XLIX
Though she waited up till nearly eleven, she did not see Dick, and, in response to the repeated hints of the girl, they went upstairs together.
The Manor was lighted by a power plant which was accommodated in a small shed midway between the house and the Ravensrill, and owed its installation to Dick’s enterprise.
Harry had always had candles in his room, Mary told her, but had accepted the lighting of his library as a compromise.
“It’s a very strange thing,” said Mary from her inner room, “but Harry was afraid of electricity. In thunderstorms he always went down into the cellar and stayed there until they were over. He used to have a bed which was made every day in the summer, in case of a storm coming on in the night, and——”
At that moment all the lights in the room went out.
“Have you turned the lights off?” asked Mary’s anxious voice.
“No, I haven’t been near the switch; I expect a fuse has gone,” said the girl.
There were matches and candles on the dressing table, she remembered, and, groping her way to the table, she lit the two candles. Mary was standing in the doorway, very pale and wide-eyed.
“What was the meaning of that?” she asked, her voice sharp with fear, which was beginning to communicate itself to Leslie.
She forced a smile.
“That happens in the best regulated houses,” she said, with spurious gaiety. “The door is locked, so there’s nothing to be afraid of.”
And then she heard footsteps in the corridor; there was a knock at the door that made Mary jump.
“Are you there, Leslie?” It was Dick’s voice. “Something has gone wrong with the lighting arrangements; we’ll put it right in a minute or two.”
“Are the lights out everywhere?” asked Mary, but he was gone.
Twenty minutes passed and again Leslie heard his footsteps approaching.
“I’m afraid we sha’n’t be able to fix up the lights till the morning. Have you candles? Did Glover put a flash light for you?”
“We’ve everything we want,” said Leslie. “Don’t worry about us: we shall be asleep in ten minutes.”
“Not me,” murmured Miss Wenner tremulously. “I sha’n’t sleep a wink!”
By the light of her candle she had replaced most of the garments she had discarded when the lights went out.
“I knew I oughtn’t to have stayed—there’s somebody coming along the corridor!”
“It is only Mr. Alford.”
But her ears caught the sound of two pairs of feet, and presently Dick’s voice spoke.
“Do you mind if I leave one of Puttler’s men outside your door?” he asked. “Don’t be alarmed if you hear him walking about in the night.”
“Is anything wrong, Dick?”
“No, no, nothing wrong; only I knew Miss Wenner was rather nervous.”
“I am,” quavered Miss Wenner loudly. “It’s very good of you, Mr. Alford.”
“You had better keep your windows fastened,” said Dick. “There is a system of ventilation in the room, so you needn’t be afraid of waking with a headache. Good-night.”
When he had gone, Mary Wenner looked solemnly at her companion.
“Did you hear what he said about keeping the windows shut?” she asked hollowly. “My Gawd!”
“Don’t be silly, Mary.”
Leslie was past feeling comfortable, but she had need to set an example.
“Come along, I’ll help you fasten the windows.”
“‘Keep the windows fastened,’” repeated Mary Wenner. “There’s something doing!”
They went from one to the other of the leaded windows, closed them and pressed down the catches. Suddenly Mary clutched the girl’s arm fiercely.
“There’s a man under my bed!” she gasped, staring wildly at the drooping counterpane.
With a fluttering heart Leslie lifted the cover, and pulled out a pair of riding boots, the soles of which the frightened secretary had seen, and they both laughed hysterically.
“I wish I could bring my bed into your room.” Mary looked helplessly at the heavy four-poster to which she had been assigned.
“You can come and sleep with me,” said Leslie. “I’ve got a big bed.” And this offer was most gratefully accepted.
“Have a look under your bed first,” said Miss Wenner nervously, and not till this ritual had been observed did she commence very slowly to undress.
Down below in the library, Dick was in consultation with Puttler, who had just returned from a hasty visit to Scotland Yard.
“The batteries were smashed, and an attempt had been made to cut the main cable,” reported Dick. “I got to the power house just after it happened, but I saw nobody.”
Puttler pulled at his comic little nose and there was a look of trouble in his brown eyes.
“The Commissioner thinks you ought to have a dozen men down here and make a clean-up,” he said. “I’ve brought three, and I think they all ought to be inside the house. One we’ve got in the east wing, another in the west, and a patrol in the hall. That will leave you and me and the local ‘flatties’ for the grounds. Though I think we might as well stay here—you want a battalion to patrol the estate properly. By the way, when I was looking round early this morning I found a great mound of earth in the northeast corner of the estate, near the river. One of your gamekeepers told me it was called Chelford Greed. What is the idea?”
Dick was not in an archæological mood, but he explained.
“One of my ancestors—I don’t know which one—planned and carried out a big steal. You probably know that the charter by which we received these lands from King Henry confines the northern boundary of the estate to the course of the Ravensrill, and the ingenious Chelford of the times had the idea of changing the course of the Ravensrill so that the estate would embrace another thousand acres. The Chelford Greed was the dam he built. The natural course of the Ravensrill runs through the Long Meadow. It was one of those clever little pieces of robbery that have made us landed proprietors what we are! As I say, I don’t know which of the Chelfords planned this piece of larceny, because there is no written record, and the legend has come down from mouth to mouth, so to speak.”
He looked up at the big portrait above the fireplace and shook his head.
“Lady,” he said softly, “you’ve given me a lot of trouble!”
Puttler was interested.
“As how?” he asked.
“I’ll tell you one of these days,” said Dick. “I wonder if those girls are asleep?”
He stole quietly up the stairs. The man on duty in the corridor flashed a lamp upon him as he approached.
“No sound,” he whispered, and Dick crept downstairs again.
It was arranged that he and Puttler should snatch a few hours’ sleep in turn, the other patrolling round and round the block of buildings. At two o’clock in the morning he was aroused from a deep slumber to feel Puttler shaking gently at his shoulder.
“Nothing has happened,” said the detective, eyeing with a friendly look the sofa from which Dick struggled. “I’ve warmed up some grub for you.”
A spirit stove was burning on the desk and the kettle above was steaming. Dick poured the black coffee into a glass and scalded himself to wakefulness.
“One of the local men thought he saw somebody moving and challenged,” reported Puttler, settling himself down with a luxurious sigh. “But it was probably only a bush. These birds are jumpy—they see a Black Abbot in every shadow!”
Dick sipped at the boiling fluid and broke a biscuit with his disengaged hand.
“Thank God, this can’t go on much longer!” he said. “By the way, did you bring those papers from London?”
“I gave them to you in the library: they were in the blue envelope.”
Dick put down the glass.
“I’d better keep them in my safe,” he said. “I don’t want the servants to see them.”
He crossed the hall, unlocked the door of the library and went in, mechanically switching on the light, and only then remembering that for the time being Fossaway Manor was denied the service of the little power house. He went back to the study and got his lamp and picked his way across the room to the desk. The envelope was where he had put it, and he slipped this into his pocket. As he did so, he was aware that a cold wind was blowing. He sent his light along the windows. That at the end was open; one of the curtains, which had been drawn across lay in a heap on the ground.
He went to the door and called Puttler softly and the detective joined him.
“Somebody has been here,” he said, and pointed to the curtain and the twisted pole that had supported it.
It was easy to see how the intruder had made his way into the library. Two of the panes near the iron handle which fastened one leaf of the window had been broken, and evidently the midnight visitor, in entering, must have fallen and, catching hold of the curtain to save himself, brought it to the ground, breaking away the pole which was hanging drunkenly.
“I passed here ten minutes ago, and the window was shut then,” said Puttler.
“He may have been inside at the moment,” replied Dick thoughtfully. “I wonder what has been taken?”
He examined the desk. Evidently the intruder had not opened any of the drawers, though, if he had done so, his labours would have been in vain, since Dick had cleared every document out of the room early in the day. As they circulated the room, Puttler stumbled over something.
“Where did this come from?” he asked.
It was a light ladder, and Dick recognized it as one of two that were part of the library furniture, and was employed to reach books from the top shelf of the lower tier.
“When I saw this last it was standing at the end of the room,” he said.
He flashed his lamp up on to the shelves, looking for a gap in the long line of books. So doing, his lamp swept across that space intervening between the shelves which was covered by the portrait of the late Lady Chelford. He could see the big gold frame, caught a glimpse of one white hand hanging gracefully, and then something brought his lamp back. He heard the churchwarden detective swear softly. Himself, he was speechless. The light of his lamp focussed on the place where the woman’s face had been, and where now was a black emptiness.
The face and shoulders of the picture had been cut from the frame, and the ragged strands of canvas told him that it had been cut by an unskilful hand.