"Yes, it hides itself very nicely," said Antony. "Where do you keep the bowls?"
"In a sort of summer house place. Round here."
They walked along the edge of the green until they came to it a low wooden bunk which had been built into one wall of the ditch.
"H'm. Jolly view."
Bill laughed.
"Nobody sits there. It's just for keeping things out of the rain."
They finished their circuit of the green "Just in case anybody's in the ditch," said Antony and then sat down on the bench.
"Now then," said Bill, "We are alone. Fire ahead."
Antony smoked thoughtfully for a little. Then he took his pipe out of his mouth and turned to his friend.
"Are you prepared to be the complete Watson?" he asked.
"Watson?"
"Do-you-follow-me-Watson; that one. Are you prepared to have quite obvious things explained to you, to ask futile questions, to give me chances of scoring off you, to make brilliant discoveries of your own two or three days after I have made them myself all that kind of thing? Because it all helps."
"My dear Tony," said Bill delightedly, "need you ask?" Antony said nothing, and Bill went on happily to himself, "I perceive from the strawberry-mark on your shirt-front that you had strawberries for dessert. Holmes, you astonish me. Tut, tut, you know my methods. Where is the tobacco? The tobacco is in the Persian slipper. Can I leave my practice for a week? I can."
Antony smiled and went on smoking. After waiting hopefully for a minute or two, Bill said in a firm voice:
"Well then, Holmes, I feel bound to ask you if you have deduced anything. Also whom do you suspect?"
Antony began to talk.
"Do you remember," he said, "one of Holmes's little scores over Watson about the number of steps up to the Baker Street lodging? Poor old Watson had been up and down them a thousand times, but he had never thought of counting them, whereas Holmes had counted them as a matter of course, and knew that there were seventeen. And that was supposed to be the difference between observation and non-observation. Watson was crushed again, and Holmes appeared to him more amazing than ever. Now, it always seemed to me that in that matter Holmes was the ass, and Watson the sensible person. What on earth is the point of keeping in your head an unnecessary fact like that? If you really want to know at any time the number of steps to your lodging, you can ring up your landlady and ask her. I've been up and down the steps of the club a thousand times, but if you asked me to tell you at this moment how many steps there are I couldn't do it. Could you?"
"I certainly couldn't," said Bill.
"But if you really wanted to know," said Antony casually, with a sudden change of voice, "I could find out for you without even bothering to ring up the hall-porter."
Bill was puzzled as to why they were talking about the club steps, but he felt it his duty to say that he did want to know how many they were.
"Right," said Antony. "I'll find out."
He closed his eyes.
"I'm walking up St James' Street," he said slowly. "Now I've come to the club and I'm going past the smoking-room—windows-one-two three four. Now I'm at the steps. I turn in and begin going up them. One-two-three-four-five-six, then a broad step; six-seven-eight-nine, another broad step; nine-ten-eleven. Eleven I'm inside. Good morning, Rogers. Fine day again." With a little start he opened his eyes and came back again to his present surroundings. He turned to Bill with a smile. "Eleven," he said. "Count them the next time you're there. Eleven and now I hope I shall forget it again."
Bill was distinctly interested.
"That's rather hot," he said. "Expound."
"Well, I can't explain it, whether it's something in the actual eye, or something in the brain, or what, but I have got rather an uncanny habit of recording things unconsciously. You know that game where you look at a tray full of small objects for three minutes, and then turn away and try to make a list of them. It means a devil of a lot of concentration for the ordinary person, if he wants to get his list complete, but in some odd way I manage to do it without concentration at all. I mean that my eyes seem to do it without the brain consciously taking any part. I could look at the tray, for instance, and talk to you about golf at the same time, and still get my list right."
"I should think that's rather a useful gift for an amateur detective. You ought to have gone into the profession before."
"Well, it is rather useful. It's rather surprising, you know, to a stranger. Let's surprise Cayley with it, shall we?"
"How?"
"Well, let's ask him—" Antony stopped and looked at Bill comically, "let's ask him what he's going to do with the key of the office."
For a moment Bill did not understand.
"Key of the office?" he said vaguely. "You don't mean—Tony! What do you mean? Good God! do you mean that Cayley—But what about Mark?"
"I don't know where Mark is—that's another thing I want to know—but I'm quite certain that he hasn't got the key of the office with him. Because Cayley's got it."
"Are you sure?"
"Quite."
Bill looked at him wonderingly.
"I say," he said, almost pleadingly, "don't tell me that you can see into people's pockets and all that sort of thing as well."
Antony laughed and denied it cheerfully.
"Then how do you know?"
"You're the perfect Watson, Bill. You take to it quite naturally. Properly speaking, I oughtn't to explain till the last chapter, but I always think that that's so unfair. So here goes. Of course, I don't really know that he's got it, but I do know that he had it. I know that when I came on him this afternoon, he had just locked the door and put the key in his pocket."
"You mean you saw him at the time, but that you've only just remembered it—reconstructed it in the way you were explaining just now?"
"No. I didn't see him. But I did see something. I saw the key of the billiard-room."
"Where?
"Outside the billiard-room door."
"Outside? But it was inside when we looked just now."
"Exactly."
"Who put it there?"
"Obviously Cayley."
"But—"
"Let's go back to this afternoon. I don't remember noticing the billiard-room key at the time; I must have done so without knowing. Probably when I saw Cayley banging at the door I may have wondered subconsciously whether the key of the room next to it would fit. Something like that, I daresay. Well, when I was sitting out by myself on that seat just before you came along, I went over the whole scene in my mind, and I suddenly saw the billiard-room key there outside. And I began to wonder if the office-key had been outside too. When Cayley came up, I told you my idea and you were both interested. But Cayley was just a shade too interested. I daresay you didn't notice it, but he was."
"By Jove!"
"Well, of course that proved nothing; and the key business didn't really prove anything, because whatever side of the door the other keys were, Mark might have locked his own private room from the inside sometimes. But I piled it on, and pretended that it was enormously important, and quite altered the case altogether, and having got Cayley thoroughly anxious about it, I told him that we should be well out of the way for the next hour or so, and that he would be alone in the house to do what he liked about it. And, as I expected, he couldn't resist it. He altered the keys and gave himself away entirely."
"But the library key was still outside. Why didn't he alter that?"
"Because he's a clever devil. For one thing, the Inspector had been in the library, and might possibly have noticed it already. And for another—" Antony hesitated.
"What?" said Bill, after waiting for him to go on.
"It's only guesswork. But I fancy that Cayley was thoroughly upset about the key business. He suddenly realized that he had been careless, and he hadn't got time to think it all over. So he didn't want to commit himself definitely to the statement that the key was either outside or inside. He wanted
to leave it vague. It was safest that way."
"I see," said Bill slowly.
But his mind was elsewhere. He was wondering suddenly about Cayley. Cayley was just an ordinary man—like himself. Bill had had little jokes with him sometimes; not that Cayley was much of a hand at joking. Bill had helped him to sausages, played tennis with him, borrowed his tobacco, lent him a putter.... and here was Antony saying that he was what? Well, not an ordinary man, anyway. A man with a secret. Perhaps a murderer. No, not a murderer; not Cayley. That was rot, anyway. Why, they had played tennis together.
"Now then, Watson," said Antony suddenly. "It's time you said something."
"I say, Tony, do you really mean it?"
"Mean what?"
"About Cayley."
"I mean what I said, Bill. No more."
"Well, what does it amount to?"
"Simply that Robert Ablett died in the office this afternoon, and that Cayley knows exactly how he died. That's all. It doesn't follow that Cayley killed him."
"No. No, of course it doesn't." Bill gave a sigh of relief. "He's just shielding Mark, what?"
"I wonder."
"Well, isn't that the simplest explanation?"
"It's the simplest if you're a friend of Cayley and want to let him down lightly. But then I'm not, you see."
"Why isn't it simple, anyhow?"
"Well, let's have the explanation then, and I'll undertake to give you a simpler one afterwards. Go on. Only remember the key is on the outside of the door to start with."
"Yes; well, I don't mind that. Mark goes in to see his brother, and they quarrel and all the rest of it, just as Cayley was saying. Cayley hears the shot, and in order to give Mark time to get away, locks the door, puts the key in his pocket and pretends that Mark has locked the door, and that he can't get in. How's that?"
"Hopeless, Watson, hopeless."
"Why?"
"How does Cayley know that it is Mark who has shot Robert, and not the other way round?"
"Oh!" said Bill, rather upset. "Yes." He thought for a moment, "All right. Say that Cayley has gone into the room first, and seen Robert on the ground."
"Well?"
"Well, there you are."
"And what does he say to Mark? That it's a fine afternoon; and could he lend him a pocket-handkerchief? Or does he ask him what's happened?"
"Well, of course, I suppose he asks what happened," said Bill reluctantly.
"And what does Mark say?"
"Explains that the revolver went off accidentally during a struggle."
"Whereupon Cayley shields him by doing what, Bill? Encouraging him to do the damn silliest thing that any man could possibly do confess his guilt by running away!"
"No, that's rather hopeless, isn't it?" Bill thought again. "Well," he said reluctantly, "suppose Mark confessed that he'd murdered his brother?"
"That's better, Bill. Don't be afraid of getting away from the accident idea. Well then, your new theory is this. Mark confesses to Cayley that he shot Robert on purpose, and Cayley decides, even at the risk of committing perjury, and getting into trouble himself, to help Mark to escape. Is that right?"
Bill nodded.
"Well then, I want to ask you two questions. First, is it possible, as I said before dinner, that any man would commit such an idiotic murder—a murder that puts the rope so very tightly round his neck? Secondly, if Cayley is prepared to perjure himself for Mark (as he has to, anyway, now), wouldn't it be simpler for him to say that he was in the office all the time, and that Robert's death was accidental?"
Bill considered this carefully, and then nodded slowly again.
"Yes, my simple explanation is a wash-out," he said. "Now let's have yours."
Antony did not answer him. He had begun to think about something quite different.
Chapter IX - Possibilities of a Croquet Set
*
"What's the matter?" said Bill sharply.
Antony looked round at him with raised eyebrows.
"You've thought of something suddenly," said Bill. "What is it?"
Antony laughed.
"My dear Watson," he said, "you aren't supposed to be as clever as this."
"Oh, you can't take me in!"
"No.... Well, I was wondering about this ghost of yours, Bill. It seems to me—"
"Oh, that!" Bill was profoundly disappointed. "What on earth has the ghost got to do with it?"
"I don't know," said Antony apologetically. "I don't know what anything has got to do with it. I was just wondering. You shouldn't have brought me here if you hadn't wanted me to think about the ghost. This is where she appeared, isn't it?"
"Yes." Bill was distinctly short about it.
"How?"
"What?"
"I said, 'How?'"
"How? How do ghosts appear? I don't know. They just appear."
"Over four or five hundred yards of open park?"
"Well, but she had to appear here, because this is where the original one—Lady Anne, you know—was supposed to walk."
"Oh, never mind Lady Anne! A real ghost can do anything. But how did Miss Norris appear suddenly over five hundred yards of bare park?"
Bill looked at Antony with open mouth.
"I—I don't know," he stammered. "We never thought of that."
"You would have seen her long before, wouldn't you, if she had come the way we came?"
"Of course we should."
"And that would have spoilt it rather. You would have had time to recognize her walk."
Bill was interested now.
"That's rather funny, you know, Tony. We none of us thought of that."
"You're sure she didn't come across the park when none of you were looking?"
"Quite. Because, you see, Betty and I were expecting her, and we kept looking round in case we saw her, so that we should all be playing with our backs to her."
"You and Miss Calladine were playing together?"
"I say, however do you know that?"
"Brilliant deductive reasoning. Well, then you suddenly saw her?"
"Yes, she walked across that side of the lawn." He indicated the opposite side, nearer to the house.
"She couldn't have been hiding in the ditch? Do you call it the moat, by the way?"
"Mark does. We don't among ourselves. No, she couldn't. Betty and I were here before the others, and walked round a bit. We should have seen her."
"Then she must have been hiding in the shed. Or do you call it the summer-house?"
"We had to go there for the bowls, of course. She couldn't have been there."
"Oh!"
"It's dashed funny," said Bill, after an interval for thought. "But it doesn't matter, does it? It has nothing to do with Robert."
"Hasn't it?"
"I say, has it?" said Bill, getting excited again.
"I don't know. We don't know what has, or what hasn't. But it has got something to do with Miss Norris. And Miss Norris—" He broke off suddenly.
"What about her?"
"Well, you're all in it in a kind of way. And if something unaccountable happens to one of you a day or two before something unaccountable happens to the whole house, one is well, interested." It was a good enough reason, but it wasn't the reason he had been on the point of giving.
"I see. Well?"
Antony knocked out his pipe and got up slowly.
"Well then, let's find the way from the house by which Miss Norris came."
Bill jumped up eagerly.
"By Jove! Do you mean there's a secret passage?"
"A secluded passage, anyway. There must be."
"I say, what fun! I love secret passages. Good Lord, and this afternoon I was playing golf just like an ordinary merchant! What a life! Secret passages!"
They made their way down into the ditch. If an opening was to be found which led to the house, it would probably be on the house side of the green, and on the outside of the ditch. The most obvious place at which to begin the search was the shed w
here the bowls were kept. It was a tidy place as anything in Mark's establishment would be. There were two boxes of croquet things, one of them with the lid open, as if the balls and mallets and, hoops (neatly enough put away, though) had been recently used; a box of bowls, a small lawn-mower, a roller and so forth. A seat ran along the back of it, whereon the bowls-players could sit when it rained.
Antony tapped the wall at the back.
"This is where the passage ought to begin. It doesn't sound very hollow, does it?"
"It needn't begin here at all, need it?" said Bill, walking round with bent head, and tapping the other walls. He was just too tall to stand upright in the shed.
"There's only one reason why it should, and that is that it would save us the trouble of looking anywhere else for it. Surely Mark didn't let you play croquet on his bowling-green?" He pointed to the croquet things.
"He didn't encourage it at one time, but this year he got rather keen about it. There's really nowhere else to play. Personally I hate the game. He wasn't very keen on bowls, you know, but he liked calling it the bowling-green, and surprising his visitors with it."
Antony laughed.
"I love you on Mark," he said. "You're priceless."
He began to feel in his pockets for his pipe and tobacco, and then suddenly stopped and stiffened to attention. For a moment he stood listening, with his head on one side, holding up a finger to bid Bill listen too.
"What is it?" whispered Bill.
Antony waved him to silence, and remained listening. Very quietly he went down on his knees, and listened again. Then he put his ear to the floor. He got up and dusted himself quickly, walked across to Bill and whispered in his ear:
"Footsteps. Somebody coming. When I begin to talk, back me up."
Bill nodded. Antony gave him an encouraging pat on the back, and stepped firmly across to the box of bowls, whistling loudly to himself. He took the bowls out, dropped one with a loud bang on the floor, said, "Oh, Lord!" and went on:
"I say, Bill, I don't think I want to play bowls, after all."
"Well, why did you say you did?" grumbled Bill.
Antony flashed a smile of appreciation at him.
"Well, I wanted to when I said I did, and now I don't want to."