"Did she drink before this estrangement?"
"Well, she took her glass, but now it is often a whole bottle of an evening. So Stephens, the butler, told me. It's all changed, Mr. Holmes, and there is something damned rotten about it. But then, again, what is master doing down at the old church crypt at night? And who is the man that meets him there?"
Holmes rubbed his hands.
"Go on, Mr. Mason. You get more and more interesting."
"It was the butler who saw him go. Twelve o'clock at night and raining hard. So next night I was up at the house and, sure enough, master was off again. Stephens and I went after him, but it was jumpy work, for it would have been a bad job if he had seen us. He's a terrible man with his fists if he gets started, and no respecter of persons. So we were shy of getting too near, but we marked him down all light. It was the haunted crypt that he was making for, and there was a man waiting for him there."
"What is this haunted cryp?"
"Well, sir, there is an old ruined chapel in the park. It is so old that nobody could fix its date. And under it there's a crypt which has a bad name among us. It's a dark, damp, lonely place by day, but there are few in that county that would have the nerve to go near it at night. But master's not afraid. He never feared anything in his life. But what is he doing there in the night-time?"
"Wait a bit!" said Holmes. "You say there is another man there. It must be one of your own stablemen, or someone from the house! Surely you have only to spot who it is and question him?"
"It's no one I know."
"How can you say that?"
"Because I have seen him, Mr. Holmes. It was on that second night. Sir Robert turned and passed us — me and Stephens, quaking in the bushes like two bunny-rabbits, for there was a bit of moon that night. But we could hear the other moving about behind. We were not afraid of him. So we up when Sir Robert was gone and pretended we were just having a walk like in the moonlight, and so we came right on him as casual and innocent as you please. 'Hullo, mate! who may you be?' says I. I guess he had not heard us coming, so he looked over his shoulder with a face as if he had seen the devil coming out of hell. He let out a yell, and away he went as hard as he could lick it in the darkness. He could run! — I'll give him that. In a minute he was out of sight and hearing, and who he was, or what he was, we never found."
"But you saw him clearly in the moonlight?"
"Yes, I would swear to his yellow face — a mean dog, I should say. What could he have in common with Sir Robert?"
Holmes sat for some time lost in thought.
"Who keeps Lady Beatrice Falder company?" he asked at last.
"There is her maid, Carrie Evans. She has been with her this five years."
"And is, no doubt, devoted?"
Mr. Mason shuffled uncomfortably.
"She's devoted enough," he answered at last. "But I won't say to whom."
"Ah!" said Holmes.
"I can't tell tales out of school."
"I quite understand, Mr. Mason. Of course, the situation is clear enough. From Dr. Watson's description of Sir Robert I can realize that no woman is safe from him. Don't you think the quarrel between brother and sister may lie there?"
"Well, the scandal has been pretty clear for a long time."
"But she may not have seen it before. Let us suppose that she has suddenly found it out. She wants to get rid of the woman. Her brother will not permit it. The invalid, with her weak heart and inability to get about, has no means of enforcing her will. The hated maid is still tied to her. The lady refuses to speak, sulks, takes to drink. Sir Robert in his anger takes her pet spaniel away from her. Does not all this hang together?"
"Well, it might do — so far as it goes."
"Exactly! As far as it goes. How would all that bear upon the visits by night to the old crypt? We can't fit that into our plot."
"No, sir, and there is something more that I can't fit in. Why should Sir Robert want to dig up a dead body?"
Holmes sat up abruptly.
"We only found it out yesterday — after I had written to you. Yesterday Sir Robert had gone to London, so Stephens and I went down to the crypt. It was all in order, sir, except that in one corner was a bit of a human body."
"You informed the police, I suppose?"
Our visitor smiled grimly.
"Well, sir, I think it would hardly interest them. It was just the head and a few bones of a mummy. It may have been a thousand years old. But it wasn't there before. That I'll swear, and so will Stephens. It had been stowed away in a corner and covered over with a board, but that corner had always been empty before."
"What did you do with it?"
"Well, we just left it there."
"That was wise. You say Sir Robert was away yesterday. Has he returned?"
"We expect him back to-day."
"When did Sir Robert give away his sister's dog?"
"It was just a week ago to-day. The creature was howling outside the old wellhouse, and Sir Robert was in one of his tantrums that morning. He caught it up, and I thought he would have killed it. Then he gave it to Sandy Bain, the jockey, and told him to take the dog to old Barnes at the Green Dragon, for he never wished to see it again."
Holmes sat for some time in silent thought. He had lit the oldest and foulest of his pipes.
"I am not clear yet what you want me to do in this matter, Mr. Mason," he said at last. "Can't you make it more definite?"
"Perhaps this will make it more definite, Mr. Holmes," said our visltor.
He took a paper from his pocket, and, unwrapping it carefully, he exposed a charred fragment of bone.
Holmes examined it with interest.
"Where did you get it?"
"There is a central heating furnace in the cellar under Lady Beatrice's room. It's been off for some time, but Sir Robert complained of cold and had it on again.
"Harvey runs it — he's one of my lads. This very morning he came to me with this which he found raking out the cinders. He didn't like the look of it."
"Nor do I," said Holmes. "What do you make of it, Watson?"
It was burned to a black cinder, but there could be no question as to its anatomical significance.
"It's the upper condyle of a human femur," said I.
"Exactly!" Holmes had become very serious. "When does this lad tend to the furnace?"
"He makes it up every evening and then leaves it."
"Then anyone could visit it during the night?"
"Yes, sir."
"Can you enter it from outside?"
"There is one door from outside. There is another which leads up by a stair to the passage in which Lady Beatrice's room is situated."
"These are deep waters, Mr. Mason; deep and rather dirty. You say that Sir Robert was not at home last night?"
"No, sir."
"Then, whoever was burning bones, it was not he."
"That's true. sir."
"What is the name of that inn you spoke of?"
"The Green Dragon."
"Is there good fishing in that part of Berkshire?" The honest trainer showed very clearly upon his face that he was convinced that yet another lunatic had come into his harassed life.
"Well, sir, I've heard there are trout in the mill-stream and pike in the Hall lake."
"That's good enough. Watson and I are famous fishermen — are we not, Watson? You may address us in future at the Green Dragon. We should reach it to-night. I need not say that we don't want to see you, Mr. Mason, but a note will reach us, and no doubt I could find you if I want you. When we have gone a little farther into the matter I will let you have a considered opinion."
Thus it was that on a bright May evening Holmes and I found ourselves alone in a first-class carriage and bound for the little "halt-on-demand" station of Shoscombe. The rack above us was covered with a formidable litter of rods, reels, and baskets. On reaching our destination a short drive took us to an old-fashioned tavern, where a sporting host, Josiah Barnes, entered eagerly into our plans for the extirpation of the fish of the neighbourhood.