Part 21 (1/2)

His companion had glanced round now, keenly, as though to probe for the meaning which might lie beneath his words. He speculated whether she might be wondering how much he knew; was he cognisant of her meeting with Henshaw?

But, whatever her thought, she answered in the same even voice, ”There is nothing to forgive. On the contrary I am most grateful.”

They were nearing the house, and Gifford was debating whether he dared suggest another turn along the shrubbery path, when Richard Morriston appeared at the hall door, beckoned to them, and went in again.

”I wonder what d.i.c.k wants. Has anything more come to light?” Miss Morriston observed with a rather bored laugh as she slightly quickened her pace.

As they went in she called, ”d.i.c.k!” and he answered her from the library.

There they found him with Kelson and Muriel Tredworth. A glance at their faces told Gifford that they were all in a state of scarcely suppressed excitement.

”I say, Edith, what do you think?” her brother exclaimed. ”We've made a rather important discovery. Were you in the middle room of the tower during the dance?”

For a moment his sister did not answer.

”No; I don't think I was,” she said, with what seemed to Gifford a certain amount of apprehension in her eyes, although her expression was calm enough.

”Oh, but, my dear girl, you must have been,” Morriston insisted vehemently. ”We have found the explanation of the stains on Miss Tredworth's dress and on yours.”

”You have?” his sister replied, looking at him curiously.

”Yes; beyond all doubt. The mystery is made clear. Come and see.”

He led the way across the hall and up the first story of the tower.

”There's the explanation,” he said, pointing to some dark red patches on the back of a sofa and on the carpet below.

”It is not a pleasant idea,” Morriston said; ”but you see these marks are directly under the place where the dead man lay in the room above. The blood from his wound evidently ran through the c.h.i.n.ks of the flooring on to the beams of the ceiling here and so fell drop by drop on the couch and on any one sitting there. Rather gruesome, but I am sure we must be all very glad to get the simple explanation. The only wonder is that no one thought of it before.”

”Muriel was sitting just at that end of the sofa when I proposed to her,”

Kelson said in a low voice to Gifford.

”I am delighted the matter is so completely accounted for,” his friend returned. ”What fools we were ever to have taken it so tragically.”

But his expression changed as he glanced at Edith Morriston; she had denied that she had been in the room.

”I have sent down to the police to tell them of the discovery,” Morriston was saying. ”The fact is that since the tragedy the servants appear to have rather shunned this part of the house, or at any rate to have devoted as little time to it as possible. Otherwise this would have come to light sooner. Anyhow it is a source of congratulation to Miss Tredworth and you, Edith. Of course you must have been in here.”

”I remember sitting just there; ugh!” Miss Tredworth said with a shudder.

”I can swear to that,” Kelson corroborated with a knowing smile.

”You must have done the same or brushed against the sofa, Edith,”

Morriston said cheerfully. ”Well, I'm glad that's settled, although it brings us no nearer towards solving the mystery of what happened overhead.”

”No,” Kelson remarked. ”It looks as though that was going to remain a mystery.”

The butler came in. ”Major Freeman is here, sir,” he said, ”with Mr.