“It was a foggy night, Mr Balfour?”
“There was a thin mist, yes. I glanced up and was considerably startled to see something that looked like a yellow blob in the middle of the pane. I got up from the desk and walked to the window. I felt no fear, only curiosity.”
Balfour changed gear and turned into a side-road, his features expressionless in the reflected light from the instrument-panel.
“Imagine my horror, Mr Pons, when I saw this soulless, inhuman face, seemingly made of wrinkled yellow skin with two black sockets where the eyes should have been!”
“How dreadful!” I exclaimed.
“You may say so, Dr Parker. I am afraid that I let out a cry and dropped my pen. The thing made off like lightning at that. It just withdrew from the window at a tremendous speed and disappeared in the fog. I ran out, roused Mrs Bracegirdle, got a powerful flash-light and searched the grounds.”
Solar Pons shook his head.
“Brave but singularly unwise, Mr Balfour.”
“Maybe, Mr Pons, but that is what happened. It is my nature to be impulsive.”
“Quite so. You found nothing?”
“Not a trace of anything, Mr Pons. And the path beneath the window is hard and would not retain the impression of a footprint. What do you think? I must confess that I have bolted and curtained the windows since that night.”
“You are extremely prudent, Mr Balfour,” said Solar Pons slowly. “This is a dark and sinister business.”
And he puffed silently at his pipe until we had arrived at our destination.
4
This proved to be a large, Edwardian mansion set back in its own grounds. The fog was so thick by this time that we could see little of our surroundings and conditions were so bad that our host almost ran the car past the carriage drive entrance. The tyres crunched frostily over the hardened ground as we eased up through shadowy clumps of rhododendron.
“A melancholy place, Pons,” I observed.
“As always, you are correct, Parker. And a suitable setting for such a tragedy as Mr Balfour has unfolded.”
We had drawn up in front of the entrance steps and the house was, as I had already observed, even more melancholy and sombre than I had imagined with the thick mist swirling about it. Before our host could descend from the driving seat, Pons had sprung down and with typical energy was already striding toward the facade of the building. I followed and saw, in a gap in the shrubbery, the small jutting turret of which our client had spoken.
There was a tarmacadam path in front of it and Pons already had his pocket lens out and was going up and down the surface, almost on his hands and knees. He rose to his feet, a disappointed look on his face, as Balfour joined us.
“Too hard, as I had expected. There is nothing there. This is your uncle’s study window, Mr Balfour?”
“Yes, Mr Pons. As you can see, it is most conveniently situated if visitors wished to attract my uncle’s attention.”
“Indeed,” said Solar Pons drily, casting his keen eyes over the broad expanse of glass, through which could be dimly glimpsed the interior of the room.
“And it is equally conveniently situated for the purposes of someone who intended your uncle harm.”
We followed Pons back along the path which ran behind the screen of shrubbery separating it from the main drive, until it debouched near the front entrance steps and the vehicle in which we had just arrived. I assisted Balfour in removing our luggage and then our host led the way up the steps to where the light of an electric lantern over the porch pricked the darkness.
“I will show you the estate tomorrow, Mr Pons,” said the young man, ushering us into a spacious hall on one side of which a warming fire blazed in a stone fireplace.
“It has only just turned ten o’clock and I am sure Mrs Bracegirdle will have something prepared for us.”
“A light meal only for my part,” said Solar Pons. “Though I must admit the journey and the coldness of the evening has put an unsuspected edge on my appetite.”
A door opening farther down the hall interrupted the conversation and a tall, distinguished-looking woman with greying hair advanced beneath the light of the electric chandelier which illuminated the hall.
“This is Mrs Bracegirdle,” said our host. “Mr Solar Pons and Dr Lyndon Parker, who will be staying with us for a few days.”
The housekeeper, who was dressed in a dark tweed suit with a touch of white at the throat bowed courteously.
“Welcome, gentlemen,” she said in a low, well-modulated voice.
She was about to pass out of the hall when Pons stopped her with a courteous movement.
“Before you go, Mrs Bracegirdle, there are one or two questions I should like to ask you. I believe you were devoted to the late Mr Charles Boldigrew?”
The woman looked at Pons with eyes which held an enigmatic expression.
“That is perfectly correct, Mr Pons.”
“Have you no theory about his death?”
Mrs Bracegirdle drew herself up.
“I do not follow you, Mr Pons.”
Solar Pons took off his hat, overcoat and scarf and laid them on top of a massive iron-bound chest that stood at one side of the hall.
“I think you follow me well enough, Mrs Bracegirdle.”
The housekeeper did not seem to take offence at my companion’s words but she visibly drew herself up as though to brace herself against an impending blow.
“I must repeat, sir, I do not understand your meaning.”
She glanced at her employer as though imploring his assistance but receiving no help from that quarter, sighed deeply. Solar Pons walked over toward the massive fireplace and held out his hands to the blaze.
“Oh, come now, Mrs Bracegirdle, it is not so very difficult. Mr Boldigrew had received a number of threats against him…”
“Mr Pons!”
Balfour was plainly shocked and staggered and I saw the housekeeper’s figure crumple, but she recovered herself admirably, though her face was white.
“How could you possibly know that, Mr Pons?” said the young man.
“It was elementary, Mr Balfour. Gentlemen of Mr Boldigrew’s wealth and standing do not change colour and almost collapse on receiving tradesmen’s bills. There was only one possible explanation when you told me of these occasions. Boldigrew had received some sort of threat through the post. What was it, Mrs Bracegirdle? Blackmail?”
The housekeeper moistened her lips and glanced imploringly at Balfour.
“Begging your pardon, Mr Balfour. I didn’t like deceiving you, but it looks as though this gentleman can read one’s very thoughts.”
“You are not so very far wide of the mark, Mrs Bracegirdle,” said I, with a triumphant glance at Pons.
We were all over by the fireplace now and Balfour gestured us into large leather chairs, set in a half-circle round the blaze. I sat and massaged the warmth back into my half-frozen fingers. The housekeeper, after nervously twisting and untwisting her hands for a few moments, broke the silence which had fallen upon us.
“It is true, Mr Pons. There was something. I had been Mr Boldigrew’s housekeeper for over thirty years. There were not many things about the family I did not know.”
Solar Pons’ face expressed keen interest in the firelight as he glanced at the housekeeper.
“For example?”
“Well, Mr Pons…”