“I only know about a message that came to Havelock,” said Dick.
“We’re staying here because it is a fortress—the only fortress which can keep this horrible man at bay. Why I am included in the invitation, I don’t know. But Mr. Havelock is very insistent upon the point. Lord Selford cannot possibly be interested in me.”
“He is your cousin,” he said significantly, and she stared at him.
“What does that mean?”
“It means,” Dick spoke slowly, “and this thought has only occurred to me recently, that, if Lord Selford dies, you are the heiress-at-law.”
She was speechless with astonishment.
“But that isn’t so, surely? Mr. Havelock hinted to me that Selford had probably married. And I’m a very distant relation.”
He nodded.
“The only relation,” he said; “and now you will understand just why you have been threatened. You told me Mr. Cody had offered you a paper to sign. There is no doubt at all that that paper was either some deed of gift or a will. Cody was in the Selford business up to his neck.”
“But where is Lord Selford?”
“I don’t know,” he replied simply. “I can only guess—and fear.”
Her eyes opened wide.
“You don’t mean—he’s dead?” she gasped.
“He may be. I’m not sure. Perhaps it would be better if he were.”
Mr. Havelock was approaching him, trouble on his rugged face, a frown of perplexity making a furrow in his forehead.
“What time do you expect Selford to arrive?” asked Dick.
The lawyer shook his head.
“If he arrives at all I shall be a happy man,” he said. “For the moment I have not any great hope, only a vague kind of apprehension. What news will the morning bring to us? I’d give my small fortune to be a day older than I am. There is no news, I suppose, about Stalletti?”
“None,” said Dick. “The police are looking for him, and he will find it difficult to escape.”
The caretaker came out at that moment to announce that a meal had been got ready, and they went into the library, where it had been served.
The dinner, for which the caretaker and his wife were equally apologetic, was of the simplest order. They dined on cold viands, of a quality in odd contrast to the wine which came up from the cellar. After the meal was over, Dick took the girl into the rose garden at the back of the house, and for a long time Mrs. Lansdown watched them pacing up and down the gravelled walk, deep in earnest conversation.
Presently the girl came in alone and spoke to her mother, and the two of them returned to where Dick Martin was passing the path, his hands behind him, his chin on his breast.
When he at last appeared on the lawn before the house, he found Mr. Havelock and Sneed were discussing the disposition of the Scotland Yard men. It was growing dark, the light showed in the window of a distant cottage. Dick looked up at the sky. Darkness would fall in an hour; after that—
“Who is going for a walk to the tombs?” he asked.
Mr. Havelock did not receive the suggestion with enthusiasm.
“It is too dark,” he said nervously. “And we can’t leave these people alone in the house.”
“Our men will look after them,” said Dick. “Anyway, they have gone to bed. Mrs. Lansdown sent her excuses.”
“I think they’re quite safe,” said Mr. Havelock, looking up at the barred windows. “I confess that as time goes on I am considerably doubtful as to the wisdom of spending the night in this wretched place. I suppose—” He hesitated and laughed. “I was going to do a very cowardly thing and suggest that I should go home. As I am the only person who need stay, that idea would hardly appeal to you gentlemen. The truth is,” he said frankly, “I’m nervous—horribly nervous! I feel as if there is some fearful shadow lurking in every bush, a ghastly shape behind every clump of trees.”
“We’ll not go to the tombs,” said Dick, “but we will go as far as the valley. There are one or two things I would like to ask you; the topography here is not very familiar to me and you may help me.”
The three men went through the farmyard, and Dick stopped only to pat the chained watchdog who had served Sybil Lansdown so well. So they passed into what he had come to call “the valley.”
The sky was clear; the sun had gone down, but it was light enough to see even distant objects. And here, as they strolled, Mr. Havelock learned for the first time of the secret behind Lew Pheeney’s death.
“But this is amazing!” he said in astonishment. “There was nothing in the newspapers about his having been asked to pick a lock—of course, it was the lock of the Selford tomb!”
“The information that doesn’t come out at inquests would fill Miss Lansdown’s library,” said Sneed. “Maybe it will all come out some day.”
They walked on in silence for a long time. Evidently Mr. Havelock was cogitating this news.
“I wish I had known before,” he said eventually. “I might have been able to give you a great deal of assistance. I suppose he didn’t tell you who was his employer?”
Dick shook his head.
“No, but we can guess.”
“Stalletti?” asked Havelock quickly.
“I should imagine so. I can’t think of anybody else.”
They stopped at the place where the struggle had occurred between Tom Cawler and the Awful Thing, and Dick turned slowly round and round until his eyes had roved the full circle of the view.
“What is that place?” He pointed to a white scar showing above a grassy ridge.
“Those are the Selford Quarries,” said the lawyer; “they are not worked today and represent a liability. We have had to close the road above them.”
Dick thought for a moment.
“You don’t feel like coming on to the tombs?” he asked, concealing a smile.
“I
