Slowly she recognised me, as through a veil, and starting, she fell
back, glaring at me as though she were witness of some appalling
apparition.
"You!" she gasped. "How did you find me here?"
"No matter how I found you, Lady Lolita," I responded. "You are in want
of a friend, and I am here to give you help, as I promised you last
night. This is no time for words; we must act, and act quickly. You
must let me take you back to the Hall."
"But look at me!" she cried in dismay. "I can't go back like this!
They would--they would suspect!"
"There must be no suspicion," I said, thoroughly aroused to the
importance of secrecy now that the police were already in the park
making their investigations. "You cannot return to the Hall like this,
for the servants would see you and know that you've been absent all
night."
"I'm afraid of Weston," she said. "She is so very inquisitive." Weston
was her maid.
"Then you must come with me to my house," I suggested. "We could reach
it across the fields and enter by the back way unobserved. I can send
Mrs Dawson out on some pretext, and you can remain locked in my
sitting-room while I go up to the Hall and fetch one of your
walking-dresses. I can slip up to your wardrobe and manage to steal
something without Weston suspecting. Then, when you return, you can
explain that you've merely been out for an early walk."
The suggestion, although a desperate one, commended itself to her, and
with a few words of heartfelt thanks she announced her readiness to
accompany me.
I longed to inquire the name of the male companion, but feared to do so,
seeing how pale and agitated she was. Her face had changed sadly since
the previous night, for she was now white, wan and haggard, presenting a
strange, terrified appearance, dishevelled and bedraggled as she was.
She must certainly have been out in the park for fully seven hours. Was
she aware of the tragedy, I wondered?
I told her nothing of the discovery. How could I in those
circumstances? True, she was not wearing the ermine collar, as I had
suspected, yet the prints made by her shoes as she now walked with me
were assuredly the same as those I had effaced.
We spoke but little as we hurried along, creeping always beneath walls
and behind trees, and often compelled to make long detours in order to
obtain cover and avoid recognition by any of those working in the
fields.
Compelled to scale the high wall of the park at last, I assisted her
over without much difficulty, for although she preserved all her natural
beauty, she was athletic, fond of all games and a splendid rider to
hounds.
"If I can only conceal the fact that I've been absent all night, it will
be of such very material assistance," she said after we had crossed the
high road and gained the shelter of a long narrow spinney. "I shall
never be able to sufficiently repay you for this," she added.
"Remember the confession of my heart to you last night, Lolita," was my
answer. "We will discuss it all later on--when you are safe." And we
pushed forward, our eyes and ears on the alert as we approached the
village.
At last, by good fortune, I managed to get her unobserved inside my
house. Creeping noiselessly up the stairs I took her to one of my
dusty, disused attics in preference to my sitting-room, and there she
locked herself in. Not, however, before I had pressed her hand in
silence as assurance that she might place her trust in me.
A few moments later I found my old housekeeper in the kitchen, and
having given her directions to go on an errand for me to a farm about a
mile and a half distant, I started off up to the Hall upon as strange an
errand as man has ever gone, namely to steal a dress belonging to his
love.
I had, of course, disregarded my appointment with Pink, and not wishing
to meet the searchers or the doctor himself, I reached the Hall by the
bypath that led from Lowick, passing along the edge of the Monk's Wood
wherein I had met Lolita.
On entering the mansion I found that the startling news of the tragedy
had just reached there, for the servants were all greatly alarmed. They
crowded about me to learn the latest details, but I passed quickly on to
my room and for a few minutes pretended to be engrossed in
correspondence, although my real reason was to await an opportunity to
reach her ladyship's room after the servants' bell had sounded and the
faithful maid Weston had gone down to breakfast.
At last the bell clanged, and I stole along the corridor in order to
watch the neat maid's disappearance with the others. She seemed longer
than usual, but presently she came, and after she had passed along to
the servants' hall I quickly ascended the main staircase, and sped along
the two long corridors to my love's room--a large, well-furnished
apartment with long mirrors and a dressing-table heaped with
silver-mounted toilet requisites.
Without a moment's hesitation I opened the huge wardrobe, and after a
brief search discovered a dark tweed tailor-made coat and skirt which I
recognised as one she often wore for walking, and these I hurriedly
rolled up and together with a pair of buttoned boots carried them off.
I noticed that the bed, with its pale blue silken hangings, was
fortunately tumbled as though it had been slept in, therefore Weston
evidently did not suspect that her young mistress had been absent all
night.
Not without risk of detection, I managed to convey the dress and boots
down to my own room, where I packed them in a neat parcel and carried
them with all speed back to Sibberton.
Mrs Dawson, who was a somewhat decrepit person, had not returned,
therefore I carried the parcel up to the attic, and ten minutes later
her ladyship came down looking as fresh and neat in her tweed gown as
though she had only that moment emerged from her room.
Leaving her cloak and muddy dinner-dress in my charge, she escaped by
the back and away down the garden, expressing her intention of returning
to the Hall as though she had only been out an hour for a morning walk,
as was so frequently her habit. She had thanked me fervently for my
assistance, and in doing so uttered a sentence that struck me as
remarkably strange, knowing what I did.
"You have saved me, Willoughby. You can save my life, if you will."
"I will," was my earnest reply. "You know my secret," I added, raising
her fingers to my hot passionate lips before we parted.
She made no mention of the tragedy, and what, indeed, could I remark?
My journey to London I was compelled to postpone in view of what had
occurred. She had not referred to it, and to tell the truth I felt that
my presence beside her just then was of greater need. Thus, after
awaiting my housekeeper's return in order to preserve appearances, I ate
my breakfast with the air of a man entirely undisturbed.
Just before nine the doctor came in, ruddy and well-shaven, and throwing
himself into an armchair exclaimed--
"You didn't keep your promise! I called and found nobody at home. You
were out."
"I'd gone down the village," I explained.
"Well, I've been up into the park with the police. They've sent that
blundering fool Redway--worse than useless! We've been over the ground,
but there's so many footprints that it's impossible to distinguish any--
save one."
"And what's that?"
"Well, strangely enough, my dear fellow, it's a woman's."
"A woman's!" I gasped, for I saw that all my work had been in vain and
in my hurry I must have unfortunately overlooked one.
"Yes, it's the print of a woman's slipper with a French heel--not the
kind of shoe usually worn in Sibberton," remarked the doctor. "Funny,
isn't it?"
"Very," I agreed with a sickly feeling. "What do the police think?"
"Redway means to take a plaster cast of it--says it's an important clue.
Got a cigarette?"
I pushed the box before him, with sinking heart, and at the same time
invited him to the table to have breakfast, for I had not yet finished.
"Breakfast!" he cried. "Why, I had mine at six, and am almost ready for
lunch. I'm an early bird, you know."
It was true. He had cultivated the habit of early rising by going
cub-hunting with the Stanchester hounds, and it was his boast that he
never breakfasted later than six either summer or winter.
"Did they find anything else?" I inquired, fearing at the same time to
betray any undue curiosity.
"Found a lot of marks of men's boots, but they might have been ours," he
answered in his bluff way as he lit his cigarette. "My theory is that
the mark of the woman's shoe is a very strong clue. Some woman knows
all about it--that's very certain, and she's a person who wears thin
French shoes, size three."
"Does Redway say that?"
"No, I say it. Redway's a fool, you know. Look how he blundered in
that robbery in Northampton a year ago. I only wish we could get a man
from Scotland Yard. He'd nab the murderer before the day is out."
At heart I did not endorse this wish. On the contrary the discovery of
this footmark that had escaped me was certainly a very serious
_contretemps_. My endeavours must, I saw, now all be directed towards
arranging matters so that, if necessary, Lolita could prove a complete
_alibi_.
"Do you know," went on the doctor, "there's one feature in the affair
that's strangest of all, and that is that there seems to have been an
attempt to efface certain marks, as though the assassin boldly returned
to the spot after the removal of the body and scraped the ground in
order to wipe out his footprints. Redway won't admit that, but I'm
certain of it--absolutely certain. I suppose the ass won't accept the
theory because it isn't his own."
I tried to speak, but what could I say? The words I uttered resolved
themselves into a mere expression of blank surprise, and perhaps it was
as well, for the man before me was as keen and shrewd as any member of
the Criminal Investigation Department. He was essentially a man of
action, who whether busy or idle could not remain in one place five
minutes together. He rushed all over the country-side from early
morning, or dashed up to London by the express, spent the afternoon in
Bond Street or the Burlington, and was back at home, a hundred miles
distant, in time for dinner. He was perfectly tireless, possessing a
demeanour which no amount of offence could ruffle, and an even temper
and chaffing good-humour that was a most remarkable characteristic. The
very name of Pink in Northamptonshire was synonymous of patient surgical
skill combined with a spontaneous gaiety and bluff good-humour.
"I've given over that bit of white fur to Red way," he went on. "And I
expect we shall find that the owner of it is also owner of the small
shoes. I know most of the girls of Sibberton--in fact, I've attended
all of them, I expect--but I can't suggest one who would, or even could,
wear such a shoe as that upon the woman who was present at the tragedy,
if not the actual assassin."
"Redway will make inquiries, I suppose?" I remarked in a faint hollow
voice.
"At my suggestion he has wired for assistance, and I only hope they'll
get a man down from London. If they don't--by Gad! I'll pay for one
myself. We must find this woman, Woodhouse," he added, rising and
tossing his cigarette-end into the grate. "We'll find her--at all
costs!"