“Where are you going, Mrs. Fisher?” I demanded. “What has happened here?”
“To Madame, to Madame,” she sobbed, pointing toward the corridor which communicated with Madame de Stämer’s bedchamber.
I heard a frightened cry proceeding from that direction, and recognized the voice of Nita, the girl who acted as Madame’s maid. Then I heard Val Beverley.
“Go and fetch Mrs. Fisher, Nita, at once— and try to behave yourself. I have trouble enough.”
I entered the corridor and pulled up short. Val Beverley, fully dressed, was kneeling beside Madame de Stämer, who wore a kimono over her night-robe, and who lay huddled on the floor immediately outside the door of her room!
“Oh, Mr. Knox!” cried the girl, pitifully, and raised frightened eyes to me. “For God’s sake, what has happened?”
Nita, the Spanish girl, who was sobbing hysterically, ran along to join Mrs. Fisher.
“I will tell you in a moment,” I said, quietly, rendered cool, as one always is, by the need of others. “But first tell me— how did Madame de Stämer get here?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know! I was startled by the shot. It has awakened everybody. And just as I opened my door to listen, I heard Madame cry out in the hall below. I ran down, turned on the light, and found her lying here. She, too, had been awakened, I suppose, and was endeavouring to drag herself from her room when her strength failed her and she swooned. She is too heavy for me to lift,” added the girl, pathetically, “and Pedro is out of his senses, and Nita, who was the first of the servants to come, is simply hysterical, as you can see.”
I nodded reassuringly, and stooping, lifted the swooning woman. She was much heavier than I should have supposed, but, Val Beverley leading the way, I carried her into her apartment and placed her upon the bed.
“I will leave her to you,” I said. “You have courage, and so I will tell you what has happened.”
“Yes, tell me, oh, tell me!”
She laid her hands upon my shoulders appealingly, and looked up into my eyes in a way that made me long to take her in my arms and comfort her, an insane longing which I only crushed with difficulty.
“Someone has shot Colonel Menendez,” I said, in a low voice, for Mrs. Fisher had just entered.
“You mean— ”
I nodded.
“Oh!”
Val Beverley opened and closed her eyes, clutching at me dizzily for a moment, then:
“I think,” she whispered, “she must have known, and that was why she swooned. Oh, my God! how horrible.”
I made her sit down in an armchair, and watched her anxiously, but although every speck of colour had faded from her cheeks, she was splendidly courageous, and almost immediately she smiled up at me, very wanly, but confidently.
“I will look after her,” she said. “Mr. Harley will need your assistance.”
When I returned to the hall I found it already filled with a number of servants incongruously attired. Carter the chauffeur, who lived at the lodge, was just coming in at the door, and:
“Carter,” I said, “get a car out quickly, and bring the nearest doctor. If there is another man who can drive, send him for the police. Your master has been shot.”
Chapter 18 INSPECTOR AYLESBURY OF MARKET HILTON
“Now, gentlemen,” said Inspector Aylesbury, “I will take evidence.”
Dawn was creeping grayly over the hills, and the view from the library windows resembled a study by Bastien-Lepage. The lamps burned yellowly, and the exotic appointments of the library viewed in that cold light for some reason reminded me of a stage set seen in daylight. The Velasquez portrait mentally translated me to the billiard room where something lay upon the settee with a white sheet drawn over it; and I wondered if my own face looked as wan and comfortless as did the faces of my companions, that is, of two of them, for I must except Inspector Aylesbury.
Squarely before the oaken mantel he stood, a large, pompous man, but in this hour I could find no humour in Paul Harley’s description of him as resembling a walrus. He had a large auburn moustache tinged with gray, and prominent brown eyes, but the lower part of his face, which terminated in a big double chin, was ill-balanced by his small forehead. He was bulkily built, and I had conceived an unreasonable distaste for his puffy hands. His official air and oratorical manner were provoking.
Harley sat in the chair which he had occupied during our last interview with Colonel Menendez in the library, and I had realized— a realization which had made me uncomfortable— that I was seated upon the couch on which the Colonel had reclined. Only one other was present, Dr. Rolleston of Mid-Hatton, a slight, fair man with a brisk, military manner, acquired perhaps during six years of war service. He was standing beside me smoking a cigarette.
“I have taken all the necessary particulars concerning the position of the body,” continued the Inspector, “the nature of the wound, contents of pockets, etc., and I now turn to you, Mr. Harley, as the first person to discover the murdered man.”
Paul Harley lay back in the armchair watching the speaker.
“Before we come to what happened here to-night I should like to be quite clear about your own position in the matter, Mr. Harley. Now”— Inspector Aylesbury raised one finger in forensic manner— “now, you visited me yesterday afternoon, Mr. Harley, and asked for certain information regarding the neighbourhood.”
“I did,” said Harley, shortly.
“The questions which you asked me were,” continued the Inspector, slowly and impressively, “did I know of any negro or coloured people living in, or about, Mid-Hatton, and could I give you a list of the residents within a two-mile radius of Cray’s Folly. I gave you the information which you required, and now it is your turn to give me some. Why did you ask those questions?”
“For this reason,” was the reply— “I had been requested by Colonel Menendez to visit Cray’s Folly, accompanied by my friend, Mr. Knox, in order that I might investigate certain occurrences which had taken place here.”
“Oh,” said the Inspector, raising his eyebrows, “I see. You were here to make investigations?”
“Yes.”
“And these occurrences, will you tell me what they were?”
“Simple enough in themselves,” replied Harley. “Someone broke into the house one night.”
“Broke into the house?”
“Undoubtedly.”
“But this was never reported to us.”
“Possibly not, but someone broke in, nevertheless. Secondly, Colonel Menendez had detected someone lurking about the lawns, and thirdly, the wing of a bat was nailed to the main door.”
Inspector Aylesbury lowered his eyebrows and concentrated a frowning glance upon the speaker.
“Of course, sir,” he said, “I don’t want to jump to conclusions, but you are not by any chance trying to be funny at a time like this?”
“My sense of humour has failed me entirely,” replied Harley. “I am merely stating bald facts in reply to your questions.”
“Oh, I see.”
The Inspector cleared his throat.
“Someone broke into Cray’s Folly, then, a fact which was not reported to me, a suspicious loiterer was seen in the grounds, again not reported, and someone played a silly practical joke by nailing the wing of a bat, you say, to the door. Might I ask, Mr. Harley, why you mention this matter? The other things are serious, but why you should mention the trick of some mischievous boy at a time like this I can’t imagine.”
“No,” said Harley, wearily, “it does sound absurd, Inspector; I quite appreciate the fact. But, you see, Colonel Menendez regarded it as the most significant episode of them all.”