XXVI
A POINT GAINED
He was surprised, for all his attempts to conceal it.
"No?" said he. "Who, then? You are becoming interesting, MissButterworth."
This I thought I could afford to ignore.
"Yesterday," I proceeded, "I would have declared it to be Silly Rufus,in the face of God and man, but after what I saw in William's roomduring the hurried survey I gave it, I am inclined to doubt if theexplanation we have to give to this affair is so simple as that wouldmake it. Mr. Gryce, in one corner of that room, from which the victimhad so lately been carried, was a pair of shoes that could never havebeen worn by any boy-tramp I have ever seen or known of."
"They were Loreen's, or possibly Lucetta's."
"No, Loreen and Lucetta both have trim feet, but these were the shoes ofa child of ten, very dainty at that, and of a cut and make worn bywomen, or rather, I should say, by girls. Now, what do you make ofthat?"
He did not seem to know what to make of it. Tap, tap went his finger onhis seasoned palm, and as I watched the slowness with which it fell, Isaid to myself, "I have proposed a problem this time that will tax evenMr. Gryce's powers of deduction."
And I had. It was minutes before he ventured an opinion, and then it waswith a shade of doubt in his tone that I acknowledge to have felt somepride in producing.
"They were Lucetta's shoes. The emotions under which you labored--verypardonable emotions, madam, considering the circumstances and thehour----"
"Excuse me," said I. "We do not want to waste a moment. I was excited,suitably and duly excited, or I would have been a stone. But I neverlose my head under excitement, nor do I part with my sense ofproportion. The shoes were not Lucetta's. She never wore any approachingthem in smallness since her tenth year."
"Has Simsbury a daughter? Has there not been a child about the housesome time to assist the cook in errands and so on?"
"No, or I should have seen her. Besides, how would the shoes of such aperson come into William's room?"
"Easily. Secrecy was required. You were not to be disturbed; so shoeswere taken off that quiet might result."
"Was Lucetta shoeless or William or even Mother Jane? You have not toldme that you were requested to walk in stocking feet up the hall. No, Mr.Gryce, the shoes were the shoes of a girl. I know it because it wasmatched by a dress I saw hanging up in a sort of wardrobe."
"Ah! You looked into the wardrobe?"
"I did and felt justified in doing so. It was after I had spied theshoes."
"Very good. And you saw a dress?"
"A little dress; a dress with a short skirt. It was of silk too; anotheranomaly--and the color, I think, was blue, but I cannot swear to thatpoint. I was in great haste and took the briefest glance. But my briefglances can be trusted, Mr. Gryce. That, I think, you are beginning toknow."
"Certainly," said he, "and as proof of it we will now act upon these twopremises--that the victim in whose burial I was an innocent partaker wasa human being and that this human being was a girl-child who came intothe house well dressed. Now where does that lead us? Into a maze, Ifear."
"We are accustomed to mazes," I observed.
"Yes," he answered somewhat gloomily, "but they are not exactlydesirable in this case. I want to find the Knollys family innocent."
"And I. But William's character, I fear, will make that impossible."
"But this girl? Who is she, and where did she come from? No girl hasbeen reported to us as missing from this neighborhood."
"I supposed not."
"A visitor--But no visitor could enter this house without it being knownfar and wide. Why, I heard of your arrival here before I left the trainon which I followed you. Had we allowed ourselves to be influenced bywhat the people about here say, we would have turned the Knollys houseinside out a week ago. But I don't believe in putting too muchconfidence in the prejudice of country people. The idea they suggested,and which you suggest without putting it too clearly into words, is muchtoo horrible to be acted upon without the best of reasons. Perhaps wehave found those reasons, yet I still feel like asking, Where did thisgirl come from and how could she have become a prisoner in the Knollyshouse without the knowledge of--Madam, have you met Mr. Trohm?"
The question was so sudden I had not time to collect myself. But perhapsit was not necessary that I should, for the simple affirmation I usedseemed to satisfy Mr. Gryce, who went on to say:
"It is he who first summoned us here, and it is he who has the greatestinterest in locating the source of these disappearances, yet he has seenno child come here."
"Mr. Trohm is not a spy," said I, but the remark, happily, fellunheeded.
"No one has," he pursued. "We must give another turn to oursuppositions."
Suddenly a silence fell upon us both. His finger ceased to lay down thelaw, and my gaze, which had been searching his face inquiringly, becamefixed. At the same moment and in much the same tone of voice we bothspoke, he saying, "Humph!" and I, "Ah!" as a prelude to the simultaneousexclamation:
"The phantom coach!"
We were so pleased with this discovery that we allowed a moment to passin silent contemplation of each other's satisfaction. Then he quietlyadded:
"Which on the evening preceding your arrival came from the mountains andpassed into Lost Man's Lane, from which no one ever saw it emerge."
"It was no phantom," I put in.
"It was their own old coach bringing to the house a fresh victim."
This sounded so startling we both sat still for a moment, lost in thehorror of it, then I spoke:
"People living in remote and isolated quarters like this are naturallysuperstitious. The Knollys family know this, and, remembering the oldlegend, forbore to contradict the conclusions of their neighbors.Loreen's emotion when the topic was broached to her is explained by thistheory."
"It is not a pleasant one, but we cannot be wrong in contemplating it."
"Not at all. This apparition, as they call it, was seen by two persons;therefore it was no apparition but a real coach. It came from themountains, that is, from the Mountain Station, and it glided--ah!"
"Well?"
"Mr. Gryce, it was its noiselessness that gave it its spectralappearance. Now I remember a petty circumstance which I dare you tomatch, in corroboration of our suspicions."
"You do?"
I could not repress a slight toss of my head. "Yes, I do," I repeated.
He smiled and made the slightest of deprecatory gestures.
"You have had advantages----" he began.
"And disadvantages," I finished, determined that he should award me myfull meed of praise. "You are probably not afraid of dogs. I am. Youcould visit the stables."
"And did; but I found nothing there."
"I thought not!" I could not help the exclamation. It is so seldom onecan really triumph over this man. "Not having the cue, you would not beapt to see what gives this whole thing away. I would never have thoughtof it again if we had not had this talk. Is Mr. Simsbury a neat man?"
"A neat man? Madam, what do you mean?"
"Something important, Mr. Gryce. If Mr. Simsbury is a neat man, he willhave thrown away the old rags which, I dare promise you, cumbered hisstable floor the morning after the phantom coach was seen to enter thelane. If he is not, you may still find them there. One of them, I know,you will not find. He pulled it off of his wheel with his whip theafternoon he drove me down from the station. I can see the sly look hegave me as he did it. It made no impression on me then, but now----"
"Madam, you have supplied the one link necessary to the establishment ofthis theory. Allow me to felicitate you upon it. But whatever oursatisfaction may be from a professional standpoint, we cannot but feelthe unhappy nature of the responsibility incurred by these discoveries.If this seemingly respectable family stooped to such subterfuge, goingto the length of winding rags around the wheels of their lumbering oldcoach to make it noiseless, and even tying up their horse's feet forthis same purpose, they must h
ave had a motive dark enough to warrantyour worst suspicions. And William was not the only one involved.Simsbury, at least, had a hand in it, nor does it look as if the girlswere as innocent as we would like to consider them."
"I cannot stop to consider the girls," I declared. "I can no longerconsider the girls."
"Nor I," he gloomily assented. "Our duty requires us to sift thismatter, and it shall be sifted. We must first find if any child alightedfrom the cars at the Mountain Station on that especial night, or, whatis more probable, from the little station at C., five miles farther backin the mountains."
"And--" I urged, seeing that he had still something to say.
"We must make sure who lies buried under the floor of the room you callthe Flower Parlor. You may expect me at the Knollys house some timeto-day. I shall come quietly, but in my own proper person. You are notto know me, and, unless you desire it, need not appear in the matter."
"I do not desire it."
"Then good-morning, Miss Butterworth. My respect for your abilities hasrisen even higher than before. We part in a similar frame of mind foronce."
And this he expected me to regard as a compliment.