Dusk came and the veil of a Regent’s Park fog. The house was in darkness, no flash of light except a faint glimmer that burnt in the hall, no sound. The woman was still there—Mrs. Sidney Telfer, nurse, companion, guardian and wife. Mrs. Sidney Telfer, the hidden director of Telfers Consolidated, a masterful woman who, not content with marrying a weakling twenty years her junior, had applied her masterful but ill-equipped mind to the domination of a business she did not understand, and which she was destined to plunge into ruin. Mr. Reeder had made good use of his time at the Records Office: a copy of the marriage certificate was almost as easy to secure as a copy of the will.
He glanced round anxiously. The fog was clearing, which was exactly what he did not wish it to do, for he had certain acts to perform which required as thick a cloaking as possible.
And then a surprising thing happened. A cab came slowly along the road and stopped at the gate.
“I think this is the place, miss,” said the cabman, and a girl stepped down to the pavement.
It was Miss Margaret Belman.
Reeder waited until she had paid the fare and the cab had gone, and then, as she walked towards the gate, he stepped from the shadow.
“Oh!—Mr. Reeder, how you frightened me!” she gasped. “I am going to see Mr. Telfer—he is dangerously ill—no, it was his housekeeper who wrote asking me to come at seven.”
“Did she now! Well, I will ring the bell for you.”
She told him that that was unnecessary—she had the key which had come with the note.
“She is alone in the house with Mr. Telfer, who refuses to allow a trained nurse near him,” said Margaret, “and—”
“Will you be good enough to lower your voice, young lady?” urged Mr. Reeder in an impressive whisper. “Forgive the impertinence, but if our friend is ill—”
She was at first startled by his urgency.
“He couldn’t hear me,” she said, but spoke in a lower tone.
“He may—sick people are very sensitive to the human voice. Tell me, how did this letter come?”
“From Mr. Telfer? By district messenger an hour ago.”
Nobody had been to the house or left it—except Sidney. And Sidney, in his blind fear, would carry out any instructions which his wife gave to him.
“And did it contain a passage like this?” Mr. Reeder considered a moment. “ ‘Bring this letter with you’?”
“No,” said the girl in surprise, “but Mrs. Welford telephoned just before the letter arrived and told me to wait for it. And she asked me to bring the letter with me because she didn’t wish Mr. Telfer’s private correspondence to be left lying around. But why do you ask me this, Mr. Reeder—is anything wrong?”
He did not answer immediately. Pushing open the gate, he walked noiselessly along the grass plot that ran parallel with the path.
“Open the door, I will come in with you,” he whispered and, when she hesitated: “Do as I tell you, please.”
The hand that put the key into the lock trembled, but at last the key turned and the door swung open. A small night-light burnt on the table of the wide panelled hall. On the left, near the foot of the stairs, only the lower steps of which were visible, Reeder saw a narrow door which stood open, and, taking a step forward, saw that it was a tiny telephone-room.
And then a voice spoke from the upper landing, a deep, booming voice that he knew.
“Is that Miss Belman?”
Margaret, her heart beating faster, went to the foot of the stairs and looked up.
“Yes, Mrs. Welford.”
“You brought the letter with you?”
“Yes.”
Mr. Reeder crept along the wall until he could have touched the girl.
“Good,” said the deep voice. “Will you call the doctor—Circle 743—and tell him that Mr. Telfer has had a relapse—you will find the booth in the hall: shut the door behind you, the bell worries him.”
Margaret looked at the detective and he nodded.
The woman upstairs wished to gain time for something—what?
The girl passed him: he heard the thud of the padded door close, and there was a click that made him spin round. The first thing he noticed was that there was no handle to the door, the second that the keyhole was covered by a steel disc, which he discovered later was felt-lined. He heard the girl speaking faintly, and put his ear to the keyhole.
“The instrument is disconnected—I can’t open the door.”
Without a second’s hesitation, he flew up the stairs, umbrella in hand, and as he reached the landing he heard a door close with a crash. Instantly he located the sound. It came from a room on the left immediately over the hall. The door was locked.
“Open this door,” he commanded, and there came to him the sound of a deep laugh.
Mr. Reeder tugged at the stout handle of his umbrella. There was a flicker of steel as he dropped the lower end, and in his hand appeared six inches of knife blade.
The first stab at the panel sliced through the thin wood as though it were paper. In a second there was a jagged gap through which the black muzzle of an automatic was thrust.
“Put down that jug or I will blow your features into comparative chaos!” said Mr. Reeder pedantically.
The room was brightly lit, and he could see plainly. Mrs. Welford stood by the side of a big square funnel, the narrow end of which ran into the floor. In her hand was a huge enamelled iron jug, and ranged about her were six others. In one corner of the room was a wide circular tank, and beyond, at half its height, depended a large copper pipe.
The woman’s face turned to him was blank, expressionless.
“He wanted to run away with her,” she said simply, “and after all I have done for him!”
“Open the door.”
Mrs. Welford set down the jug and ran her huge hand across her forehead.
“Sidney is my own darling,” she said. “I’ve nursed him, and
