Part 4 (2/2)

As I looked I saw others, both of a person advancing and receding. One was ill-defined, where she had apparently slipped upon the clay. But all of them I stamped out--all, indeed, that I could find. Yet was it possible, I wondered, to efface every one?

If one single one remained, it might be sufficient to throw suspicion upon her.

While engaged in this, something white caught my eye lying upon the gra.s.s about ten yards distant. I picked it up and found it to be a piece of white fur about an inch square that had evidently been torn bodily out of a boa or cape--the same fur that had been found between the dead man's fingers.

This I placed carefully in my cigarette-case and continued my work of effacing the d.a.m.ning footprints. There were other marks, of men's boots, but whether those of the dead man or of our own I could not decide, so I left them as evidence for the police to investigate.

My eyes were everywhere to try and discover the weapon with which the foul deed had been committed, for the a.s.sa.s.sin, I thought, might have cast it away, but my search was in vain. It had disappeared.

Fully twenty distinct marks of those small well-shod feet I effaced by stamping upon them or sc.r.a.ping the surface with the trowel, and was preparing to return and keep the appointment with the doctor when of a sudden I saw, lying close behind the trunk of the giant oak, a half-smoked cigarette, which on taking up I found to be of the same brand as those found in the dead man's pocket. He had therefore kept a tryst at that spot, and had smoked calmly and unsuspiciously in order to while away the time.

Of men's footprints in the soft ground there were a quant.i.ty, but then I remembered how all four of us had tramped about there, in addition to the victim himself, and I was not sufficiently expert in tracking to be able to distinguish one man's tread from another's.

It was already daylight and in the distance I could hear the sound of a reaping machine in one of the fields beyond the park, therefore I was compelled to escape in order that my premature examination should remain secret. So I struck straight across the level sward to the London road, which ran beyond the park boundary, in preference to pa.s.sing straight down the avenue at risk of meeting any of the labourers.

News of the tragedy I knew had not yet reached the Hall, otherwise the servants would have been out to see the spot, therefore I believed myself quite safe from detection until, just as I scaled the old stone wall and dropped into the broad white high road with its long line of telegraph lines, I encountered the innkeeper Warr who, mounted on his bicycle, was riding towards me.

He had approached noiselessly and we were mutually surprised to meet each other in such circ.u.mstances.

”Halloa!” he cried, dismounting. ”You've been out again very early-- eh?”

”I've been back to the spot to see if I could find any traces of the dead man's a.s.sailant,” was my reply. ”I thought I'd go back early, before the crowd trod over the place. Don't say anything, or Knight may consider that I've taken his duty out of his hands.”

”Ah, a very good idea, sir,” was the man's approving response. ”I thought of doing so myself, only they're beginning to cut my bit o'

wheat in the mill-field this morning and I have to go into Thrapston about the machine. I'll be back in an hour.”

He was preparing to re-mount, when I stopped him, saying--

”Look here, Warr. You recollect that stranger who called and left the note for Lady Lolita last evening? Well, there seems considerable mystery about the affair, and somehow I feel there's connexion with the fellow's visit with this poor young man's death. If so, her ladys.h.i.+p's name must be rigorously kept out of it, you understand. There's to be an inquest to-morrow, and we shall both be called to give evidence.

Recollect that not a word is said about the man Keene, the note, or the message.”

”If you wish it, sir, I'll keep a still tongue,” was his reply. ”I've told n.o.body up to now--not even the missus.”

”Very well. Remember only you and I know of this man's return, and the knowledge must go no further. There's a mystery, but it must have no connexion with her ladys.h.i.+p.”

”You may trust me, sir. The family have been too good to me all these years for me not to try and render them a service. I quite agree with you that the stranger was suspicious, and from what he said to me in private it is certain that he must know her ladys.h.i.+p very well indeed.”

”You're sure you've never seen that young man before?” I asked, watching his face narrowly.

”Him? No, I don't know him from Adam!” was the landlord's reply, yet uttered in a manner and tone that aroused my distinct suspicions. His a.s.surance was just a trifle too emphatic, I thought.

I paused a moment, half inclined to express my doubt openly, then said at last--

”That letter--what shall you do with it?”

”Give it to her, of course. I'll come up to the Hall when I come back.

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