“Her ladyship cannot be approached,” Glenlitten declared. “She was in a dead faint when she was found and is now in the hands of the physician. I am sure he will agree that she must be left alone until the morning. You have plenty to occupy yourself with. What about that open window and the missing jewels?”
“I think that Lord Glenlitten is right,” Sir Richard observed. “It is useless to question her ladyship at present.”
Both men turned their heads at the sound of the opening of the door. Haslam made his apologetic entrance, closing it firmly behind him.
“You’ll forgive me, Andrew,” he said. “I had to come up and see if there was anything I could do. There’s a rumour downstairs that De Besset has been shot.”
His host nodded.
“I’m afraid it is the truth,” he admitted. Haslam came slowly forward and looked down steadily at the crumpled-up figure upon the floor, the white face with its strange lack of expression, as colourless indeed as the thin cambric handkerchief which Meadows had left over the eyes. His gaze was a curiously intent one; his eyebrows were drawn together, his thin face seemed more saturnine than ever. Sir Richard watched him with an intentness which he scarcely troubled to conceal.
“How did he come in here?” Haslam asked at last, raising his head.
“That is a matter for later explanation,” Glenlitten answered almost curtly. “It’s very good of you to come up, but there’s nothing any one can do for the moment. You might help us in the search we are going to make in the grounds. We shall be downstairs in a few minutes.”
Glenlitten’s suggestion of dismissal was apparent. With one lingering glance, Haslam turned around and left the room, closing the door softly behind him.
“No friend of the dead man’s, I should say,” Richard speculated.
“They disliked each other intensely,” Andrew agreed. “We saw something of them both at Deauville this summer. Couldn’t very well be helped. Félice knew De Besset’s people—they own the château where she was brought up, and Haslam was at Eton with me. They never had a civil word to say to each other.”
“Time we got along with the business on hand,” Sir Richard suggested, turning back to the sergeant. “We don’t want to elaborate any theories yet, of course, but this seems to me to be a possible reconstruction of what may have happened. De Besset must have been in his room for some reason or other, and either heard Lady Glenlitten call for help, or saw from his window a man climbing up the side of the house. He rushed here through her bathroom, found the burglar in the room and already collecting the jewels, and was shot through the heart. The sooner we’re downstairs, Sergeant, searching for traces of a car in the avenue and examining the ground for footprints underneath, the better. There may be other theories to be exploited later, but this one is good enough to be getting on with.”
The sergeant closed his book reluctantly. His bucolic instinct of obstinacy reasserted itself.
“I should have liked just a word with her ladyship,” he persisted.
“To-morrow, or the next day, you can have it,” Glenlitten told him sharply. “You don’t suppose I am going to allow her ladyship to be worried now with questions when she’s nearly prostrate with shock. Besides, what can she tell you? It is obvious that the man entered by that window; it is obvious that he escaped by it. Why don’t you hurry up and be getting after him? You would rather finish this little affair off by yourself without sending for Scotland Yard, wouldn’t you?”
The idea was an ecstatic one. The sergeant closed his book and the three men descended quietly by the back stairs. Glenlitten excused himself for a moment and made his way into the great hall. The remainder of the guests were sitting about in little groups, talking in whispers to one another, and it was obvious they were still suffering from the shock of the tragical news which they had just been told. The service of the house, however, was not being neglected. The usual array of nocturnal refreshments stood upon the great round table, and Haslam was officiating as host to Fraser and his young Russian friend. Glenlitten passed his arm through his sister’s and spoke to all of them.
“I’m terribly sorry that our little party has been brought to such a sad end,” he said. “My wife isn’t hurt in any way, but she’s had an awful shock. I daresay you know what has happened. There has been a burglary. De Besset, apparently, got wind of it and has been shot.”
Lady Susan took his hand in hers and patted it.
“Don’t you worry, my dear,” she begged. “I’ll take charge down here, and to-morrow we’ll all clear off.”
“I’m most frightfully sorry,” he apologised, “but I don’t really see what else there is to be done. We can’t very well shoot until after the funeral, and there will be the inquest, and all that sort of bother. Make it up to you later on, I hope. It’s too bad, Haslam, that you and Grindells have had such a long journey for nothing, and I only hope you’ll be able to come down later on. I’ll fix a date as soon as we’ve got over this wretched business. The birds have got to be killed somehow or other.”
“Never mind about us,” Haslam begged him. “I don’t think we’re any of us so tied that we can’t get away for a day or two whenever it suits you.”
“I hope not,” Glenlitten rejoined, mixing himself a whisky and soda. “As for you fellows at the barracks, you have a standing invitation. I can always do with a couple of guns. If Prince Charles is down again, you must bring him along one day.”
“I thank you indeed,” the latter said. “It will please me very much to shoot English partridges.”
“Tell me, shall I go up and see Félice?” Lady Susan asked.
“You might go up, if you will,” her brother assented. “You can find out from Meadows whether she would like to have you with her. They are giving her a sleeping draught, and perhaps Meadows may prefer her left alone. I’m terribly afraid that whatever happened—she saw it.”
No one asked another question. They were really a very well-bred lot of people, and presently Andrew finished his drink and hurried out to the avenue. Sir Richard and the sergeant were bending over a certain spot amongst the flower beds which bordered the front of the house, with a little group of servants in the background. The former held an electric torch in his hand.
“There’s been a man up here without a doubt,” he announced. “We found that ladder, which belongs to the gardeners’ sheds, and which you see reaches as far as the cornice above the library window. From there, he must have hooked a silk or rope ladder to the balcony—easy enough if he were an expert. He must have known the habits of the household, for he made for the window which I understand that her ladyship always has open, so that he could get in without making a sound.”
“Left any traces down below?” Glenlitten asked. Sir Richard pointed to where a little semicircle of handkerchiefs lay upon the ground.
“There are some footprints there,” he confided. “We’ve marked them off, and I’m going to have one of the boys from the house stay around until morning. Now the thing is, which way did the man go from here? If I remember rightly, Andrew, there’s a road from the woodsheds and carpenters’ quarters which crosses the avenue, passes through the Home Wood, and leads down into the main road.”
“That’s right,” Glenlitten assented. “There it is, about fifty yards on the other side of the main avenue.”
“My idea is,” Sir Richard continued, “that our friend would leave the car somewhere in the shadow of the trees there. He wouldn’t use the main drive for fear of meeting some of your guests coming or going. I propose we go down there and see. First of all, though, has any one got a revolver?”
“I have,” Glenlitten announced, touching his pocket. “I took it out of my drawer before I left my room.”
They trooped off—leaving the main avenue in a few minutes