”
The pressure of her hand, the love and sympathy in her voice, were
almost too much for him, and he had to set his teeth or he would have
taken her in his arms, and, in that place of tragedy and horror, told
her of the love that was shaking him, and which had added a new and
fearful burden to his overstrung nerves.
“Go to bed early,” he said, with an effort at gaiety, “and rise with
the dawn. I shall be busy till very late.”
“The butler was telling me that you have ordered a basket of food for
the policemen.”
Not a muscle of his face moved.
“That is so; one or two men who are patrolling the cutting need a
little light refreshment. They cannot get to the house and we haven’t
men to relieve them.”
She was sensible enough not to pursue the subject.
It was only on her earnest entreaty that, as the night grew on, Mary
Wenner remained. The girl was a bundle of nerves, started at every
sound, paled and flushed with the opening of a door, and the sound of
a falling plate in the servery whilst they were at dinner had made her
scream.
“I can’t help it, my dear; I’m naturally temperamental,” she
explained. “And this house has got me shivering. I can’t leave another
young lady without a chaperon, or I’d fly off to London before it got
dark.”
She had been in the library that afternoon, she told Leslie, and the
sight of that familiar room with its empty chair had been almost the
last straw.
“I had to have a good cry,” she confessed, “and I’m not ashamed of it.
Harry was one of the best--you don’t mind me calling him Harry, do
you, dear?” And, when Leslie shook her head: “I can’t say that I was
fond of him as a young girl ought to be fond of a man she loves, but
he was very nice. He had his tempers, the same as the rest of us, but
they were only his high spirits. I could never understand why he hated
Mr. Alford.”
Leslie looked at her incredulously.
“Hated Mr. Alford?” she repeated. “Surely you’re mistaken? They were
very good friends.”
Mary shook her head.
“No, they weren’t,” she said. “It all arose out of her ladyship’s
picture.”
“The late Lady Chelford?”
“That was the lady,” nodded Mary. “It happened three years ago. Dick
Alford suggested that the portrait should be moved to the gallery. I
think he was silly to say it, knowing how Harry adored his mother, and
when he said the picture was depressing--and that was the silliest
thing of all--Harry got right up in the air! It was dreadful, the
things he said to Mr. Alford--and before me, too! Dick Alford realized
his mistake: I could see that, and he tried to pacify Harry, but for a
fortnight they didn’t speak.”
Leslie was silent. Slowly the inner life of Fossaway Manor was
beginning to reveal itself to her; she had seen nothing of these
cross-currents, had not suspected, even dimly, the conflicting
antagonism which must have been visible to Harry Chelford’s secretary.
“They were very friendly sometimes. You’d think that Harry was fond of
him, and I think he was,” Mary continued; “but the quarrels used to
break out every now and then, once because Dick always stood with his
back to the picture, and never looked at it at all. He hated it, I’m
sure of that. Of course, he never took me into his confidence. We were
not what you might term good friends. I suppose it was foolish of me
to take up Harry’s quarrel, but I never liked Dick--you don’t mind me
calling him Dick?--after that.”
She glanced nervously through the window. The sun had set, and dusk
was creeping over the great park.
“If I get any sleep to-night I’ll be lucky,” she said. “Do you mind if
I leave my door open and keep a light burning?”
“Why, of course not,” smiled Leslie.
“There is a lock on the door, and I asked Glover to find me the key,”
Miss Wenner went on. “And I’ll tell you frankly, Leslie, that if he
hadn’t found it I wouldn’t have stayed, not for all the money in the
world.”
Leslie felt that it would be indiscreet to offer encouragement to a
further discussion of this subject, for she was as reluctant to spend
the night under that roof as her new-found friend.
XLIX
Though she waited up till nearly eleven, she did not see Dick, and,
in response to the repeated hints of the girl, they went upstairs
together.
The Manor was lighted by a power plant which was accommodated in a
small shed midway between the house and the Ravensrill, and owed its
installation to Dick’s enterprise.
Harry had always had candles in his room, Mary told her, but had
accepted the lighting of his library as a compromise.
“It’s a very strange thing,” said Mary from her inner room, “but Harry
was afraid of electricity. In thunderstorms he always went down into
the cellar and stayed there until they were over. He used to have a
bed which was made every day in the summer, in case of a storm coming
on in the night, and----”
At that moment all the lights in the room went out.
“Have you turned the lights off?” asked Mary’s anxious voice.
“No, I haven’t been near the switch; I expect a fuse has gone,” said
the girl.
There were matches and candles on the dressing table, she remembered,
and, groping her way to the table, she lit the two candles. Mary was
standing in the doorway, very pale and wide-eyed.
“What was the meaning of that?” she asked, her voice sharp with fear,
which was beginning to communicate itself to Leslie.
She forced a smile.
“That happens in the best regulated houses,” she said, with spurious
gaiety. “The door is locked, so there’s nothing to be afraid of.”
And then she heard footsteps in the corridor; there was a knock at the
door that made Mary jump.
“Are you there, Leslie?” It was Dick’s voice. “Something has gone
wrong with the lighting arrangements; we’ll put it right in a minute
or two.”
“Are the lights out everywhere?” asked Mary, but he was gone.
Twenty minutes passed and again Leslie heard his footsteps
approaching.
“I’m afraid we sha’n’t be able to fix up the lights till the morning.
Have you candles? Did Glover put a flash light for you?”
“We’ve everything we want,” said Leslie. “Don’t worry about us: we
shall be asleep in ten minutes.”
“Not me,” murmured Miss Wenner tremulously. “I sha’n’t sleep a wink!”
By the light of her candle she had replaced most of the garments she
had discarded when the lights went out.
“I knew I oughtn’t to have stayed--there’s somebody coming along the
corridor!”
“It is only Mr. Alford.”
But her ears caught the sound of two pairs of feet, and presently
Dick’s voice spoke.
“Do you mind if I leave one of Puttler’s men outside your door?” he
asked. “Don’t be alarmed if you hear him walking about in the night.”
“Is anything wrong, Dick?”
“No, no, nothing wrong; only I knew Miss Wenner was rather nervous.”
“I am,” quavered Miss Wenner loudly. “It’s very good of you, Mr.
Alford.”
“You had better keep your windows fastened,” said Dick. “There is a
system of ventilation in the room, so you needn’t be afraid of waking
with a headache. Good-night.”
When he had gone, Mary Wenner looked solemnly at her companion.
“Did you hear what he said about keeping the windows shut?” she asked
hollowly. “My Gawd!”
“Don’t be silly, Mary.”
Leslie was past feeling comfortable, but she had need to set an
example.
“Come along, I’ll help you fasten the windows.”
“‘Keep the windows fastened,’” repeated Mary Wenner. “There’s
something doing!”
They went from one to the other of the leaded windows, closed them and
pressed down the catches. Suddenly Mary clutched the girl’s arm
fiercely.
“There’s a man under my bed!” she gasped, staring wildly at the
drooping counterpane.
With a fluttering heart Leslie lifted the cover, and pulled out a pair
of riding boots, the soles of which the frightened secretary had seen,
and they both laughed hysterically.
“I wish I could bring my bed into your room.” Mary looked helplessly
at the heavy four-poster to which she had been assigned.
“You can come and sleep with me,” said Leslie. “I’ve got a big bed.”
And this offer was most gratefully accepted.
“Have a look under your bed first,” said Miss Wenner nervously, and
not till this ritual had been observed did she commence very slowly to
undress.
Down below in the library, Dick was in consultation with Puttler, who
had just returned from a hasty visit to Scotland Yard.
“The batteries were smashed, and an attempt had been made to cut the
main cable,” reported Dick. “I got to the power house just after it
happened, but I saw nobody.”
Puttler pulled at his comic little nose and there was a look of
trouble in his brown eyes.
“The Commissioner thinks you ought to have a dozen men down here and
make a clean-up,” he said. “I’ve brought three, and I think they all
ought to be inside the house. One we’ve got in the east wing, another
in the west, and a patrol in the hall. That will leave you and me and
the local ‘flatties’ for the grounds. Though I think we might as well
stay here--you want a battalion to patrol the estate properly. By the
way, when I was looking round early this morning I found a great mound
of earth in the northeast corner of the estate, near the river. One of
your gamekeepers told me it was called Chelford Greed. What is the
idea?”
Dick was not in an archæological mood, but he explained.
“One of my ancestors--I don’t know which one--planned and carried out
a big steal. You probably know that the charter by which we received
these lands from King Henry confines the northern boundary of the
estate to the course of the Ravensrill, and the ingenious Chelford of
the times had the idea of changing the course of the Ravensrill so
that the estate would embrace another thousand acres. The Chelford
Greed was the dam he built. The natural course of the Ravensrill runs
through the Long Meadow. It was one of those clever little pieces of
robbery that have made us landed proprietors what we are! As I say, I
don’t know which of the Chelfords planned this piece of larceny,
because there is no written record, and the legend has come down from
mouth to mouth, so to speak.”
He looked up at the big portrait above the fireplace and shook his
head.
“Lady,” he said softly, “you’ve given me a lot of trouble!”
Puttler was interested.
“As how?” he asked.
“I’ll tell you one of these days,” said Dick. “I wonder if those girls
are asleep?”
He stole quietly up the stairs. The man on duty in the corridor
flashed a lamp upon him as he approached.
“No sound,” he whispered, and Dick crept downstairs again.
It was arranged that he and Puttler should snatch a few hours’ sleep
in turn, the other patrolling round and round the block of buildings.
At two o’clock in the morning he was aroused from a deep slumber to
feel Puttler shaking gently at his shoulder.
“Nothing has happened,” said the detective, eyeing with a friendly
look the sofa from which Dick struggled. “I’ve warmed up some grub for
you.”
A spirit stove was burning on the desk and the kettle above was
steaming. Dick poured the black coffee into a glass and scalded
himself to wakefulness.
“One of the local men thought he saw somebody moving and challenged,”
reported Puttler, settling himself down with a luxurious sigh. “But it
was probably only a bush. These birds are jumpy--they see a Black
Abbot in every shadow!”
Dick sipped at the boiling fluid and broke a biscuit with his
disengaged hand.
“Thank God, this can’t go on much longer!” he said. “By the way, did
you bring those papers from London?”
“I gave them to you in the library: they were in the blue envelope.”
Dick put down the glass.
“I’d better keep them in my safe,” he said. “I don’t want the servants
to see them.”
He crossed the hall, unlocked the door of the library and went in,
mechanically switching on the light, and only then remembering that
for the time being Fossaway Manor was denied the service of the little
power house. He went back to the study and got his lamp and picked his
way across the room to the desk. The envelope was where he had put it,
and he slipped this into his pocket. As he did so, he was aware that a
cold wind was blowing. He sent his light along the windows. That at
the end was open; one of the curtains, which had been drawn across lay
in a heap on the ground.
He went to the door and called Puttler softly and the detective joined
him.
“Somebody has been here,” he said, and pointed to the curtain and the
twisted pole that had supported it.
It was easy to see how the intruder had made his way into the library.
Two of the panes near the iron handle which fastened one leaf of the
window had been broken, and evidently the midnight visitor, in
entering, must have fallen and, catching hold of the curtain to save
himself, brought it to the ground, breaking away the pole which was
hanging drunkenly.
“I passed here ten minutes ago, and the window was shut then,” said
Puttler.
“He may have been inside at the moment,” replied Dick thoughtfully. “I
wonder what has been taken?”
He examined the desk. Evidently the intruder had not opened any of the
drawers, though, if he had done so, his labours would have been in
vain, since Dick had cleared every document out of the room early in
the day. As they circulated the room, Puttler stumbled over something.
“Where did this come from?” he asked.
It was a light ladder, and Dick recognized it as one of two that were
part of the library furniture, and was employed to reach books from
the top shelf of the lower tier.
“When I saw this last it was standing at the end of the room,” he
said.
He flashed his lamp up on to the shelves, looking for a gap in the
long line of books. So doing, his lamp swept across that space
intervening between the shelves which was covered by the portrait of
the late Lady Chelford. He could see the big gold frame, caught a
glimpse of one white hand hanging gracefully, and then something
brought his lamp back. He heard the churchwarden detective swear
softly. Himself, he was speechless. The light of his lamp focussed on
the place where the woman’s face had been, and where now was a black
emptiness.
The face and shoulders of the picture had been cut from the frame, and
the ragged strands of canvas told him that it had been cut by an
unskilful hand.
L
Neither man spoke until they were back in the little study, and then
Puttler looked gloomily at his companion.
“What do you make of that?”
“Heaven knows!” groaned Dick.
The study door was closed, and he had pulled across a dark curtain
which had been hung that day for the purpose.
“I suppose I’d better get out, though I don’t suppose I shall find
anything.”
“Wait until I’ve had the remainder of your coffee and I’ll come with
you,” said Puttler. “No, Mr. Alford, I never felt less like sleep. We
shall have daylight in a couple of hours. Wait.”
He turned out the oil lamp which had been requisitioned from the
kitchen, blew down the glass chimney, and the room was in darkness.
“Now you can pull open those curtains and go out,” he said, “if that
is your way.”
Dick moved the curtains slightly and looked out. The world lay
peaceful, silent, in the pallid light of the moon, and as he opened
the door, the sweet scent of the earth and the cold morn greeted him
fragrantly.
His foot was raised to step across the threshold when Puttler’s big
hand closed round his arm.
“Wait,” he whispered again.
Dick stood motionless.
“I see nothing,” he said in the same tone.
Still Puttler held him, his head bent, listening.
“All right,” he said, released his grip, and stepped out on to the
little terrace before the Second Son.
He gave a swift glance left and right.
“What was it?” asked Dick, in surprise.
“Somebody breathing,” was Puttler’s astonishing reply. “You won’t
believe that I could hear a man breathing a dozen yards away, but I
can. It’s one of my many animal qualities.”
He took a little run, cleared the gravel path in a bound, and went
noiselessly along the grass to the left. Presently Dick saw him
returning at a jog-trot. The detective went past and disappeared round
the wing of the block. In a few minutes he returned.
“Hearing and scent are my two qualities. Can you smell anything?”
Dick sniffed the morning air.
“No,” he confessed.
“Come along with me.”
This time he walked softly across the path, explaining that he was
afraid of waking the girls who slept almost immediately above them.
They went to the end of the wing, and then the sergeant halted.
“Now do you smell anything?” he asked.
Dick sniffed again. There was a sweet odour in the air, the scent of
some exotic flower that seemed familiar to him.
“Does anybody in this house smoke scented cigarettes?” asked the
detective, and Dick went suddenly cold.
“Harry!”
“Your brother, eh?” Puttler’s deep-set eyes surveyed him in the half
light. “That doesn’t necessarily mean that he is smoking them. Where
were they kept?”
“In the library as a rule.”
Puttler began searching the grounds with the aid of his lamp. He had
not gone far before he saw something and picked it up. It was a
half-smoked cigarette with a rose-leaf tip.
“Humph!” muttered Puttler, and continued his search--a search which
yielded no further evidence.
Retracing their steps, they passed the study door, and Puttler, who
was walking a little ahead, stumbled over something and put his light
to the ground.
“You keep rather a lot of ladders about here, Mr. Alford,” he said, in
a low voice. “A library ladder outside? What’s the great idea?”
The ladder was lying parallel with the gravel drive, and Puttler
examined it rung by rung.
“That wasn’t here last night, I’ll take my oath,” he said.
“No,” said Dick, puzzled; “it usually hangs on two pegs near the
garage.”
He lifted it up. It was a long, light, triangular ladder tapering to a
point at the top, and used by the staff for outside window cleaning.
“You had better have it chained up,” was all Puttler said after he had
finished his inspection. “The man who brought this here was the man
who cut off your light supply and, incidentally----”
Far away in the grounds came the faint sound of a man’s voice,
challenging in military fashion.
“Halt! Who goes there?”
“That’s Renwick, a local man,” said Puttler immediately.
They ran toward the sound of the voice, and presently saw the flicker
of his lantern; and it was a badly scared man who challenged them a
few minutes later. He had seen nothing, he said, but he had heard
voices.
“One of them was laughing. I thought at first it was you, Sergeant,
but when I heard it again it was so wild that I got a little nervous.”
“Did anybody answer your challenge?”
“No, but the voices stopped. I couldn’t hear the woman’s voice----”
“The woman’s voice?” said Dick quickly. “Was it a woman? Surely you’re
mistaken?”
“I could swear to it,” said the watcher. “It was the woman’s voice I
heard first, and the man who laughed. I think the voices must have
stopped as soon as I put my lamp on.”
“In what direction?”
The policeman pointed across Long Meadow, the shallow, valley-like
depression which ran parallel with the rising ground on which the
Abbey stood. To the left there were a number of cottages, occupied in
the main by people working on the estate, two gamekeepers, a carter
and a groom. It was from one of these cottages that the Black Abbot
had been seen and reported by a terrified gamekeeper.
“They sounded as if they were walking away from you over the Mound to
the river--or to the ruins?” suggested Puttler.
“Well,” confessed the man, “they might have been going that way: I
can’t be sure.”
“That certainly beats the band,” said the sergeant, as they were
moving in the direction the man had indicated.
“He must have been mistaken,” said Dick with emphasis. “They were
walking away from him----”
“They,” repeated Puttler significantly. “I don’t think he was wrong at
all.”
“There is another possible solution,” said Dick. “Sometimes the people
at Chelfordbury avail themselves of a short cut across the park to a
neighbouring village.”
“At three o’clock in the morning?”
“There may have been a dance,” suggested Dick lamely.
“A short cut through a park that’s known to be haunted and where a
murder was committed two nights ago?”
There was no answer to this.
They reached the bank and followed along the top till they were
parallel with the Abbey, but there was no sign of man or woman, and
they turned back. In spite of his protestations of wakefulness,
Sergeant Puttler did not resist the suggestion that he should take his
sleep. Dick was left alone to his vigil.
By the time daylight came he was a very weary man. Twice in the night
he had visited the two men posted in the corridors above, found them
awake, but in each case with nothing to report.
“Thank goodness, at any rate, somebody’s had some sleep!” he muttered,
as he passed under the girl’s window and glanced up.
The morning wind which stirred the trees and filled the world with the
pleasant music of rustling leaves moved also the casement window of
the room which he had assigned to Mary Wenner. The window swayed to
and fro slowly, and he inwardly condemned the girl for not carrying
out his instructions.
By six o’clock the first of the servants was stirring; smoke was
crawling lazily from one of the big twisted chimneys. He was sitting
in envious contemplation of Sergeant Puttler when the door of the
study burst violently open and Mary Wenner came in. She was in her
dressing gown; her untidy hair floated over her face.
“Mr. Alford,” she asked agitatedly, “have you seen Leslie?”
He was on his feet in an instant and the movement woke the sleeping
detective.
“No; she’s with you, isn’t she?”
“We went to bed together,” said the girl, in a tremulous tone, “but
when I woke up just now she was not in the room. I waited awhile,
thinking she was taking her bath, and then I went outside and asked
the man you put there. He said she hadn’t come out of the room!”
Puttler, listening, dragged himself erect.
“The ladder!” he said simply, and Dick reeled under the blow. The
Black Terror of Fossaway Manor had in his grip the woman for whom he
would have given his soul and counted it no heavy price.
Running out on to the lawn, Puttler searched beneath the window. Yes,
there were the marks of the ladder in the mould of a garden bed, and
on the ladder itself he found confirmatory proof. Lifting it against
the wall, he scrambled up, and came breast-high to the window-sill on
its top-most rung. Drawing himself up, he sprang into the room and
looked round for some clue. By this time Mary Wenner, followed by
Dick, had come through the door.
“Her dressing gown isn’t gone!” whimpered Mary, pointing to the hook
where it had hung. “But her shoes are. She must have dressed--and I
didn’t hear.”
The tired man at the door had heard no sound in the night. A thick
carpet covered the floor. Mary said that, when she woke, the door
which communicated between the two rooms was closed.
She had heard no sound at all, and claimed that she was a light
sleeper, which, in fact, she was not. When she had gone to sleep the
candle was burning. Examining this, Dick saw that it would not have
been alight for more than an hour. There were two burnt matches in the
tray, which meant that the candle had been extinguished once and lit
again.
“I wonder she didn’t wake me; I’m usually a light sleeper.…”
Dick left the girl explaining to the watcher who had been on guard
outside the door.
“It was her voice, of course, that the patrol man heard in the dark. I
blame myself that I didn’t jump at that idea.”
“I’d like to keep all the blame!” said Dick bitterly. “Oh, God! it
doesn’t bear thinking about!”
He went away on a solitary search; none saw him slip through the back
of the house, and he moved under cover of the river bank. When he
returned, after an absence of two hours, Puttler told him that there
was a message from the Home Office awaiting him. That institution had
rung up twice. Dick got through after a wait, and learned that he was
talking to an important under-secretary.
“Could you run up to London for an hour?”
“Is it necessary?” asked Dick, and he explained with all rapidity the
happenings of the night.
“I’m afraid you had better see us as soon as you possibly can. In view
of all the circumstances you cannot come too soon.”
With a curse Dick hung up the ’phone, and this time he took Harry’s
big two-seater, a car that his brother had only used a dozen times,
but the use of which he had steadfastly refused to anybody else.
Just as he was leaving he recalled a resolution he had made in the
night; he ran upstairs into his room, and, bolting the door, opened a
locked drawer of his dressing chest and took out something which he
put carefully in his bag. That must be removed from Fossaway Manor as
soon as possible, he thought. He put the bag in the boot of the car
and sent the machine flying down the drive.
Midway between Horsham and Dorking, a motorist, coming from the
opposite direction by another route, shot at a fast pace from a forked
road right across his path. Dick jammed on the brakes and the big car
skidded halfway round, struck the concrete curb with a thud, but no
damage was done, and he went on, with a glare at the goggled driver of
the machine at fault that was murderous.
He did not hear the cover of the dickey snap open, nor did he see the
brown bag leap up and roll over on to the sidewalk. But the man in the
other car saw all this through his big goggles, and, restarting his
machine, brought it to the curb.
And there and then, Fabrian Gilder discovered the secret of the Black
Abbot!
LI
At nine o’clock that morning Mr. Fabrian Gilder had risen intending
to make a hurried visit to his country cottage. The newspapers had
been full of the Chelford tragedy, but no mention had been made of the
fact that Thomas had been Mr. Gilder’s guest. Such a happening, he
realized, being an intelligent man, must necessarily upset all
arrangements and plans that the girl had made.
There was a lot about Fabrian Gilder that was admirable. To his
servants he was a kind master; to all who knew him superficially, an
excellent and even a generous friend. He was in truth no worse than
the average man in point of desires, a little better in his fairness
of dealing. Arthur Gwyn had been legitimate prey, but he had, he
thought, treated him with scrupulous fairness. He had succeeded, by
the exploitation of the lawyer’s weakness, in amassing a very
considerable fortune; but then, the City of London, and, for the
matter of that, the City of New York, was filled with rich men who had
founded their houses upon the cupidity or folly of men who were now
almost penniless.
He glanced at the morning papers. There was nothing new reported from
Chelford, except the little interview that one reporter had had with
Dick, and that paragraph was, in many ways, very comforting to Gilder,
for it explained why the girl--and then his eye caught sight of a
line.
Mr. Alford said he had asked Miss Leslie Gwyn to stay at Fossaway
Manor whilst her brother was abroad.…
Abroad? He frowned. If Arthur Gwyn had gone abroad he must have left
very suddenly. He had seen him only a day or two before. But perhaps
that was one of Dick Alford’s lies to save the girl’s face. Still, it
was disquieting.
He was pondering this matter when the maid brought him his morning
letters, and the first he saw was one in a well-known hand. It was
from Leslie. He tore it open with trembling fingers, took out the half
sheet of paper and read the few lines. He read it not once but many
times. So that was that! She had changed her mind.
It did not occur to him that she had not made any promise but he was
so sure of her, so satisfied in his mind that she would agree to his
proposal, that he felt he had been tricked.
When the shock had worn off, his anger and resentment grew. Very well:
if she could not keep her promise, he at least would keep his. He
understood now, he thought. Arthur had bolted, and there was no
necessity for the girl to make her sacrifice. He had been fooled,
tricked. He pushed the chair back from the table, leaving his
breakfast untouched, and, going into his library, turned the handle of
the combination and pulled open the door of the safe with a savage
jerk. There was the letter, all ready to post, and at the sight of it
his heart grew hard and sour.
He took out the letter, made to tear it into fragments, and then
remembered that inside was a blank check. He pulled out the sheet of
notepaper and felt for the little pink slip that in his magnificence
he had signed with a complacent flourish. It was not there!
Gilder peered into the envelope with a frown. Gone! He searched the
safe: it might have fallen out, though how, he could not imagine; but
there was no sign of the check. He unlocked his drawer and took out
his check-book. There was the counterfoil, and written across it, “For
Leslie----.” He had intended to show her that counterfoil one of these
days, when she felt more kindly toward him.
With his head in his hands he tried to remember when he had last seen
the check, and then he recalled that it was on the morning Arthur Gwyn
had called to see him. At that thought he went white. Surely he had
closed the safe? Again he struggled to remember, minute by minute,
that fateful morning. He had been looking at the letter, he had put it
away, he had closed the door, and then--the telephone bell had rung
and he had forgotten to fasten the safe!
He pulled the ’phone toward him now and called furiously for a number.
It was twenty past nine; most of the staff of the bank would be there.
When the call was answered:
“I am Mr. Gilder,” he said quickly. “Is the manager there?… No? Then
the sub-manager will do. It is very urgent.”
He waited whilst the clerk went to investigate. Presently he heard the
voice of a man he knew--the manager himself.
“I just came in at this moment. Is anything wrong?”
“Fletcher, do you remember my telling you that I should be sending
down a check for fifty thousand pounds and asking you to honour it?”
“Yes; I honoured it.”
For a second Gilder was speechless.
“You honoured it? Who presented the check?”
“Arthur Gwyn--it was made out in his favour. I notified you last
night; didn’t you get my letter?”
“I haven’t opened all my post yet,” said Gilder steadily. “Thank you.”
He hung up the receiver, breathing heavily. For now he remembered
clearly every event of the morning: the coming of Arthur Gwyn, and his
seemingly absurd proposal, that Gilder should write a note expressing
his willingness to lend the money. That was the trick of it! Not only
had Arthur got the fifty thousand, but with that letter he had a
complete answer to any charge of fraud.
He sat with clasped hands, every vein on his forehead swollen, and
murder in his heart. Tricked! And she should know. She had been a
party to the fraud--unwittingly, perhaps, but nevertheless a party.
She must have told him of this money.…
Whatever else he was, Fabrian Gilder had the gift of clear thinking.
Five minutes’ riotous fury, and he was his cold self again. Of course
she couldn’t have helped in the fraud. It was the accident of leaving
the safe unlocked, and Arthur Gwyn’s known inquisitiveness--he could
never resist reading even Gilder’s private letters; Arthur had no
sense of other people’s privacy.
What could he do now? He thought the matter out. He must tell the
girl, and perhaps she would regard herself as being under an
obligation to him. If she had any sense of honour she must fulfil her
promise, whatever she had written in her letter that morning.
He telephoned for his car to be brought round from the garage, and
came back to his breakfast table and made an attempt to eat.
He would try Leslie first, telling her nothing about the letter he had
given to her brother, and threaten him with a warrant for fraud.
Perhaps this strengthened rather than weakened his position. He grew
cheerful as the thought took shape.
He passed slowly out of London, for all the streets in the metropolis
seemed to be “up,” and at last struck the open country, avoiding the
main roads and taking a more circuitous route which would bring him to
the main Sussex road between Dorking and Horsham. With a clear road
before him, he sent his car at full speed. He was not well acquainted
with the road, but he knew that he joined the old Roman “street” at a
gentle angle, and he did not slow down as he approached the principal
thoroughfare.
Left of him, on the London side, the road was clear; to the right, the
view was a little obstructed. He sounded his klaxon and came out on to
the main thoroughfare at thirty miles an hour.
He saw the car just in time, jammed on his brakes, and threw the
machine into reverse. The big car ahead of him skidded round; he
caught one malevolent gleam from Dick Alford’s eyes, and then he saw
the bag and, driving to the side of the road, picked it up. His first
inclination was to leave it; he had no particular desire to help the
Second Son; but there are certain innate decencies to be observed by
motorists, even though they loathe each other, and he picked the
little grip from the sidewalk and threw it into the back of his car.
As he did so, it opened, and, turning to fasten it, he saw something
that made him change his mind. Getting out of the car, he lifted the
bag to the sidewalk, opened it wide and pulled out--the sombre habit
and cowl of the Black Abbot!
LII
So Dick Alford was the Black Abbot! It was unbelievable; he could
hardly credit the importance of his find. Here, then, was the greatest
lever of all. Beside this, the threat of a charge against Leslie
Gwyn’s brother faded to unimportance. He snapped the lock, put the bag
carefully back in the car, and, restarting his engine, moved at a
slower pace toward Chelfordbury.
He stopped in the village, where he was recognized, and heard at first
hand from the innkeeper the story of the strange happenings at the
“big house.”
“They do say that something’s happened to the young lady from Willow
House.”
“What!” Gilder almost shouted the word. “You don’t mean Miss Gwyn?”
“Yes, Miss Gwyn,” nodded the landlord. “I haven’t got the rights of it
yet, it’s only a rumour down here, but, Lord bless your heart, Mr.
Gilder, there’s never been so many rumours in this village since I
came to live here forty-eight years ago. Some say that his lordship’s
been murdered”--he lowered his voice and looked round--“by his
brother! Mr. Alford is a very hard man, though the people who work for
him have got nothing to say against him, but that doesn’t seem
possible to me.”
Gilder’s mind was in a whirl. He did not want to know anything about
Dick Alford or his reputation.
“Who told you this story about Miss Gwyn?” he asked, and the landlord,
looking round the group that had formed outside the Red Lion, pointed
to a man.
“He’s a carter up at the big house,” he said.
“Fetch him here,” said Gilder.
When the carter arrived:
“What is this story about Miss Gwyn?” Gilder asked.
The man looked a little sheepish to find himself the centre of
interest.
“I don’t know nowt about it,” he said. “It’s only what I heerd that
monkey-faced gentleman saying to Mr. Richard. He says, ‘I don’t think
any harm’s come to her.’ And one of the maids says that that young
lady who used to be his lordship’s secretary----”
“Miss Wenner? Is she there?” asked Gilder quickly.
“Yes, she come up last night.”
“What about her?” asked Gilder.
“They say she’s been crying her eyes out all the morning. That’s all I
know about it. They do say something bad happened to the young lady
early this morning, and the way Mr. Richard has been running about and
him looking as ill as death----”
“I hope something’s going to be done about this Black Abbot,”
interjected the innkeeper. “My womenfolk are so frightened they want
to sit up half the night.”
Gilder looked at him with a queer expression.
“You needn’t be afraid of the Black Abbot,” he said. “I am going to
lay that ghost to-day.”
“You, Mr. Gilder?” said the man, in surprise.
But it was not the occasion for confidences, and Gilder, getting back
into his car, turned it about and went up the road till he came to the
lodge gates. Here a policeman on duty would have barred his progress,
but fortunately he was a local man who knew the lawyer.
“Mr. Alford’s away, sir. Do you want to see Sergeant Puttler?”
“Is that the man who has been staying at the hall? What is he--a
policeman?”