“Did you ever go for a voyage on a ship?” he asked.
“Yes; why?”
“Because every day at noon three officers take an observation to determine the ship’s position—the captain, the first officer, and the second officer. Each writes his observation down, and the captain takes the three observations and compares them. If the first or second officer is out in his reckoning, the captain tells him so, but he does not show his own. For at times, no doubt, he is wrong too. So, gentlemen, I criticise your observations, but I do not show you mine.”
He took up Ricardo’s paper and read it through again.
“Yes,” he said pleasantly. “But the two questions which are most important, which alone can lead us to the truth—how do they come to be omitted from your list, Mr. Ricardo?”
Hanaud put the question with his most serious air. But Ricardo was none the less sensible of the raillery behind the solemn manner. He flushed and made no answer.
“Still,” continued Hanaud, “here are undoubtedly some questions. Let us consider them! Who was the man who took a part in the crime? Ah, if we only knew that, what a lot of trouble we should save ourselves! Who was the woman? What a good thing it would be to know that too! How clearly, after all, Mr. Ricardo puts his finger on the important points! What did actually happen in the salon?” And as he quoted that question the raillery died out of his voice. He leaned his elbows on the table and bent forward.
“What did actually happen in that little pretty room, just twelve hours ago?” he repeated. “When no sunlight blazed upon the lawn, and all the birds were still, and all the windows shuttered and the world dark, what happened? What dreadful things happened? We have not much to go upon. Let us formulate what we know. We start with this. The murder was not the work of a moment. It was planned with great care and cunning, and carried out to the letter of the plan. There must be no noise, no violence. On each side of the Villa Rose there are other villas; a few yards away the road runs past. A scream, a cry, the noise of a struggle—these sounds, or any one of them, might be fatal to success. Thus the crime was planned; and there was no scream, there was no struggle. Not a chair was broken, and only a chair upset. Yes, there were brains behind that murder. We know that. But what do we know of the plan? How far can we build it up? Let us see. First, there was an accomplice in the house—perhaps two.”
“No!” cried Harry Wethermill.
Hanaud took no notice of the interruption.
“Secondly the woman came to the house with Mme. Dauvray and Mlle. Célie between nine and half-past nine. Thirdly, the man came afterwards, but before eleven, set open the gate, and was admitted into the salon, unperceived by Mme. Dauvray. That also we can safely assume. But what happened in the salon? Ah! There is the question.” Then he shrugged his shoulders and said with the note of raillery once more in his voice:
“But why should we trouble our heads to puzzle out this mystery, since M. Ricardo knows?”
“I?” cried Ricardo in amazement.
“To be sure,” replied Hanaud calmly. “For I look at another of your questions. ‘What did the torn-up scrap of writing mean?
’ and you add: ‘Probably spirit-writing.’ Then there was a séance held last night in the little salon! Is that so?”
Harry Wethermill started. Mr. Ricardo was at a loss.
“I had not followed my suggestion to its conclusion,” he admitted humbly.
“No,” said Hanaud. “But I ask myself in sober earnest, ‘Was there a séance held in the salon last night?’ Did the tambourine rattle in the darkness on the wall?”
“But if Hélène Vauquier’s story is all untrue?” cried Wethermill, again in exasperation.
“Patience, my friend. Her story was not all untrue. I say there were brains behind this crime; yes, but brains, even the cleverest, would not have invented this queer, strange story of the séances and of Mme. de Montespan. That is truth. But yet, if there were a séance held, if the scrap of paper were spirit-writing in answer to some awkward question, why—and here I come to my first question, which M. Ricardo has omitted—why did Mlle. Célie dress herself with so much elegance last night? What Vauquier said is true. Her dress was not suited to a séance. A light-coloured, rustling frock, which would be visible in a dim light, or even in the dark, which would certainly be heard at every movement she made, however lightly she stepped, and a big hat—no no! I tell you, gentlemen, we shall not get to the bottom of this mystery until we know why Mlle. Célie dressed herself as she did last night.”
“Yes,” Ricardo admitted. “I overlooked that point.” “Did she—” Hanaud broke off and bowed to Wethermill with a grace and a respect which condoned his words. “You must bear with me, my young friend, while I consider all these points. Did she expect to join that night a lover—a man with the brains to devise this crime? But if so—and here I come to the second question omitted from M. Ricardo’s list—why, on the patch of grass outside the door of the salon, were the footsteps of the man and woman so carefully erased, and the footsteps of Mlle. Célie—those little footsteps so easily identified—left for all the world to see and recognise?”
Ricardo felt like a child in the presence of his schoolmaster. He was convicted of presumption. He had set down his questions with the belief that they covered the ground. And here were two of the utmost importance, not forgotten, but never even thought of.
“Did she go, before the murder, to join a lover? Or after it? At some time, you will remember, according to Vauquier’s story, she must have run upstairs to
