Dick looked at the pitiable thing, bewildered; and then he remembered the girl and, with a low word of instruction to Puttler, went back to her.
“Is he--dead?” she asked fearfully.
“Yes, I’m afraid he is.”
“Who--who is it?”
“One of the servants,” he said evasively.
“Not Thomas?”
Why she should think it was Thomas she could not for the life of her tell.
“Yes--Thomas.”
She made no inquiries, and they walked back without a word to his room. He rang the bell, and, to the footman who answered:
“Ask Mr. Glover to come to me,” he said.
The old butler came apprehensively. All the servants had heard the scream in the park.
“Where is his lordship?”
“He went up to bed about five minutes ago, Mr. Alford.”
“Had he heard--anything?”
“No, sir. He’s so particular about our talking of the Black Abbot----”
“How do you know it was the Black Abbot?” asked Dick sharply, and the butler explained that somebody had seen the figure in the grounds.
“He was trying to open a window. One of the maids looking out of her window saw him walking on the paved path below, and raised an alarm. Has he hurt anybody, Mr. Richard?”
“No, he has hurt nobody,” said Dick.
He drew the butler out into the hall and closed the door behind him.
“A man has been found in the grounds in the dress of a black abbot--and he is dead--murdered!”
“Good Lord, sir!” said the startled servant. “Is it anybody we know?”
“Thomas,” said Dick laconically, and the old man staggered back against the panelled wall.
“Not our Thomas? Thomas Luck, the man who was dismissed?”
Dick nodded.
“Get the servants to bed. Tell them that the scream came from somebody who was skylarking and that we caught him--anything you like.” Then, catching a glimpse of the man’s ashen face: “First of all you’d better go down into the dining-room and help yourself to a good stiff glass of brandy and water; you look a corpse, man!”
“Thomas!” muttered the old man. “It’s terrible! Do you think----”
Dick cut short his question.
“Do as I tell you; get the servants to bed. The police will be up here soon enough, but I’ll arrange that your staff are not questioned till the morning.”
He went back to the girl.
“As for you, young lady,” he said, with a grim smile, “I seem to spend my life taking you back to your home.”
“Couldn’t I stay?” she asked timidly.
Dick shook his head.
“We shall have to call in the police, and I want to keep your name out of the business. Arthur is at home?”
“Yes, Arthur is at home,” she said listlessly.
At that moment the telephone bell rang and he took up the instrument.
“Is that Lord Chelford’s house?” said an unfamiliar voice.
“Yes,” said Dick shortly.
“I’m speaking from the sub post office. That isn’t Lord Chelford speaking?”
“No, it’s Mr. Alford,” said Dick.
“Well, listen, Mr. Alford. Have you sent anything very important from the local post-box?”
“Why?” asked Dick quickly.
“Because our roundsman reported that the box had been tampered with. He couldn’t get in his key, so the letters that had been posted between six and ten have not yet been collected.”
Dick uttered an exclamation.
“Right! When it’s cleared, will you ask the postman to bring the letters up to the hall? There are one or two that I want to withdraw.”
The man at the other end of the wire hesitated.
“Why, in the special circumstances, yes,” he said, and Dick hung up the receiver and turned slowly to the girl.
“The letter box hasn’t been cleared.”
Slowly the significance of the words dawned upon her.
“What shall I do?” she whispered.
“Give me authority to withdraw your letter to Gilder. There are six more days.”
She held her breath. For a second a vision of her brother in convict’s garb came to her eyes, and then she looked at the man before her. Something of his vitality, his confidence, passed to her soul.
“I will do as you tell me,” she said, in a voice little above a whisper. “But, Dick, what will happen?”
“I am going to do my duty,” said Dick.
And all that sleepless night, as she tossed from side to side in her bed, she pondered those words but could find no solution to their mystery.
