“What’s happening in there now?” he said. “Anything we can do?”
The girl shook her head. “I don’t think so. They’re just standing about talking. I heard Wyatt say that the news had come down that it was nothing serious, and he asked us all to go on as if nothing had happened. Apparently the Colonel often gets these attacks …” She hesitated and made no attempt to move.
Abbershaw felt her trembling by his side, and once again the curious fear which had been lurking at the back of his mind all evening showed itself to him.
“Tell me,” he said, with a sudden intuition that made his voice gentle and comforting in the darkness. “What is it?”
She started, and her voice sounded high and out of control.
“Not—not here. Can’t we get outside? I’m frightened of this house.” The admission in her tone made his heart leap painfully.
Something had happened, then.
He drew her arm through his.
“Why, yes, of course we can,” he said. “It’s a fine starlit night; we’ll go on to the grass.”
He led her out on to the roughly cut turf that had once been smooth lawns, and they walked together out of the shadows of the house into a little shrubbery where they were completely hidden from the windows.
“Now,” he said, and his voice had unconsciously assumed a protective tone; “what is it?”
The girl looked up at him, and he could see her keen, clever face and narrow brown eyes in the faint light.
“It was horrible in there,” she whispered. “When Colonel Coombe had his attack, I mean. I think Dr. Whitby found him. He and Mr. Gideon carried him up while the other man—the man with no expression on his face—rang the gong. No one knew what had happened, and there were no lights. Then Mr. Gideon came down and said that the Colonel had had a heart attack …” She stopped and looked steadily at him, and he was horrified to see that she was livid with terror.
“George,” she said suddenly, “if I told you something would you think I—I was mad?”
“No, of course not,” he assured her steadily. “What else happened?”
The girl swallowed hard. He saw she was striving to compose herself, and obeying a sudden impulse he slid his arm round her waist, so that she was encircled and supported by it.
“In the game,” she said, speaking clearly and steadily as if it were an effort, “about five minutes before the gong rang, someone gave me the dagger. I don’t know who it was—I think it was a woman, but I’m not sure. I was standing at the foot of the stone flight of stairs which leads down into the lower hall, when someone brushed past me in the dark and pushed the dagger into my hand. I suddenly felt frightened of it, and I ran down the corridor to find someone I could give it to.”
She paused, and he felt her shudder in his arm.
“There is a window in the passage,” she said, “and as I passed under it the faint light fell upon the dagger and—don’t think I’m crazy, or dreaming, or imagining something—but I saw the blade was covered with something dark. I touched it, it was sticky. I knew it at once, it was blood!”
“Blood!” The full meaning of her words dawned slowly on the man and he stared at her, half-fascinated, half-incredulous.
“Yes. You must believe me.” Her voice was agonized and he felt her eyes on his face. “I stood there staring at it,” she went on. “At first I thought I was going to faint. I knew I should scream in another moment, and then—quite suddenly and noiselessly—a hand came out of the shadows and took the knife. I was so frightened I felt I was going mad. Then, just when I felt my head was bursting, the gong rang.”
Her voice died away in the silence, and she thrust something into his hand.
“Look,” she said, “if you don’t believe me. I wiped my hand with it.”
Abbershaw flashed his torch upon the little crumpled scrap in his hand. It was a handkerchief, a little filmy wisp of a thing of lawn and lace, and on it, clear and unmistakable, was a dull red smear—dry blood.
IV
Murder
They went slowly back to the house.
Meggie went straight up to her room, and Abbershaw joined the others in the hall.
The invalid’s corner was empty, chair and all had disappeared.
Wyatt was doing his best to relieve any feeling of constraint amongst his guests, assuring them that his uncle’s heart attacks were by no means infrequent and asking them to forget the incident if they could.
Nobody thought of the dagger. It seemed to have vanished completely. Abbershaw hesitated, wondering if he should mention it, but finally decided not to, and he joined in the halfhearted, fitful conversation.
By common consent everyone went to bed early. A depression had settled over the spirits of the company, and it was well before midnight when once again the great candle-ring was let down from the ceiling and the hall left again in darkness.
Up in his room Abbershaw removed his coat and waistcoat, and, attiring himself in a modestly luxurious dressing-gown, settled down in the armchair before the fire to smoke a last cigarette before going to bed. The apprehension he had felt all along had been by no means lessened by the events of the last hour or so.
He believed Meggie’s story implicitly: she was not the kind of girl to fabricate a story of that sort in any circumstances, and besides the whole atmosphere of the building after he had returned from the garage had been vaguely suggestive and mysterious.
There was something going on in the house that was not ordinary, something that as yet he did not understand, and once again the face of the absurd young man with the horn-rimmed spectacles flashed into his mind and he strove vainly to remember where he had seen it before.
His meditations
