CHAPTER VI

The butler left the moat-house at a brisk pace which became almost a run

after he crossed the moat bridge. His way across the park lay along the

carriage drive, bordered by an avenue of tall trees, between an

ornamental lake and some thick game covers, and then through the outer

fields to the village.

It was a soft and mellow September night, with a violet sky overhead

sprinkled with silver. But a touch of autumn decay was in the air, which

was heavy and still, and a white mist was rising in thick, sluggish

clouds from the green, stagnant surface of the lake. The wood was veiled

in blackness, in which the trunks of the trees were just visible,

standing in straight, regular rows, like soldiers at attention.

Tufnell hurried along this lonely spot, casting timid glances around

him. He was not a nervous man at ordinary times, but like many country

people, he had a vein of superstition running through his phlegmatic

temperament, and the events of the night had swept away his calmness.

The croaking of the frogs and the whispering of the trees filled him

with uneasiness, and he kept glancing backwards and forwards from the

lake to the wood, as though he feared the murderer might suddenly appear

from the misty surface of the one or the dim recesses of the other.

He had almost reached the confines of the wood when he was startled by a

loud whirr, which he recognized as the flight of a covey of partridges

from a cover close at hand. What had startled them? Glancing fearfully

around him he saw, or thought he saw, the crouching figure of a man in

one of the bypaths of the wood, partly hidden by the thick branches

which stretched across the path a short distance from the drive.

Tufnell's first impulse was to take to his heels, but he was saved from

this ignominious act by the timely recollection that he was an

Englishman, whose glorious privilege it is to be born without fear. So

he stood still, and in a voice which had something of a quaver in it,

called out:

"Who is there?"

In the wood a bird gave a single call like the note of a flute, the wind

murmured in the tall avenue of trees, a frog splashed in the still

waters of the lake, but there was no sound of human life. Glancing

cautiously into the wood, the butler could no longer see anything

crouching in the path. The man--if it had been a man--had vanished.

"It may have been my fancy," muttered the butler, speaking aloud as

though to reassure himself by hearing his own voice.

He walked quickly onward, and was relieved when he had left the wood

behind him, and could see the faint lights of the village twinkling

beyond the fields. Crossing a footbridge which spanned a narrow stream

at the bottom of the meadows, Tufnell climbed over a stile, and walked

along the road on the other side until he reached a cottage standing

some distance back from the road at the summit of a gentle slope.

Tufnell ascended the slope and knocked loudly at the cottage door.

After the lapse of a few moments the door was opened by a woman with a

candle in her hand--a stout countrywoman of forty, with a curved nose,

prominent teeth, and hair screwed up in a tight knob at the back of her

head. Her small grey eyes, scanning the visitor at the door, showed both

surprise and deference. The butler of the moat-house was not in the

habit of mixing with the villagers, and by them he was accounted

something of a personage. He not only shone with the reflected glory of

the big house, but was respected on his own merit as a "snug" man, who

had saved money, and had a little property of his own.

"Is your husband at home, Mrs. Lumbe?" he asked, in response to her mute

glance of inquiry. He spoke condescendingly, like a man who recognized

the social gulf between them, but believed in being polite to the lower

orders.

"Yes, he is in, Mr. Tufnell. Will you come inside?"

The butler rubbed his boots carefully on the doormat, and followed the

woman down a narrow passage to a small sitting-room at the end of it,

where a man was sitting, reading a newspaper and smoking a pipe.

"Robert," said the woman, "here is Mr. Tufnell to see you."

The man looked up from his newspaper in some surprise, and got up to

greet his visitor. He was not in uniform, and his rough, ungainly figure

and round red face revealed the countryman, but from the crown of his

close-cropped bullet head to his thick-soled boots he looked like a

rural policeman. There was an awkward pose about him as he stood up--a

clumsy effort to maintain the semblance of an official dignity. The

questioning look his ferret eyes cast at the butler through the haze of

tobacco smoke which filled the room indicated his impression that the

visit was not merely a neighbourly call. Tufnell did not leave him in

doubt on the point.

"You are wanted at the moat-house at once, Sergeant Lumbe," he said

gravely. "A terrible crime has been committed. Mrs. Heredith has been

murdered."

"Murdered!" ejaculated the sergeant, looking vacantly across the table

at his wife, who had given vent to a cry of horror. "Murdered!" he

repeated, as though seeking to assure himself of the truth of the

butler's statement by a repetition of the word.

"Yes. She was shot in her bedroom a little while ago while the other

guests were at dinner. You must come at once."

Sergeant Lumbe laid his pipe on the table with a trembling hand. He was

overwhelmed by the magnitude of the catastrophe, and hardly knew what to

do. His previous experience of crime was confined to an occasional

arrest of the village drunkard, who invariably went with him

confidingly. His eye wandered to a bookcase in the corner of the room,

as if he would have liked to consult a "Police Code" which was

prominently displayed on one of the shelves. Apparently he realized the

indignity of such a course in the presence of a member of the public, so

he turned to Tufnell and said:

"I'll go with you, but I must first put on my tunic."

"Be as quick as you can," said the butler, taking a chair.

Sergeant Lumbe went into an inner room, where his wife followed him.

Tufnell heard them whispering as they moved about. Then Sergeant Lumbe

hastily emerged buttoning his tunic. There was an eager look on his

face.

"The wife has been saying that we ought to take her brother along," he

said. "He belongs to Scotland Yard. He's spending his holidays with us."

"Where is he?" asked Tufnell, impressed by the magic of the name of

Scotland Yard.

"He's just stepped over to the _Fox and Knot_ to have a game of

billiards, finding it a bit lonesome here, after London. Do you think we

might send for him and take him with us?"

"I think it would be a very good idea," said Tufnell. "But can he be got

at once?" he added, with a glance at the little clock on the

mantelpiece. "The sooner we return the better."

"The wife can bring him while I am changing my boots. Hurry down to the

_Fox_, Maggie, and tell Tom he's wanted at once."

"Don't tell him what it's for until you get him outside," hastily

counselled the butler as the policeman's wife was departing on her

errand. "Sir Philip won't like it if he hears that what happened

to-night was discussed in the _Fox_ tap-room."

The little clock on the mantelpiece had barely ticked off five

additional minutes when Mrs. Lumbe returned in a breathless state,

accompanied by a young man with billiard chalk on his coat and hands.

"This is my brother, Detective Caldew," said Mrs. Lumbe, between pants,

to the butler. "I told him about the murder, and we hurried back as fast

as we could."

"It's a horrible crime, and we must lose no time while there is still a

chance of catching the murderer," said the young man, regaining his

breath more easily than his stout sister. He brushed the billiard chalk

off his clothes as he spoke. "Let us go at once."

Tufnell cast a curious glance at the new-comer. He saw a man of about

thirty-five, tall, well-built and dark, with a clean-shaven face and

rather intelligent eyes under thick dark brows. He had some difficulty

in recognizing Detective Caldew as the village urchin of a score of

years before who had touched his cap to the moat-house butler as a great

personage, second only in importance to Sir Philip Heredith himself.

Tufnell was not aware that in the former village boy who had become a

London detective he was in the presence of a young man of soaring

ambition. Caldew had gone to London fifteen years before with the idea

of bettering himself. After tramping the streets of the metropolis for

some months in a vain quest for work, he had enlisted in the

metropolitan police force rather than return to his native village and

report himself a failure. At the end of two years' service as a

policeman he had been given the choice of transfer to the Criminal

Investigation Department of Scotland Yard. He had gladly accepted the

opportunity, and had shown so much aptitude for plain-clothes work that

by the end of another two years he had risen to the rank of detective.

Caldew thought he was on the rapid road to further promotion, and had

married on the strength of that belief. But another ten years had passed

since then, and he still occupied a subordinate position, with not much

hope of promotion unless luck came his way. And there seemed very little

chance of that. Caldew's professional experience had imbued him with the

belief that the junior officers of Scotland Yard existed for no other

purpose than to shoulder the blame for the mistakes of their official

superiors, who divided amongst themselves the plums of promotion,

rewards, and newspaper publicity. That, of course, was the recognized

thing in all public departments. Caldew found no fault with the system.

His great ambition was to obtain some opening which would bring him

advancement and his share of the plums.

He believed his opportunity had arrived that night. It had always been

his dream to have the chance to unravel single-handed some great

crime--a murder for choice--in which he alone should have all the glory

and praise and newspaper paragraphs. He determined to make the most of

the lucky chance which had fallen into his hands, before anybody else

could arrive on the scene. He had confidence in his own abilities, and

thought he had all the qualifications necessary to make a great

detective. He was, at all events, sufficiently acute to realize that

opportunity seldom knocks twice at any man's door.

The three men set out for the moat-house. At the butler's request

Sergeant Lumbe went ahead to summon the doctor, who lived on the other

side of the village green, and while he was gone Caldew drew the details

of the crime from his companion. Lumbe rejoined them at the footbridge

which led across the meadows into the Heredith estate, and they

proceeded on their way in silence. Sergeant Lumbe's brain--such as it

was--was in too much of a whirl to permit him to talk coherently;

Tufnell, habitually a taciturn individual, had been rendered more so

than usual by the events of the night; and Caldew was plunged into such

a reverie of pleasurable expectation, regarding the outcome of his

investigations of the moat-house murder, that the stages of his

promotion through the grades of detective, sub-superintendent, and

superintendent, flashed through his mind as rapidly as telegraph poles

flit past a traveller in a railway carriage. The crime which had struck

down one human being in the dawn of youth and beauty, turned another

into a murderer, and plunged an old English family into horror and

misery, afforded Detective Caldew's optimistic temperament such extreme

gratification that he could scarcely forbear from whistling aloud. But

that is human nature.

They passed through the wood, and crossed the moat bridge. The mist was

creeping out of the darkness on both sides of the moat-house, casting a

film across the faint light which gleamed from one or two of the heavily

shuttered windows. Caldew, pausing midway on the bridge to glance at the

mist-spirals stealing up like a troop of ghosts, asked his

brother-in-law if the moat was still kept full of water. He received an

affirmative reply, and walked on again.

A maidservant answered Tufnell's ring at the front door, and informed

him in a whisper that Sir Philip and Miss Heredith were in the

drawing-room. Thither they bent their steps, and found Musard awaiting

them near the door. He nodded to Sergeant Lumbe, whom he knew, and

glanced interrogatively at Caldew. Lumbe announced the latter's

identity.

"You had better come in here first," said Musard, opening the door of

the drawing-room and revealing the baronet and Miss Heredith sitting

within. Brother and sister glanced at the group entering the room.

"This is Detective Caldew, of Scotland Yard," Musard explained to them,

indicating the young man. "He is staying with Lumbe, who thought it

advisable to bring him."

"Have you told them everything?" Miss Heredith spoke to Tufnell. Her dry

lips formed the words rather than uttered them, but the old retainer

understood her, and bowed without speaking. "What do you wish to do

first, Detective Caldew?" she added, turning to him, and speaking with

more composure. She was quick to realize that he would take the lead in

the police investigations. A glance at Sergeant Lumbe's flustered face

revealed only too clearly that the position in which he found himself

was beyond his official capabilities.

Caldew stepped briskly forward. He was in no way embarrassed by his

unaccustomed surroundings or by the commanding appearance of the great

lady who was addressing him. He was a man who believed in himself, and

such men are too much in earnest to be diffident.

"I should like to ask a few questions first, madam," he said. "So far, I

have heard only your butler's version of what happened." Without waiting

for a reply he launched a number of questions, and made a note of the

replies in a pocket-book.

Musard, who assisted Miss Heredith to answer the questions, was rather

impressed by the quick intelligence the detective displayed in eliciting

all the known facts of the murder, but Sergeant Lumbe, who remained

standing near the door, was shocked to hear Caldew cross-questioning the

great folk of the moat-house with such little ceremony. He thought his

brother-in-law a very forward young fellow, and hoped that Miss Heredith

would not hold him responsible for his free-and-easy manner.

"Now I should like to commence my investigations," said Caldew,

replacing his pocket-book. "There has been too much time lost already. I

will start with examining the room where the body is, if you please."

"Certainly." Miss Heredith rose from her seat as she uttered the word.

"My dear Alethea!"--Musard's tone was expostulatory--"I will take the

detective upstairs. There is no need for you to come."

"I prefer to do so." Miss Heredith's tone admitted of no further

argument. She was about to lead the way from the room when she paused

and glanced at Tufnell. "When will Dr. Holmes be here?" she asked.

"Almost immediately, ma'am."

"You had better stay here and receive him, Philip." Miss Heredith placed

her hand affectionately on her brother's shoulder. He had not spoken

during the time the police were in the room, but had sat quietly on his

chair, with bent head and clasped hands, looking very old and frail. "It

will be as well for him to see Phil before going upstairs," she added.

Sir Philip looked up at the mention of his son's name. "Poor Phil," he

muttered dully.

"I think the doctor should examine Phil the moment he comes," continued

Miss Heredith, aside, to Musard. "His look alarms me. I fear the shock

has affected his brain. Tufnell, be sure and show Dr. Holmes to Mr.

Philip's room directly Sir Philip has received him."

"You can rely upon me to do so, ma'am," said Tufnell earnestly.

"Very well. We will now go upstairs."

She left the drawing-room and proceeded towards the broad oak staircase,

with Musard close behind her. Detective Caldew followed more slowly,

noting his surroundings. When they reached the head of the staircase

Miss Heredith switched on the electric current, and the bedroom corridor

sprang into light. Detective Caldew was surprised at its length.

"Where does this passage lead to?" he asked abruptly.

"To the south side of the moat-house," replied Musard.

"Has it any outlet?"

"Yes; a door at the end communicates with a narrow staircase, leading to

another door at the bottom. The second door was a former back

entrance--it opens somewhere near the servants' quarters, I think?" He

glanced inquiringly at Miss Heredith.

"Those stairs are never used now," she replied. "The entrance door at

the bottom of the staircase is kept locked."

"There are such things as skeleton keys," commented the detective.

Musard opened the door of the death-chamber and switched on the light.

Caldew walked at once to the bedside. He drew away the covering which

had been placed over the face of the young wife, and stood looking at

her.

Death had invested her with pathos, but not with dignity. On the pallor

of the death mask the tinted lips, the spots of rouge, the pencilled

eyebrows of the dead face, were as clearly revealed as print on a white

page. The lips were parted; the small white teeth were showing beneath

the upper lip. The little nose rose in the sharp outline of death;

between the half-closed eyelids the darkened blue eyes looked out

vacantly. The thick, fair hair, spotted with blood, flowed in disordered

waves over the white pillow; the numerous rings on the dead hands blazed

and glittered with hard brilliance in the electric light.

It was these costly jewels on the murdered girl's hands which prompted

the question which sprang to the detective's lips:

"Did the murderer take anything?" he asked. "Has anything been missed?"

"No," said Miss Heredith. "Nothing has been taken."

"Mrs. Heredith had more jewellery than this, I suppose?" pursued the

detective. "Brooches and necklaces, and that kind of thing. Where were

they kept?"

"Mrs. Heredith's jewel-case is downstairs, in the safe in the library,"

replied Miss Heredith. She did not feel called upon to add the

additional information that she had taken it there herself, and locked

it up, not half an hour before.

Detective Caldew made a mental note of the fact that the motive for the

crime was not robbery, unless, indeed, the murderer had become flurried,

and fled. His eye, glancing round the room, was attracted by the window

curtains, which were stirring faintly. He flung them back, and saw the

open window.

"How long has this window been open?" he asked.

Miss Heredith gave her reasons for believing that the window was closed

when she left Violet to go downstairs to the dining-room. Caldew

listened thoughtfully, and nodded his head in quick comprehension when

she added the information that the bedroom window was nearly twenty feet

from the ground.

"You think the murderer did not jump out of the window," he said. "The

more important point is, did he get in that way? It is not a difficult

matter to scale a wall to reach a window if there is any sort of a

foothold. It is a point I will look into afterwards."

He tried the window catch, and then walked about the room, examining it

closely. His quick, eager eyes, looking about in every direction, were

caught by something glittering on the carpet, close to the bed. He

glanced at his companions. As a detective, he had long learnt the wisdom

of caution in the presence of friends and relatives.

"I should like to be left alone in the room in order to examine it more

thoroughly," he briefly announced.

When Miss Heredith and Musard had left the room he locked the door

behind them, and, kneeling down by the bedside, disentangled a small

shining object almost concealed in the thick green texture of the

carpet. It was a trinket like a bar brooch, with gold clasps. The bar

was of transparent stone, clear as glass, with a faint sea-green tinge,

and speckled in the interior with small black spots. Caldew had never

seen a stone like it. The frail gold of the setting suggested that it

was not of much intrinsic value, but it was a pretty little trinket,

such as ladies sometimes wear as a mascot. Caldew reflected that if it

were a mascot it was by no means certain that the owner was a woman.

Many young officers took mascots to the front for luck.

As he turned it over in his hand he observed some lettering on the

underside. He examined it curiously, and saw that an inscription had

been scratched into the stone in round, irregular handwriting--obviously

an unskilled, almost childish effort. Holding the brooch closer to the

light, he was able to decipher the inscription. It consisted of two

words--"Semper Fidelis."

It seemed to Caldew that the inscription rather weakened the correctness

of his first impression that the trinket had been worn as a feminine

mascot. He doubted very much whether any modern woman would cherish a

mid-Victorian sentiment like "Always Faithful." On the other hand, many

men might. His experience as a detective had led him to the belief that

men were more prone to such sentiments than the other sex, though their

conduct rarely accorded with their protestations and temporary

intentions.

Struck by a sudden thought, he dropped the trinket back on the carpet.

It was just visible in the thick pile.

"A good idea!" he murmured, as he rose to his feet. "I'll watch this

room to-night."

As he stood there, speculating on the possibility of the owner of the

trinket returning to the room to search for it, he was interrupted by a

low tap at the door. He walked across and opened it. Tufnell stood

outside, grave and composed.

"Mr. Musard would like to see you in the library," he said.

His tone was even and almost deferential, but the detective's watchful

eyes intercepted a fleeting glance cast by the butler over his shoulder

in the direction of the still figure on the bed.

"Very well, I will see him," said the detective.

"I will take you to him, if you will come with me." The butler preceded

him along the passage with noiseless step, and Caldew followed him, deep

in thought.

The butler escorted him to the library, and entered after him. Musard

was in the room alone, standing by the fireplace, smoking a cigar. He

looked up as Caldew entered.

"I have just learnt something which I think you ought to know," he said.

"The information comes from Tufnell. He tells me that while he was going

around the house this afternoon he found the outside door of the back

staircase unlocked."

"Do you mean the door at the bottom of the staircase in the left wing?"

asked Caldew.

"Precisely."

"I understood from Miss Heredith that this door was always kept locked."

"So it is, as a rule. It was only by chance that the butler discovered

this evening that it had been unlocked. You had better explain to the

detective, Tufnell, how you came to find it unfastened."

"I was going round by the back of the house this evening," said the

butler, coming forward. "As I passed the door I tried the handle. To my

surprise it yielded. I opened the door, and found that the key was in

the keyhole, on the other side. I locked the door, and took the key

away."

"What time was this?" inquired Caldew.

"A little before six--perhaps a quarter of an hour."

"Is it your custom to try this door every night?"

"Oh, no, it is not necessary. The door is always kept locked, and the

key hangs with a bunch of other unused keys in a small room near the

housekeeper's apartments, where a number of odds and ends are kept."

"When was the last time you tried the door?"

The butler considered for a moment.

"I cannot rightly say," he said at length. "The door is never used, and

I rarely think of it."

"Then, for all you know to the contrary, the key may have been in the

door for days, or weeks past."

"Why, yes, it is possible, now that you come to mention it," said the

butler, with an air of surprise, as though he had not previously

considered such a contingency.

"The key had been taken off the bunch?"

"Yes."

"Do the servants know where the key is kept?"

"Some of the maidservants do. The back staircase is occasionally opened

for ventilation and dusting, and the maid who does this work gets the

key from the housekeeper."

"Who has charge of the room where the keys are kept?"

"Nobody in particular. It is really a sort of a lumber-room. The

housekeeper has charge of the keys."

"Thank you; that is all I wish to know."

The butler left the room, and Caldew looked up, to encounter Musard's

eyes regarding him.

"Do you think this has anything to do with the murder?" Musard asked.

Caldew hesitated for a moment. It was on the tip of his tongue to reply

that he attached no importance to the butler's statement, but

professional habits of caution checked his natural impulsiveness.

"I want to know more about the circumstances before advancing an

opinion," he replied. "Tufnell's story was rather vague."

"In what respect?"

"In regard to time. The door may have been left unlocked for days."

"Who would unlock it?" replied Musard. "The inference, in view of what

has happened, seems rather that the door was unlocked to-day, and

Tufnell stumbled upon the fact by a lucky chance--by Fate, if you like.

At least it looks like that to me."

"And the murderer entered by the door?"

"Yes."

"I think that is assuming too much," said Caldew. He had no intention of

pointing out to his companion that such an assumption overlooked the

fact that Tufnell's discovery, and the locking of the door, had not

prevented the crime and the subsequent escape of the murderer.

He turned to leave the room, but Musard was in a talkative mood. He

offered the detective a cigar, and kept him for a while, chatting

discursively. Caldew was in no humour to listen. His mind was full of

the problems of this strange case, and he was anxious to return

upstairs. He took the first opportunity of terminating the conversation

and leaving the room.

It was his intention to conceal himself in one of the wardrobes of the

bedroom in the hope that the owner of the trinket he had found would

return in search of it. As he reached the landing he was surprised to

see that the door of the murdered woman's bedroom was wide open,

although he remembered distinctly that he had closed it when he left the

room to accompany the butler downstairs. With a quickly beating heart he

hurried across the room to the spot where he had left the trinket. But

it was gone.