house he knocked out theashes and placed it in his pocket.
"No dogs there, I hope?" Boyd said, addressing him.
"No, sir. None."
I confess to feeling a thrill of excitement, for the business of"breaking and entering a dwelling-house" was entirely new to me. TheHampton Road is ill-lit, and after ten at night utterly deserted,therefore in our walk we met no one except the solitary policeman, whostood beneath a lamp and greeted Boyd with a low "All right, sir," as wepassed on towards The Hollies.
All was in darkness. Not a soul was about save ourselves and thepoliceman standing watchful and motionless beneath the street-lamp fiftyyards away. The well-kept garden with its laurels, its monkey-trees andits old yews was shut off from the road by a high wall, in which was apair of heavy iron gates giving entrance to the gravelled drive. Thesegates were locked and secured by a chain and formidable padlock, a factwhich showed that to enter we must climb them. The houses on eitherside were of rather meaner order than The Hollies, and in one of them alight still showed in an upper window.
In order not to attract the occupiers of these houses we conversed inlow whispers, and in obedience to the local detective's suggestionclimbed the gates one after another and carefully descended within thegarden. On either side of the house extended walls some ten feet inheight, with doors in them giving access to the rear of the premises,and again, guided by the plain-clothes man, we scaled this wall, asomewhat perilous process, it being spiked on the top. As it was,indeed, I made a serious rent in an almost new pair of trousers, much toBoyd's amusement.
At last, when we were in the rear garden, our guide began foragingbeneath a laurel bush and brought forth a dark lantern, a short,serviceable-looking jemmy, and a big bunch of skeleton keys.
"I examined the place this afternoon," he explained. "This door is theonly one locked from the outside, therefore if we can pick the lock weshall be able to enter and get away without leaving a trace."
"Very well," Boyd said impatiently. "Let's get to work," and taking thekeys he went to the garden entrance and commenced work upon the lock,while his assistant lit and held the lantern.
Every effort, however, to open the lock proved a failure.
"It's a Chubb, a Bramah, or one of those lever locks," said Boyd, in alow tone, giving it up after he had tried all the keys in vain. "Itwon't do to force the door, for that'll betray us."
"Why not try a window?" I suggested.
"No, sir," said the plain-clothes man. "They're all barred, I'mafraid."
"But those on the first floor," I suggested, looking up at one,evidently a landing window, over the door.
"We might try if we could only reach it," Boyd said, laying down thekeys upon the doorstep. "If we forced the catch we could screw it downagain before we left."
In order to discover something by which we might gain access to thewindow we all three crept carefully across the lawn and down the longold-fashioned garden to an outhouse, where, after some search, we foundan old and rotten ladder, half the rungs of which seemed missing. Thiswe carried back, and a few moments later Boyd, mounting, with a strongclasp-knife which he had taken from his pocket, began slowly workingback the catch, until at last he was able to throw up the window andcrawl in. Without a sound I followed, the local detective clambering inafter me.
We found ourselves on the first floor landing, therefore, descending thestairs to the main hall, we lit the candles provided by theplain-clothes man, and after taking the precaution to let down theblinds of the front windows, commenced an active search of thedrawing-room, that spacious old-fashioned apartment into which I hadbeen shown when I had called. Our search, directed by Boyd, was carefuland methodical; neither nook nor corner escaped him, although wereplaced everything just as we found it. So large were the rooms thatwe found the lights we carried were not sufficient to give us properillumination, therefore we sought the gas-meter, and after turning onthe gas, lit jets in the various rooms. Fortunately all the windowswere furnished with Venetian blinds, therefore we let them down andclosed them, so that no light should be noticed outside.
An air of desolation hung about the place, and every sound we madeechoed weirdly, for at dead of night all noise becomes exaggerated. Thedrawing-room yielded practically nothing, therefore we passed into awell-furnished morning-room, and thence to the dining-room, which welikewise thoroughly overhauled. None of these rooms bore any trace ofthe struggle with poverty which the innkeeper's wife had alleged.Indeed, in the drawing-room was a fine grand piano of one of thebest-known makers, together with several rare works of art. All therooms bore signs of being the abode of a rich and cultured family, theold oak in the dining-room being, I noted, genuine, evidently antique,Italian, while the upholstery and carpets were of the first quality. Onthe walls of those ground-floor rooms were many examples of old as wellas modern masters, one portrait hanging in the dining-room representingEva herself, a half-length picture, undoubtedly from recent sittings,signed by an artist extremely well-known in London. In this room alsowere antique high-backed oak chairs, lined with old tapestry, the backand arms bearing armorial bearings embroidered in coloured silks,evidently the arms of the Glaslyns, for a similar device was upon theplate.
On ascending to the first floor we found the house to be of far largerproportions than we had imagined, for off a long, well-carpeted corridoropened quite a number of bed and other rooms, each of which we proceededto inspect.
"We haven't found a single thing below," Boyd observed to me, as weentered the first of these rooms, evidently one of the spare bedrooms,for the place was very dirty and neglected in comparison with the otherapartments. "Let's hope we may come across something here."
Nothing was locked, and five minutes sufficed to show us that no attempthad been made to conceal anything in any of the two chests of drawers,or in the wardrobe. So thoroughly did Boyd search that in each room hewent around the wainscoting, tapping it with the jemmy and examining anypart which appeared to be loose or movable. The next room, apparentlyLady Glaslyn's room, with a small dressing-room adjoining, we searchedwith redoubled energy, but beyond establishing the fact that herladyship was not in want of money by the finding of three five-poundnotes placed carelessly in an unlocked drawer, there was nothing toarouse our curiosity.
Adjoining the dressing-room, with its window overlooking the road, was asmall but elegant apartment upholstered in pale-blue, quite a luxuriouslittle room with a piano; evidently a boudoir. The carpet was so thickand rich that our feet fell noiselessly, while near the window was ahandsome Louis XV escritoire inlaid with various woods and heavymountings of chased ormolu. A pretty cosy-corner occupied the anglebeside the tiled hearth, while the little bamboo table with its smallshelves spoke mutely of cosy five-o'clock tea often served there.
"I wonder what's in this?" Boyd said, advancing to the escritoire whilehis assistant lit the gas.
Finding it locked, my friend bent, examined the keyhole carefully, andthen commenced to ply the various skeleton keys. For some time he wasunsuccessful, but at length the lock yielded and he opened it. Then,while the local officer took the dark lantern and went along thecorridor to explore what further rooms there were, and their character,Boyd and I proceeded to carefully examine every paper, letter ordocument the escritoire contained. Some letters were addressed to LadyGlaslyn, others to Eva, but most of them were ordinary correspondencebetween relatives and friends, while the folded documents were receiptedbills, together with a file of papers relating to some action at lawregarding property near Aberdeen.
Behind the receptacle in which we found these letters was a panel whichBoyd at once declared concealed some secret drawers, and being wellversed in all the contrivances of cabinet-making, he very soondiscovered the means by which the panel could be released. As he hadpredicted, its removal disclosed three small drawers.
To the first I gave my attention, while he took out the contents of thesecond. The letters, of which there were seven or eight, secured by anelas
tic band, I took out and read, being puzzled greatly thereby. Theywere all type-written and bore the post-mark "London, S.E." The firsthad been received about three months before, the last as recently as afortnight ago. They were very friendly, commencing "Dear Eva," andalthough the writer was apparently extremely intimate, there was,however, not a word of love, a fact which gave me some satisfaction.They all, without exception, contained a most mysterious reference to"the Silence," in terms extremely guarded and curious, one urging theutmost caution and declaring that a grave peril had unexpectedly arisenwhich must, at all hazards, be removed. The writer did not appear to bea very educated person, for in many places there were mistakes inspelling, while all were devoid of both address or signature, bearingonly the single initial