“When are the police going to give me my beautiful jewels?” she asked almost gaily.
“I am afraid they will retain those until after the court proceedings are through. There must be an inquest, you know.”
“Oh,” she said, and seemed disappointed. Then again she returned to the murder. “It seems all so dreadful and mysterious,” she said quietly. “How do you account for it, Mr. Holland? One of the newspapers says that it was impossible that any other hand than Mr. Trasmere’s could have locked the door and yet they are equally certain that he did not commit suicide. And who is the man Brown, for whom they are searching?”
“He is an adventurer from China who was at some time or other a sort of secretary to old Trasmere.”
“A secretary?” she said quickly. “A man—how do you know that?”
“Brown told me himself. I saw him the day before the murder. Apparently Trasmere had treated him badly and had held him off for years by paying him a sum of money.”
She bit her lip in thought.
“Why did he come back?” she said, half to herself. “He might have lived comfortably on the allowance. I suppose it was a good allowance?” she added quickly. “That is all you want to see me about, Mr. Holland?”
“You may have to go to the police station to identify the jewelry,” said Tab, “and they are pretty certain to ask you how the box came into Mr. Trasmere’s possession.”
She did not answer this, and he left her with an odd feeling of uneasiness.
Going to report the result of his interview to Carver, he found that energetic man crawling about the vault on all fours. He looked over his shoulder at the sound of Tab’s footsteps.
“Was Saturday wet or fine?” he asked.
“It was a particularly fine day.”
“Then this must be a blood impression.” He pointed to the floor, and Tab went on his knees at his side. There was a faint half-moon printed on the edge of the concrete. “That is the edge of a heel, and a rubber heel,” said Carver, “which proves beyond any doubt whatever, that somebody came into the vault after the old man was killed, probably went close to the body to see the effect of the shot, and in doing so, got a little of the blood on a part of his heel. The rubber accounts for his coming on Trasmere without the old man hearing him. There is no other impression that I can find.”
“Which brings us back to the question of the duplicate key.”
“There was no duplicate key, you can cut that idea right out,” said Carver, getting up and dusting his knees. “I have been into the matter very thoroughly with the manufacturers, and although they each claim to have the best kind of lock and are naturally inclined to take an uncharitable view of their rivals, they say that the maker of our particular key is reliable and he says that it was in the hands of his most trustworthy man, and that no second key was ever made. Not only that, but no drawing of the key was kept. In fact, the lock, just before it was fitted, was altered by the manufacturer’s expert, here on the premises. I am seeing him tomorrow, but from what I learn on the telephone he says that we can dismiss from our minds the possibility of there being a duplicate.”
“But Walters was making—”
“Walters hadn’t finished his job, and even if he had, he could not have fashioned a key that would have unlocked this door, clever as he was. No, the bloodstained key is the key that locked the door. What is more, it is the key which the old man carried on a thin silver chain round his neck. We found the broken ends of the chain in his clothing after the body was searched. Then again, there are the bloodstains, both on the inside and on the outside of the door. That is the most remarkable feature of the case, that after the murder, the door was locked both from the inside and the outside. At one period, after the death of Trasmere, the murderer must have been locked in this vault with him. If I did not know it was an absolute impossibility, I should say that it was locked finally from the inside, the key was placed on the table and the murderer disappeared through some secret entrance, which we know very well does not exist.”
“Have you tested the roof?”
“I have tested everywhere—roof, walls, floor and door,” said Carver. “A fact, which may or may not be important, is that there is about an eighth-of-an-inch of space between the bottom of the door and the floor. If the key had been found on the floor there would be no mystery about the matter, because the murderer could have pushed it under and, with a flick of his finger, sent it into the middle of the room. Here is the situation in a nutshell.” He ticked off the points on his finger. “Trasmere is murdered in a vault, the door of which is locked. The murderer is either Brown, who has threatened him, or Walters who has been robbing him. Inside the locked vault is found the only key which could open or close it. Note this particular, that Trasmere was shot in the back.”
“Why is that important?”
“As proving that at the moment of his murder Trasmere was in no fear. He was not expecting either to be shot or hurt. And now we add to the situation, which is sufficiently baffling, the discovery in the vault of a jewel-case belonging to an eminent actress, from whom it has been stolen on the very day
