Day had come now, and Dick was reeling with weariness. He threw himself down on the bed, half dressed as he was, pulled the coverlet over him, and was immediately asleep.
XIV
It was the ringing of the telephone bell that woke him. He rolled over on the bed and took down the receiver.
“Hullo!” he said, in genuine surprise. “Your voice was the last in the world I expected to hear.”
There was a little laugh at the other end of the phone.
“You recognized it? That’s rather clever of you. I came down to see you half an hour ago, but the hall porter was certain that you were not in.”
“Is anything wrong?” he asked quickly.
There was a little hesitancy.
“N-no,” said Sybil Lansdown. “Only I wanted to—consult with you. That is the technical term, isn’t it?”
“Come along by all means. I will mollify the porter.”
She did not know why the porter should need mollification until she arrived. He had had no time to shave, to do any more than jump in and out of the bath, and he was in the throes of cooking when he opened the door to her.
“The truth is,” he said, “I’ve sent my housekeeper away—that’s rather a grand name for a daily help, but it impresses most people.”
“Then I’ll be impressed,” she laughed, and sniffed. “What is that burning?”
He clasped his forehead and flew into the kitchenette, the girl at his heels.
“When you fry eggs,” she said severely, “you usually put fat in the pan. You are not domestic, Mr. Martin. And what on earth is that?”
She pointed to the crude rope ladder that lay in the corner of the kitchen.
“My fire escape,” he said glibly. “I’m one of those scared folk who can’t go to sleep unless they’re sure that they’re not going to be roasted—with or without fat,” he added maliciously, “before they wake.”
She was looking at him suspiciously.
“It never occurred to me that you were that kind of man,” she said, and sliced the eggs scientifically from the pan on to a plate. “Twelve o’clock is disgracefully late for breakfast, but I’ll wait till you have finished. You have just got up, I suppose? Did I wake you?”
“You did,” he confessed. “Now, Miss Lansdown, what is troubling you?”
“Finish your breakfast,” she ordered, and was adamant to his wheedling until he had drunk his coffee. “I was talking to mother last night after you’d left. I’m afraid you’ve rather worried her. And you need not feel penitent about it, because I realize that you only said as much as you thought necessary. We had a long, long talk, and the upshot of it was, I went to see Mr. Havelock this morning, and I told him all about my Portuguese trip and the incident of the key. Mr. Havelock was very worried, and he wants me to have police protection. In fact, I had the greatest difficulty in dissuading him from telephoning to Scotland Yard. I then made a suggestion to him, which rather surprised him, I think.”
“What was the suggestion?”
“I won’t tell you. I’d like to spring my surprise on you without warning. Have you a car?”
He nodded.
“Will it hold three?”
“Who is the other?” asked Dick, nettled at the thought that what at first had promised to be a tête-à-tête was to be spoiled by the inclusion of a third person.
“Mr. Havelock. We are going down to Selford Hall—and the tombs of the Selfords,” she added dramatically.
A slow smile dawned on Dick’s face.
“You’re certainly a mind-reader, for I was taking that trip this afternoon—alone.”
“You wouldn’t have been able to see the tombs alone,” said the girl; “and I warn you it’s an awfully creepy place. In fact, mother isn’t particularly keen on my going down with you. Mr. Havelock has very kindly agreed to come, and I’m relieved, because he knows the place and its history. We are to call for him at half past two at his office. And will you bring the key you have?”
“The two keys,” he corrected. “I’m sort of collecting keys just now. Yes, I’ll be there.”
She gathered up her bag and rose.
“What is the mystery?” he asked, sensing from her air of quiet triumph that she had made some important discovery.
“You will know this afternoon,” she said.
He saw her from the door, took off his coat, and shaved, and by one o’clock he had retrieved the keys from his banker, and just before half past one his car drew up at the door of 107, Coram Street. The girl was waiting for him, for no sooner had he knocked than the door opened and she appeared.
“Have you the keys?” she asked, almost before he had greeted her. “Mother doesn’t like my going. She is nervous about anything connected with the Selford family.”
“What is the mystery?” he asked.
“You shall see. I feel in my most mysterious mood. You haven’t asked me why I’m not at the library. It is Founder’s Day, and to celebrate the birth of the man who opened the library—we close it! Are you a good driver?”
“I have few equals,” he admitted modestly.
“But are you a good driver?”
It was only then, as she chattered on inconsequently, that he realized that she was a little overwrought; perhaps some of her mother’s nervousness
