CHAPTER XI
FURTHER DISCOVERIES
The silence which followed Diana's announcement regarding the ribbon andstiletto--for Lucian kept silence out of sheer astonishment--was brokenby the hoarse voice of Mrs. Kebby:
"If ye want the ribbon, miss, I'll not say no to a shilling. With whatyour good gentleman promised, that will be three as I'm ready to take,"and Mrs. Kebby held out a dirty claw for the silver.
"You'll sell it, will you!" cried out Diana indignantly, pouncing downon the harridan. "How dare you keep what isn't yours? If you had shownthe detective this," shaking the ribbon in Mrs. Kebby's face, "he mighthave caught the criminal!"
"Pardon me," interposed Lucian, finding his voice, "I hardly think so,Miss Vrain; for no one but yourself could have told that the ribbonadorned the stiletto. Where did you see the weapon last?"
"In the library at Berwin Manor. I hung it up on the wall myself, bythis ribbon."
"Are you sure it is the same ribbon?"
"I am certain," replied Diana emphatically. "I cannot be mistaken; thecolour and pattern are both peculiar. Where did you find it?" sheadded, turning to Mrs. Kebby.
"In the kitchen, I tell ye," growled the old woman sullenly. "I onlyfound it this blessed morning. 'Twas in a dark corner, near the door asleads down to the woodshed. How was I to know 'twas any good?"
"Did you find anything else?" asked Lucian mildly.
"No, I didn't, sir."
"Not a stiletto?" demanded Diana, putting the ribbon in her pocket.
"I don't know what's a stiletter, miss; but I didn't find nothing; and Iain't a thief, though some people as sets themselves above others bytaking ribbons as doesn't belong to 'em mayn't be much good."
"The ribbon is not yours," said Diana haughtily.
"Yes it are! Findings is keepings with me!" answered Mrs. Kebby.
"Don't anger her," whispered Denzil, touching Miss Vrain's arm. "We mayfind her useful."
Diana looked from him to the old woman, and opened her purse, at thesight of which Mrs. Kebby's sour face relaxed. When Miss Vrain gave herhalf a sovereign she quite beamed with joy. "The blessing of heaven onyou, my dear," she said, with a curtsey. "Gold! good gold! Ah! this is abrave day's work for me--thirteen blessed shillings!"
"Ten, you mean, Mrs. Kebby!"
"Oh, no, sir," cried Mrs. Kebby obsequiously, "the lady gave me ten,bless her heart, but you've quite forgot your three."
"I said two."
"Ah! so you did, sir. I'm a poor schollard at 'rithmetic."
"You're clever enough to get money out of people," said Diana, who wasdisgusted at the avarice of the hag. "However, for the present you mustbe content with what I have given you. If, in cleaning this house, youfind any other article, whatever it may be, you shall have another tenshillings, on consideration that you take it at once to Mr. Denzil."
Mrs. Kebby, who was tying up the piece of gold in the corner of herhandkerchief, nodded her old head with much complacency. "I'll do it,miss; that is, if the gentleman will pay on delivery. I like cash."
"You shall have cash," said Lucian, laughing; and then, as Dianaintimated her intention of leaving the house, he descended the stairs inher company.
Miss Vrain kept silence until they were outside in the sunshine, whenshe cast an upward glance at the warm blue sky, dappled with lightclouds.
"I am glad to be out of that house," she said, with a shudder. "There issomething in its dark and freezing atmosphere which chills my spirits."
"It is said to be haunted, you know," said Lucian carelessly; then,after a pause, he spoke on the subject which was uppermost in his mind."Now that you have this piece of evidence, Miss Vrain, what do youintend to do?"
"Make sure that I have made no mistake, Mr. Denzil. I shall go down toBerwin Manor this afternoon. If the stiletto is still hanging on thelibrary wall by its ribbon, I shall admit my mistake; if it is absent,why then I shall return to town and consult with you as to what is bestto be done. You know I rely on you."
"I shall do whatever you wish, Miss Vrain," said Lucian fervently.
"It is very good of you," replied the lady gratefully, "For I have noright to take up your time in this manner."
"You have every right--that is, I mean--I mean," stammered Denzil,thinking from the surprised look of Miss Vrain that he had gone too farat so early a stage of their acquaintance. "I mean that as a brieflessbarrister I have ample time at my command, and I shall only be too happyto place it and myself at your service. And moreover," he added in alighter tone, "I have some selfish interest in the matter, also, for itis not every one who finds so difficult a riddle as this to solve. Ishall never rest easy in my mind until I unravel the whole of thistangled skein."
"How good you are!" cried Diana, impulsively extending her hand. "It isas impossible for me to thank you sufficiently now for your kindness asit will be to reward you hereafter, should we succeed."
"As to my reward," said Lucian, retaining her hand longer than wasnecessary, "we can decide what I merit when your father's death isavenged."
Diana coloured and turned away her eyes, withdrawing her hand in themeantime from the too warm clasp of the young man. A sense of hismeaning was suddenly borne in upon her by look and clasp, and she felt amaidenly confusion at the momentary boldness of this undeclared lover.However, with feminine tact she laughed off the hint, and shortlyafterwards took her leave, promising to communicate as speedily aspossible with Lucian regarding the circumstances of her visit to Bath.
The barrister wished to escort her back to the Royal John Hotel inKensington, but Miss Vrain, guessing his feelings, would not permitthis; so Lucian, hat in hand, was left standing in Geneva Square, whilehis divinity drove off in a prosaic hansom. With her went the glory ofthe sunlight, the sweetness of the spring; and Denzil, more in love thanever, sighed hugely as he walked slowly back to his lodgings.
For doleful moods, hard work and other interests are the sole cure;therefore, that same afternoon Lucian returned to explore the SilentHouse on his own account. It had struck him as suggestive that theparti-coloured ribbon to which Diana attached such importance shouldhave been found in so out-of-the-way a corner as the threshold of thedoor which conducted to what Mrs. Kebby, with characteristicmisrepresentation, called the woodshed. In reality the place inquestion was a cellar, which extended under the soil of the back yard,and was lighted from the top by a skylight placed on a level with theground.
On being admitted again by Mrs. Kebby, and sending that ancient femaleto her Augean task of cleansing the house, Lucian descended to thebasement in order to examine kitchen and cellar more particularly. If,as Diana stated, the ribbon had been knotted loosely about the hilt ofthe stiletto, it must have fallen off unnoticed by the assassin when,weapon in hand, he was retreating from the scene of crime.
"He must have come down here from the sitting-room," mused Denzil, as hestood in the cool, damp kitchen. "And--as the ribbon was found by Mrs.Kebby near yonder door--it is most probable that he left the kitchen bythat passage for the cellar. Now it remains for me to find out how hemade his exit from the cellar; and also I must look for the stiletto,which he possibly dropped in his flight, as he did the ribbon."
While thus soliloquising, Denzil lighted a candle which he had taken theprecaution to bring with him for the purpose of making his undergroundexplorations. Having thus provided himself with means to dispel thedarkness, he stepped into the door and descended the stone stairs whichled to the cellars.
At the foot of the steps he found himself in a passage running from thefront to the back of the house, and forthwith turned to the right inorder to reach the particular cellar, which was dug out in the manner ofa cave under the back yard.
This, as Lucian ascertained by walking round, was faced with stone andhad bins on all four sides for the storage of wine. Overhead there was aglass skylight, of which the glass was so dusty and dirty that only afew rays of light could struggle into the murky depths below. But whatparticularly attracted the at
tention of Denzil was a short wooden ladderlying on the stone pavement, and which probably was used to reach thewine in the upper bins.
"And I should not be surprised if it had been used for another purpose,"murmured Lucian, glancing upward at the square aperture of the skylight.
It struck him as possible that a stranger could enter thereby anddescend by the ladder. To test the truth of this he reared the ladder inthe middle of the cellar so that its top rung rested against the loweredge of the square overhead. Ascending carefully--for the ladder was byno means stout--he pushed the glass frame upward and found that ityielded easily to a moderate amount of strength. Climbing up, step afterstep, Lucian arose through the aperture like a genie out of the earth,and soon found that he could jump easily out of the cellar into theyard.
"Good!" he exclaimed, much gratified by this discovery. "I now see howthe assassin entered. No wonder the kitchen door was bolted and barred,and that no one was seen to visit Vrain by the front door. Any one whoknew the position of that skylight could obtain admission easily, at anyhour, by descending the ladder and passing through cellar and kitchen tothe upper part of the house. So much is clear, but I must next discoverhow those who entered got into this yard."
And, indeed, there seemed no outlet, for the yard was enclosed on threesides by a fence of palings the height of a man, and rendered imperviousto damp by a coating of tar; on the fourth side by the house itself.Only over the fence--which was no insuperable obstacle--could a strangerhave gained access to the yard; and towards the fence opposite to thehouse Lucian walked. In it there was no gate, or opening of any kind, soit would appear that to come into the yard a stranger would need toclimb over, a feat easily achieved by a moderately active man.
As Denzil examined this frail barrier his eye was caught by a flutteringobject on the left--that is, the side in a line with the skylight. Thishe found was the scrap of a woman's veil of thin black gauze spottedwith velvet. At once his thoughts reverted to the shadow of the woman onthe blind, and the suspicions of Diana Vrain.
"Great heavens!" he thought, "can that doll of a Lydia be guilty, afterall?"