"To see if they could get any clue to his disappearance," replied the Earl.
"And they found-that!" retorted Joseph.
"In the housekeeper's room," said the Earl. "She may have appropriated the jewels."
"I think your lordship must see that that is very unlikely-without collusion between Horbury and herself," remarked Gabriel.
"Mrs. Carswell," said Joseph, "has always been more or less of a mysterious person. We know nothing about her. I don't even know where Horbury got her from. But-the probability is that they were in collusion, and that when he went, she stayed behind, to ascertain how things turned out on his disappearance; and that she fled when it began to appear that searching inquiries were to be made into which she might be drawn."
The Earl made no reply. He recognized that the Chestermarke observations and suggestions were rather more than plausible, and much as he fought against the idea of the missing manager's dishonesty, he could not deny that the circumstances as set forth by the bankers were suspicious.
"Your lordship will, of course, follow up this woman?" said Gabriel, after a brief silence.
"I suppose the police will," replied the Earl. "But-aren't you going to do anything yourselves, Mr. Chestermarke? You told me, you know, that certain securities of yours were missing."
Gabriel glanced at his nephew-and Joseph nodded.
"Oh, well!" answered Gabriel. "We don't mind telling your lordship-and if your lordship pleases, you may tell the police-we are doing something. We have, in fact, been doing something from an early hour. We have a very clever man at work just now-he has been at work since he heard from us twenty-four hours ago. But-our ideas are not those of Polke. Polke begins his inquiries here. Our inquiries-based on our knowledge-begin … elsewhere."
"You think Horbury will be heard of-elsewhere?" suggested the Earl.
"Much more likely to be heard of elsewhere than here, my lord!" asserted Gabriel.
"But, of course, what we do need not interfere with anything that your lordship does, or that Miss Fosdyke does, or that the police do."
"All that any of us want, I suppose, is to find Horbury," said the Earl, as he rose. "If he's found, then, I conclude, some explanation will result. You don't believe in searching about here, then?"
"Let Polke and his men have their way, my lord," replied Gabriel, with a wave of his hand. "My impression of police methods is that those who follow them can only follow that particular path. We are not looking for Horbury-here. He's-elsewhere."
"So, by this time, are your lordship's jewels," added Joseph significantly. "They, one may be sure, are not going to be found in or about Scarnham."
The Earl said good-day and went out, troubled and wondering. In the hall he met the search-party. Mr. Batterley had failed to find anything in the way of secret stairs or passages or openings beyond those already known to the occupants, and though he was still confident that they existed, the police had wound up their present investigations to turn to more palpable things. Polke and the detective listened to the Earl's account of his interview, and the superintendent sniffed at the mention of the inquiries instituted by the partners.
"Ah!" he said incredulously. "Just so! Private inquiry agent, no doubt. All right-let 'em do what they like. But we're going to do what we like, my lord, and what we do will be on very different lines. First thing now-we want that woman!" CHAPTER XIV
THE MIDNIGHT SUMMONS
The search-party separated outside the bank, not too well satisfied with the result of its labours. The old antiquary walked away obviously nettled that he was not allowed to pursue his investigations further; Betty Fosdyke and the solicitor went across to the hotel in deep conference; the Earl accompanied Starmidge and Polke to the police-station. And there the detective laid down a firm outline of the next immediate procedure. It was of no use to half-do things, he said-they must rouse wholesale attention. Once more the press must be made use of-the sudden disappearance of Mrs. Carswell must be noised abroad in the next morning's papers. A police notice describing her must be got out and sent all over the kingdom. And-last, but certainly not least-Lord Ellersdeane must offer a substantial reward for the recovery of, or news of, his missing property. Let the Chestermarkes adopt their own method-if they had any-of finding the alleged absconding manager; he, Starmidge, preferred to solve these mysteries by ways of his own.
It was growing near to dusk when all their necessary arrangements had been made, and Starmidge was free to seek his long-delayed dinner. He had put himself up, of his own choice, at a quiet and old-fashioned inn near the police-station, where he had engaged a couple of rooms and found a landlady to his liking. He repaired to this retreat now, and ate and drank in quiet, and smoked a peaceful pipe afterwards, and was glad of a period of rest. But as he took his ease, he thought and pondered, and by the time that evening had fairly settled over the little town, he went out into the streets and sought the ancient corner of Scarnham which was called Cornmarket.
Starmidge wanted to take a look at the house in which Joseph Chestermarke spent his bachelor existence. Since his own arrival in the town, he had been learning all he could about the two Chestermarkes, and he was puzzled about them. For a man who was still young, Starmidge had seen a good deal of the queer side of life, and had known a good many strange people, but so far he had never come across two such apparently curious characters as the uncle and nephew who ran the old-fashioned bank. Their evident indifference to public opinion puzzled him. He could not understand their ice-cold defiance of what he himself called law. He never remembered being treated as they had treated him. For Starmidge, when on duty, considered himself as much the representative of Justice as any ermined and coifed judge could be, and he had been accustomed-so far-to attentive and respectful consideration. But neither Gabriel nor Joseph Chestermarke appeared to have any proper appreciation of the dignity of a detective-sergeant of the Criminal Investigation Department, and their eyes had regarded him as if he were something very inferior indeed. Starmidge, though by no means a vain man, felt nettled by such treatment, and he accordingly formed something very like a prejudice against the two partners. That prejudice was quickly followed by suspicion-especially in the case of Joseph Chestermarke. According to Starmidge's ideas, the bankers, if they really believed Horbury to have absconded, if certain securities of theirs really were missing, if they really thought that Horbury had carried them off, and the Countess of Ellersdeane's jewels with him, ought to have placed every information in their power at the disposal of the police: it was suspicious, and strange, and not at all proper, that they didn't. And it was suspicious, too, that the housekeeper, Mrs. Carswell, should take herself off after a brief exchange of words with Joseph. It looked very much as if the junior partner had either warned her to go, or had told her to go. Why had she gone then ?-when she might have gone before. And why in such haste? Clearly, considering everything, there were grounds for believing that there was some secret between Mrs. Carswell and Joseph Chestermarke.
Anyway, rightly or wrongly, Starmidge was suspicious of the junior partner in Chestermarke's Bank, and he wanted to know everything that he could find out about him. He had already learnt that Joseph, like his uncle, was a confirmed bachelor, and lived in an old house at the corner of Cornmarket, somewhat-so far as the town-folk could judge-after the fashion of a hermit. Starmidge would have given a good deal for a really good excuse to call on Joseph Chestermarke at that house, so that he might see the inside of it: indeed, if he had only met with a better reception at the bank, he would have invented such an excuse. But if Gabriel was icily stand-offish, Joseph was openly sneering and contemptuous, and the detective knew that no excuse would give him admittance. Still, there was the outside: he would take a look at that. Starmidge was a young man of ideas as well as of ability, and without exactly shaping his thought in so many words, he felt-vaguely perhaps, but none the less strongly-that just as you can size up some men by the clothes they wear, so you can get an idea of others by the outer look of the houses which shelter them.