“What is the matter with that dog?” he thought, as Haig barked once more.
A door opened somewhere. Or was he imagining it? No, for here were footsteps, softly crossing the hall. “Last up,” he reflected, as he followed them in his imagination to the staircase. “Wonder which?” But the footsteps did not go to the staircase. They came to his door. He sat up abruptly.
“Just five minutes!” came Lord Aveling’s voice quietly.
The door-handle turned.
“No—really—isn’t it rather late?”
That was Zena Wilding, in an anxious whisper.
“But I’d like you to see it,” answered Lord Aveling. “Han dynasty. Genuine. Two thousand years old. They imitated it in Delft—”
The door opened an inch or two, then suddenly closed.
“Can’t—I forgot!” came the mutter. “Of course, Foss is in there!”
“Never mind, to-morrow!” answered Zena Wilding, and John detected the relief in her voice. “I’d adore to see it then.”
“You shall, my dear. And we’ll talk some more about your play. Although I think I may say to-night—I have almost made up my mind to—”
“No, do you really mean it?”
“Would it make you happy?”
John stuffed his fingers in his ears. Something in Lord Aveling’s tone had made him do it. He kept them there for a minute. Then he took them out.
But he took them out a second too soon. He heard Zena whisper—“Please—good-night!”
Then, silence.
“This won’t do!” decided John unhappily. “I must get to sleep! Meanwhile, it’s strictly understood, I’ve been dreaming!”
He closed his eyes tightly. He pretended not to hear the dog growling. He pretended so well that sleep began to come to him at last. But it was not peaceful sleep. Footsteps drifted through it, and Nadine’s green wrap. The wrap became a large green silk boat in which he was floating first with Nadine, then with Zena Wilding, and finally with Edyth Fermoy-Jones. “Mr. Pratt has been painting my picture,” barked Edyth Fermoy-Jones, like a dog, “and it will ruin my circulation. I must smash it!” A butler brought the picture on a tray. The picture was framed, behind glass, and the enraged authoress struck it with her fist. The glass splintered all around them, and John dodged and sat up.
He was no longer in a green silk boat. He was on his couch, staring ahead of him into the darkness.
“Did I dream that glass?” he wondered. “And Edyth Fermoy-Jones’s bark?”
A few moments later he knew he had not dreamt the bark, for it was repeated. Once—twice—thrice, each time a little more distant. Then, a final bark.…
A door opened. It was not the one Lord Aveling had opened; he had heard that through his own door. He heard this through his window. In a few moments there came a gasp, obviously feminine. Then steps flying across the hall. Then other steps—slower, deliberate, stealthy. And then an exclamation.
“Hallo!”
Chater’s voice.
“Eh?”
He did not recognise the second speaker, but it was another male voice.
“What are you doing here?”
“Well, sir, I—I thought I—” The tone suddenly changed. “There’s a door open somewhere!”
“Oh?”
“A draught—from over there—”
“Here, wait a moment!”
The order was not obeyed. A short silence was broken by the sound of hurrying feet. Then the second speaker returned.
“Did you open that door, sir?”
“I? No, certainly not!”
“Then, might I ask why you’ve come down?”
The question was asked with timid challenge.
“Well, I’ve no reason for not telling you,” came Chater’s response, after a pause. “I came down because I thought I heard noises.”
“Ah—I see, sir.”
“And why did you come down?”
“For the same reason, sir.”
But John would have sworn they were both lying.
“Apparently we were right,” said Chater. “Or have you any other explanation of the open door?”
“I may have forgotten to lock it.”
“Is that your job?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What’s your name?”
“Thomas, sir.”
“Thomas. I’ll make a note of it. Well, Thomas, even an unlocked door doesn’t open of its own accord.”
“The latch is defective. It might have blown open.”
“It might. And it mightn’t. Now suppose you tell me the real reason you’re here?”
“I have told you!” exclaimed Thomas, the anxiety in his voice disputing his statement. “I thought I heard noises—as you say you did yourself—”
“All right, all right! Don’t raise your voice like that! Suppose we did hear noises? Is there a burglar in the house? If so, why aren’t we searching for him? But perhaps it isn’t a him, Thomas? Perhaps it’s a lady? Or, more correctly speaking, a maid. Tell me, does Bessie sleep in the house, or in some annexe or other outside?”
Thomas did not reply. John missed the flush that came into the butler’s pale cheeks, and the expression of astonishment that gradually changed into mute fury. But he gathered that something emotional was happening when Chater’s smooth voice droned on:
“Attend to me, my man. I’m asking no questions, but that may be because I don’t need to. You didn’t come here to find any burglar. And it won’t help your career if anybody inquires to-morrow what you did come here for. So your policy is to go right back to your room, this minute, and not to let any one know that you ever left it. Whether I’ll assist you will depend upon what I decide—and how you behave.”
“What do you mean?” muttered the butler.
“Ought to be clear,” answered Chater. “I know all I need to know to smash you—and Bessie. So if I have any little jobs for you, you’ll be a good boy and do them. Well, what are you waiting for? Whoa, steady!”
Then John heard heavy breathing, and a sharp, stifled cry of pain.
“Want it broken?” inquired Chater’s voice.
“Let go!” gasped Thomas.
“I wonder what Bessie would think of you if she could see you at this moment,” answered Chater. “She’d lose her good opinion of you, I’m afraid—and gain it, perhaps, for some one else. She’s a pretty girl.…You know, I’m quite ready to break it, if you want me to.…Ah, that’s more sensible. Now get out!”
John heard the butler’s footsteps receding towards the servants’ quarters. Then, after a pause, he heard Chater moving. Chater did not move towards the main staircase, but towards the passage that led to the back lawn. It was the door to this lawn, John concluded, that had been under discussion, and that he had heard opening shortly before Chater and the butler had met.
A long silence followed. John waited, his nerves frayed, for Chater’s returning footsteps. The clock in the hall chimed once. Was that one, or half-past? He had lost count of time. About to switch on the lamp—not that the time mattered, but he wanted to do something to break this uncomfortable silence—he paused abruptly. Ah—Chater’s footsteps, at last.
“He’s been the devil of a time,” thought John. “What’s his latest mischief?”
He listened to the soft tread. In the back passage—on the hall carpet—towards the staircase—no, some other direction—silence. Quite a long silence.
“What’s he doing?” wondered John.
The silence continued. Then, suddenly, the steps were heard again, crossing the hall and mounting the stairs.
“Where did he go that time?” murmured John. “Nocturnal prowling, to see what else he can pick up?”
Now John switched on the light and again consulted his wrist-watch. Twenty-five minutes to two.<
br />
Well, the hall was empty at last, and now he could try once more to go to sleep. If he kept awake much longer he’d be a wreck in the morning. He began counting sheep. No good. They all had Chater’s face. He concentrated on another face. Perhaps Nadine could send him off. He visualised her hair and her eyes and her lips, deliberately and unashamedly. His mind was full of little pricks, of other people’s affairs, of fragments of disturbing knowledge that seemed to saddle him, somehow, with responsibility, though he had no idea how to discharge the responsibility, or who would thank him—and he wanted to escape from them to one unshifting point. And the pleasantest point he could escape to was Nadine. He wondered what it would feel like to lie in her arms.…
“Some one is in the hall still!” he thought suddenly. “What the blazes—!”
Chater’s face drove Nadine’s away. Indignation surged through him. Why didn’t the fellow go to bed? He must have come down again, and probably his ear was at the keyhole.
“Well, I’ve had enough of it!” decided John. “I’ll give the poisonous blighter a shock!”
He rolled carefully off his couch. He wrenched his foot a little, but just managed to keep back his groan. Then he rose, and using the support of furniture en route he hopped to the door. With his hand on the knob he paused to listen. Yes, somebody was undoubtedly there. He turned the knob, and threw the door open.
Moonlight came through a high window above the stairs, making a bright patch on the hall carpet. In the patch, her head turned towards him, and her right hand pressing the folds of her soft cerise dressing-gown, stood Anne.
Even in the surprise of the moment the thought flashed through John’s mind that this was how she should have been painted. There was no trace of hardness now around her mouth. Her lips were slightly parted, and there was an expression in her eyes he could not define. It was as though her softness had been surprised and caught, and while she would not have revealed it voluntarily, something courageous in her refused to hide it again at once. The lines of her dressing-gown accentuated her slim boyish figure without detracting from her feminine appeal.
But it was something else that caused John to break the little silence suddenly and to speak first. He sensed not only her courage, but her need for it. Behind her poise, he was certain, lay fear. He wanted to eliminate himself from her oppressions.
“I’m awfully sorry,” he said. “I thought I heard something.”
His voice brought back her movement. She turned to him fully, and smiled.
“You did,” she answered. “You heard me. I’m the one to apologise.”
“Not a bit.”
“Did I wake you?”
“I’m not sure. I think I was in that state known as betwixt and between.”
He felt that she was grateful to him for his easy, uncurious attitude, even though he also felt she rewarded him with a lie.
“I came down to get a book,” she said.
“You read late,” he replied.
“Yes. When I can’t sleep. How did you get here? Did you hop?” He nodded. “I’ll help you back.”
“I can manage.”
“Don’t be silly.”
She came to the door, and assisted him back to the couch. When he was settled, she stood regarding him for a second.
“This is rotten luck on you,” she said.
“I’ll get over it,” he answered. “I’m not invalided for life, you know.”
“No—not for life,” she repeated slowly. This was one of the many moments he recalled later. Then she added, her speech quickening, “But it was disgusting of me disturbing you like this. If you tell any one, I’ll get into hot water.”
He recognised the request behind the statement.
“Count on me,” he smiled. “Good-night.”
“Good-night.”
A few seconds later he listened to her footsteps fading up the stairs. She had not stopped to get her book.
Chapter XI
Haig
“Must you get up so early?” asked Bultin sleepily.
“It’s seven o’clock,” replied Pratt, as he crossed to the window and pulled up the blind. “And what a morning!”
“But the fires aren’t lit,” protested Bultin.
“One doesn’t get up before breakfast to sit by a fire,” retorted Pratt. “One gets up to take a stroll.”
“One does,” murmured Bultin, turning away from the light, “but two don’t. For God’s sake, pull down that blind!”
Pratt smiled, gazed out for a moment at the lawn, and then satisfied his friend’s craving for continued dimness. The blind came down again. Fifteen minutes later he was out on the lawn.
A low white mist was slowly rolling off it. The air was autumn-crisp. Raising his eyes, he rested them on russet bushes, then raised them higher to the sky. It was cloudless, and an early lark was singing the song men envy.
“The illusion of joy and beauty,” reflected Pratt.
Yet it was odd how moments came when intelligence fled and one could enjoy the illusion!
He walked across the lawn, his eyes no longer on the sky but on his boots moist with mist. The movement of the boots had a restless purpose that contrasted with the mist’s leisurely drift. He reached the russet bushes, and walked through them to the studio. He was making for the door, when a window caught his attention and diverted his direction. It was smashed.
He stared at the splintered glass beneath the window. He lifted his eyes to the sky for a moment and asked, “What about this, blithe spirit?” and then stared at the glass again. Somebody had broken into the studio. No—in that case, most of the glass would be inside. “Some one has broken out of the studio,” he corrected his thought. “But how did they break in, to break out?”
Now he walked to the door, and producing the key unlocked it. The studio seemed as he had left it on the previous evening. There was the ruined picture of Anne, with its long smudge of crimson paint. It pleased him that he could look at it calmly. There were all the other pictures and easels, including Anne’s own large painting of the stag. And the studio furniture. Nothing looked altered.…No, wait a moment.…
He crossed to the picture of the stag. “As bad as it is big,” he murmured. If the criticism were just, the picture was unusually bad, for the canvas almost obliterated the large easel on which it stood, leaving only a few inches of pedestal visible beneath it. He walked behind the canvas.
“Possible,” he murmured. “Possible.”
He stood for a few moments pondering, his eyes scanning the ground. Then he turned in the direction of the picture of Anne, moved a pace to the side, and stooped. He stooped until the top of the canvas he was behind rose in his line of vision, and obliterated the picture of Anne.
“Yes, quite possible,” he said. “And—then?”
He rose, and walked to the broken window. It was a small window in a wall, though not too small for a man to pass through. The larger window in the sloping roof, facing north, was intact. He examined the edges of broken glass, put his head gingerly out, and brought it in again. Then he left the studio, locking it as before, and dropping the key in his pocket.
He walked round the studio. The path continued at the back towards a little wood. He walked towards the wood, his eye attracted by something. It was a brown heap a few yards off the path, lying under a bush. Reaching it, he stooped and touched it. It did not move.
On his way back to the house he passed a gardener.
“I’m afraid one of your dogs has had an accident,” he said. “It’s on the left of the path to the wood at the back of the studio. You’d better go and have a look.”
Bultin grunted as Pratt re-entered the bedroom, but did not turn.
“I hoped you’d stay out longer,” he muttered.
“I was out quite long enough,” answered Pratt, throwing himself into an arm-
chair. “Are you interested in dead dogs?”
Bultin turned, and opened an eye.
“Should I be?” he inquired.
“I asked if you were,” retorted Pratt.
Bultin considered. Then he closed the eye and murmured, “Not particularly.”
Pratt lit a cigarette.
“You’re a horrible bedroom companion,” said Bultin. “Getting up at unearthly hours. Filling the room with foul smoke. And talking of dead dogs. Is that the way you work up your breakfast appetite?”
Pratt continued to puff the foul smoke without responding.
“Well?” smiled Bultin.
“It’s name is, or was, Haig,” remarked Pratt. “A golden retriever. It is lying at this moment under a hedge, and it has a nasty wound in its side.”
“You mean, some one’s killed it?”
“Without doubt.”
“Probably a poacher.”
“That may be the theory.”
“But it’s not your theory?”
“No, it’s not my theory.”
“Perhaps I’d better get up,” sighed Bultin, rising regretfully from his pillow and sticking a leg out of bed. “What’s your theory?”
“I’m not sure that I have one,” admitted Pratt.
“Your guess, then?”
“Well, I’m wondering whether the person who killed the dog is the person who ruined my picture.”
“The connection being?”
“A broken window.”
“Where?”
“Getting interested?”
“Not enough to telephone my editor.”
“I’ll wager you a hundred cigars you’ll be phoning before the day’s finished!” exclaimed Pratt suddenly.
“I’m not a betting man,” replied Bultin. “Where is this broken window?”
“The studio.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Somebody smashed his way out. And shall I tell you why?”
“I have a brain.”
“Use it.”
“Because he wanted to get out.”
“Don’t be irritating, Lionel,” pleaded Pratt. “If you wanted to get out of this room, what would you do? You would go out of the door. But this person smashed his way out of the window because he couldn’t get out of the door. I’d locked it.”
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