“Well, Inspector?” he said at last.
The little detective’s head shook out a negative.
“Perhaps it is a matter of reward,” said the manager.
“No, Mr. Ransome; but it is becoming one of my personal reputation.”
“Then, by thunder, you are in danger of losing it! Why don’t you and your friend there hustle instead of loitering around as if you were paid by the job. I tell you, man, there are thousands, hundreds of thousands melting, slipping through our fingers, every hour of the day.”
He sprang from his seat and started his walk again, up and down, up and down, as we had just seen him.
“Shall you be returning to London?”
At the question the manager halted in his stride, staring sharply down into Hartley’s face.
“No,” he said, “I shall stay here. Inspector, until such time as you have something definite to tell me.”
“I have an inquiry to make which I would rather place in the hands of some one who has personal knowledge of Mr. Ford. Neither Mr. Harbord nor yourself desires to leave Meudon. Is there any one else you can suggest?”
“There is Jackson, Ford’s valet.” said Ransome after a moment’s thought. “He can go if you think him bright enough. I’ll send for him.”
While the footman who answered the bell was gone upon his errand we waited in uneasy silence. There was the shadow of mystery upon us all. Jack-son, as he entered, was the only one who seemed at his ease. He stood there a tall figure of all the respectabilities.
“The Inspector here wishes you to go to London, Jackson,” said the manager. “He will explain the details. There is a train from Camdon at twelve.”
“Certainly, sir. Do I return to-night?”
“No, Jackson,” said Hartley; “it will take a day or two.”
The man took a couple of steps toward the door, hesitated and then returned to his former place.
“I beg your pardon, sir.” he began, addressing Ransome, “but I would rather remain at Meudon under present circumstances.”
“What the devil do you mean?” thundered the manager.
“Well, sir, I was the last to see Mr. Ford. There is, as it were, a suspicion upon me. I should like to be present while the search continues both for his sake — and my own.”
“Very kind of you, I’m sure,” growled Ransome, “but you either do what I tell you, Jackson, or you can look for another job. So be quick and make up your mind.”
“I think you are treating me most unfairly, sir. But I cannot be persuaded out of what I know to be my duty.”
“You impertinent rascal—” began the furious manager. But Hartley was already on his feet with a hand outstretched.
“Perhaps, after all, I can make other arrangements with Mr. Ransome,” he said. “It is natural that Jackson should consider his own reputation in this affair. That is all, Jackson; you may go now.”
It was half an hour afterward, when the end of breakfast had dispersed the party, that I spoke to Hartley about it, offering to go to London myself and to do my best to carry out his instructions.
“I had bad luck in my call for volunteers,” he said.
“I should have thought they would have been glad enough to get the chance of work. They can find no particular amusement in loafing about the place all day.”
“Doubtless they all had excellent reasons,” he said with a little smile. “But, anyway, you cannot be spared, Mr. Phillips.”
“You flatter me.”
“I want you to stay in your bedroom. Write, read, do what you like — but keep your door ajar. If any one passes down the corridor, see where he goes — only don’t let him know that you are watching him if you can help it. I will take my turn at half past one. I don’t mean to starve you.”
I obeyed. After all, it was in a manner promotion that Hartley had given me.
Yet it was a tedious, anxious time. No one came my way barring a sour-looking house-maid. I tried to argue out the case, but the deeper I got the more conflicting grew my theories. I was never more glad to see a friendly face than when the little man came in upon me.
The short winter’s afternoon crept on, the Inspector and I taking turn and turn about in our sentry duty. Dinner-time came and went. I had been off since nine and at ten thirty I poured out a whisky and soda and went back to join him. He was sitting in the middle of the room, smoking a pipe in great apparent satisfaction.
“Bedtime, isn’t it?” I grumbled, sniffing at the strong tobacco.
“Oh, no,” he said. “The fact is, we are going to sit up all night.”
I threw myself on a couch by the window without reply; perhaps I was not in the best of tempers; certainly I did not feel so.
“You insisted on coming down with me,” he suggested.
“I know all about that,” I told him; “I haven’t complained, have I? If you want me to shut myself up for a week I’ll do it; but I should prefer to have some idea of the reason why.”
“I don’t wish to create mysteries, Mr. Phillips,” he said kindly. “But, believe me, there is nothing to be gained and much that may be lost in vague discussions.”
I knew that settled it as far as he was concerned, so I nodded my head and filled a pipe. At eleven he walked across the room and switched off the light.
“If nothing happens you can take your time at the wheel in four hours from now,” he said. “In the meanwhile get to sleep. I will keep the first watch.”
I shut my eyes, but there was no rest in me that night. I lay listening to the silence of the old house with a dull speculation. Somewhere far down in the lower floor a great gong-like clock chimed the hours and quarters. I heard them every one, from twelve to one, from one to two. Hartley had stopped smoking and sat silent.
It must have been some fifteen minutes after two that I heard the faint creak of a board in the corridor outside. I sat up, every nerve strung to a tense alertness. Then there came a sound I knew well, the soft drawing touch of a hand groping in the darkness as some one felt his way along the paneled walls. It passed us and was gone. Yet Hartley never moved. Could he have fallen asleep? I whispered his name.
“Hush.”
The answer came to me like a gentle sigh.
One minute, two minutes more and the room sprang into sight under the steady glow of an electric hand-lamp. Inspector Hartley rose from his seat and slid through the door with me upon his heels. The light he carried searched the clustered shadows; but the corridor was empty. Nor was there any place where a man might hide.
“You waited too long,” I whispered impatiently.
“The man is no fool, Mr. Phillips. Do you imagine that he was not listening and staring like a hunted beast. A noisy board, a stumble or a flash of light and — we should have wasted a tiring day.”
“Nevertheless he has got clear away.”
“I think not.”
As we crept forward I saw that a strip of the oak flooring along the walls was gray with dust. If it had been in such a neglected state in the afternoon I should surely have noticed it. In some curiosity I stooped to examine the phenomenon.
“Flour,” whispered the little man, touching my shoulder.
“Flour?”
“Yes. I sprinkled it myself. Look — there is the first result.” He steadied his light as he spoke, pointing with his other hand. On the powdery surface was the half-footprint of a man.
The flour did not extend more than a couple of feet from the walls, so that it was only here and there that we caught up the trail. We had passed the bedroom on the left — yet the footprints still went on; we were at the store-room door, yet they still were visible before us. There was no other egress from the corridor. The tall window at the end was, as I knew, a good twenty feet from the ground. Had this man also vanished off the earth like Silas Ford?