WITHIN thirty minutes after Ackerman had received Stella’s message that
she had found the secret entrance to the house he was waiting for her at
the door of the vault as she had suggested.
He had entered by the rear wagon road and passed into the shrubbery
without attracting the attention of the servants.
She showed him the way to the underground passage through the niche
in the rear of the vault, and in ten minutes Ackerman entered the hall
through the panel under the stairs.
Stella, who had returned to the house across the lawn, watched the panel
slowly open at his touch and her eyes gleamed with a cold, hard light as
she saw reenacted in imagination the tragedy of her father’s death.
The detective made an accurate diagram of the hall, measured carefully
the distance of the secret door from the chair in which the Judge had
been found, and reëxamined the ballroom and all its possible exits and
entrances.
Stella returned to the entrance of the vault and placed a padlock and
chain on its iron door while Ackerman again entered the underground
passage and spent two hours alone, making the most minute examinations
and measurements of every track to be found at any point from the door
of the vault to the panel in the wainscoting. The work of measurement
was rendered easy by the accumulation of soft earth in the bottom of the
underground way from the action of the water which had soaked through
the brick ceiling and walls.
He discovered the footprints of eleven different men besides the dainty
mark of Stella’s little shoe made the night before.
He returned to the hall and asked her permission to come from time to
time and continue his study of the grounds.
“Certainly,” she answered eagerly. “And your discoveries?”
“Confirm so far my theory of the crime,” he answered quickly. “The
assassins undoubtedly entered the house by this secret passage,
committed the crime and passed quickly out without discovery. I did not
know who was with you last night, but he has been there at least once
before within the past few weeks.”
“Is it possible!” Stella exclaimed.
“I find,” he continued, “that he merely took a single step inside the
door leading from the vault into the underground passage as if he were
showing the way to others who traversed the entire length.”
Stella’s red lips were suddenly pressed tight and Ackerman watched her
keenly.
“This may mean something or it may mean nothing. It all depends on what
night he stepped inside the door.”
“I see,” she said cautiously.
“Other facts I have found are of significance,” he went on. “I have
located Mr. Isaac A. Postle, and learned from him two startling things.
First that he encountered John Graham at the gate on the night of the
murder--collided with him, he declares, as he was running from the
masked men who had just galloped past his cottage.”
The girl smothered a cry.
“He also says that later in the evening, just before the murder
occurred, he passed by the front door and saw John Graham seated on a
rustic bench in the shadows watching the house.”
“It’s horrible--it’s horrible!” Stella murmured. “The two statements
contradict each other. Uncle Isaac is lying at some point of his story.
If he ran for his life from the masqueraders he certainly would not have
returned to the house in thirty minutes while they were still there.
Until I can find the motive for that lie his story must be taken with a
large grain of salt. In the meantime if you can confirm for me his
statement that Graham was here on that night you will do me a service.”
“Within a week I’ll tell you,” she replied, the strange cold light
flashing again from her eyes.