Crossword Mystery (10 page)

So far as Bobby could see, no reasonable suspicion could be entertained against any of them. And if it was murder that had been committed in the early hours of that calm spring morning, why had the Airedale made no sound, shown no sign of agitation? It seemed clear proof no stranger or intruder had appeared. Odd, by the way, that to-night the dog was missing, but no doubt it would turn up again all right in the morning.

A clock somewhere in the house struck two. The time had gone quickly for Bobby, absorbed in so many and such baffling thoughts. He yawned and thought of bed, and he was rising slowly to his feet to seek it when he stiffened to quick attention, alert and eager, as he saw a light shine out there in the garden a little distance away, flash out and vanish, and appear again three times in succession.

A signal, evidently, Bobby thought, with a quick sensation of relief that now, it seemed, the time for puzzling, bewildering, baffling thoughts had gone by, and that for action had arrived. With swift and silent movements he turned to his suit-case. There was a false bottom to it, holding one or two things there was no need for any servants' eyes to catch a glimpse of, and one of them was a long, thin, knotted rope of woven silk, very light and strong. One end Bobby made fast with a double hitch to the bed; the other end he let fall gently from the window. It reached very nearly to the ground. The window was wide open, so that fortunately there was no need to raise the sash, and the curtain he had already pulled to one side. Now he swung himself across the sill, and, hand over hand, slid down the rope to the ground beneath.

In the distance he thought, but was not sure, that he heard a door closing. If so, it must have been either the back door or the garden door leading from Mr. Winterton's study. The front door of the house was near where Bobby stood, and no one could have issued from it without his knowledge. Unfortunately, this seaside garden offered very little cover. There were no trees. A few ornamental shrubs would give shelter to anyone crouching behind them, but provided no continuous concealment. The night was clear, too, luminous with the light of the many stars in a sky still cloudless overhead, though in the west heavy storm banks were piling up. It was very quiet, too; even the restless murmur of the sea seemed still, so that every faintest sound was audible instantly for long distances.

Bobby began to understand that, if any secret interview were being held here, the task of approaching unperceived near enough to acquire any useful information was going to be one of extreme difficulty. So far as he could tell, the spot where had shown the light he had imagined to be a signal was about half way between the house and the entrance to the drive. Presumably someone had come up the drive, and half way along it had stopped to flash the light it must have been expected some inmate of the house would be on the look-out for.

Only was this person, whoever it might be, waiting there in the drive, or was he seeking admittance to the house?

Bobby dared not leave the shelter of the shadows that lay by the side of the building. Hugging the wall as closely as he could, he ran to the south-east corner, and thence, swiftly, in a wide circuit, crouching low, upon his hands and knees often, sometimes crawling, he made his way towards the spot where the light had been shown.

A clump of bushes gave him shelter and protection for a few yards, but beyond it lay the open lawn, and now there came to him a sound of footsteps and soon a low, faint murmur of voices. At a little distance, right in the middle of the lawn, he was able to make out the dim shape of two forms standing there, two vague shadows in the night.

Though eagerness consumed him like a fire, though he felt that here almost within his grasp might be the clue to the whole affair, yet he could not see how he could approach even an inch nearer without incurring almost certain discovery. A heart-breaking experience to be held thus, as it were, dangling upon the very edge of knowledge and yet unable to grasp it. A few yards nearer, and the issues of life and death could be determined; he would know the truth of Archibald's death, whether accident or murder; he would learn what danger, if any, threatened the life of the dead man's brother.

Impotent, he raged internally, and yet knew he must control himself. One incautious movement and any hope would be gone of bringing murder to justice, if murder there had been, or of giving the protection he claimed to a threatened man, if indeed he were threatened. The truth was there perhaps, almost certainly, and yet how to reach it across this bare expanse of closely shaven lawn, in this still night air, when he feared even the ticking of his wrist-watch might be heard, so loud it seemed in that tremendous silence?

The idea came to him to end the suspense, to show himself, to demand of these two who they were, and what was the meaning of their nocturnal interview. But if he did that he would have to give his authority, and so disclose his own identity, and that would be to go against his instructions. Besides, they would very likely refuse to answer, or answer falsely, and he would be no further forward, and they would be warned.

Yet he felt it was imperative to ascertain who and what they were. To let this nocturnal visitor slip away without finding out all about him would be abject failure. Bobby felt that if that happened he would never dare face Mitchell again.

Crouching there, watching intently but able to make out only two almost formless shadows, straining his ears to catch every sound but able to hear only a low, indistinguishable murmur, consumed with the devouring impatience of his helplessness, Bobby tore at his mind with almost physical effort to wrench from it some practicable course of action. An incautious movement he made – it was hardly more than the angry straightening of his arm, as if to seize by the throat the problem that baffled him – appeared to attract the attention of those he watched, for at last two words that were audible came to his hearing, as one of them exclaimed:

“What's that?”

He lay very still. He held his breath. He would have stilled the beating of his heart had that been possible. He turned the face of the wrist-watch he was wearing against the grass in an effort to smother its boisterous ticking. Apparently reassured, the two on the lawn began their colloquy again, and Bobby was not sure, but thought he heard a rustling sound, as of paper being handled. He wondered if that meant that money was passing from one to the other.

Very carefully and cautiously he began to withdraw, abandoning as hopeless any idea of drawing near enough to be able to overhear what was being said or to have any chance of recognising the speakers. One of the shrubs behind which he was sheltering he saw move suddenly, and then he heard a rustling sound coming from it. For a moment he almost imagined someone else must be hidden there, watching like himself. Then he saw it was a prowling cat, busy on its own occasions, and he instantly resolved to make it a sacrifice to his needs. He found a clod of earth and flung it with force and good aim. The startled animal scampered away, fortunately taking its course across a corner of the lawn close by the two who were talking there. Startled in their turn by the animal's sudden rush, they jumped apart, and then, realising that it was only a cat, resumed their talk, while, profiting by their distraction, Bobby hurriedly retreated. Any slight noise he made now he hoped would be attributed to the wandering cat, and be disregarded, and, running and crouching from shelter to shadow, from shadow to shelter, he made his way to the entrance to the drive.

The gate was half open, and he hurried through. The wristwatch he was wearing had a luminous dial, and, not without a pang of regret at the sacrifice he was making, he took it off, and let it fall gently by the wayside, making sure that the luminous dial faced towards the entrance to the drive, so that anyone coming out could hardly fail to notice the watch as it lay there.

This done, he ran back lightly through the gate and looked about for a place of concealment. The best that he could find was an angle of the garden wall at a little distance, where at any rate a shadow fell.

There he took his post, and was hardly in position when he heard footsteps coming down the drive – a light, rapid, almost running step, as though whoever came was in haste. A moment later a swiftly hurrying, shadowy form became dimly visible, and in a moment was gone, passing with the same secret speed. All Bobby could make out was that it was someone of no great height or size, wrapped in a cloak or long, loose coat. He thought it might be a woman, but was not sure.

Whoever it was passed quickly through the gate. Bobby left his corner in the shadows and was just in time to see the unknown pause to pick up his watch from where he had left it by the wayside and then hurry on: becoming soon lost in the night which now, Bobby noticed, was growing darker as the clouds spread overhead.

Slowly, still taking every precaution against being seen or heard, Bobby made his way back to the house. Which of the inmates was it, he asked himself again and again, who had taken part in this secret colloquy of the night, and what, he wondered still more, had been its purpose? His thoughts turned again to the strange motorboat reported seen in the Cove shortly before Archibald Winterton's death? Had it appeared again, and was this a messenger of some sort landed from it that he had seen? And, if so, was some equally tragic
denouement
portended?

And who had been the other party to the interview?

George Winterton himself? His nephew, Colin Ross? Or one of the Coopers, perhaps; either Mrs. Cooper or her husband? Which of the four?

Bobby was near the house now, though still going slowly and with as infinite a precaution to every step, almost, as if the whole garden were full of hidden watchers it was necessary to avoid. He heard a door shut. This time the sound was quite plain. The next moment he saw lights go up in that room to the right of the front door which he knew was George Winterton's study.

The light remained on for two or three minutes, and then was extinguished, and to Bobby it seemed clear evidence that the second party to the interview he had just witnessed must have been Mr. Winterton himself. Any other inmate of the house might easily have made use of the study door for secretly leaving the house, but only Winterton himself, familiar with the room and no longer thinking secrecy essential since his own presence in his own room would hardly require any special explanation except sleeplessness, would have been likely to switch on the light. He indeed might have done it automatically, finding himself in his familiar surroundings. No one else would have been likely to do it at all.

“Only what's he up to?” Bobby asked himself wonderingly and doubtingly, and with resentment wondered, too, how he was supposed to be able to protect from an unknown danger a man who indulged in these nocturnal and secret excursions.

“Might easily have found him there in the morning in the middle of the lawn with his head knocked in and a knife in his back,” Bobby thought discontentedly, “and then, of course, I should be told I had failed.”

He made his way, still with the same caution and care, to the study door. There might be footprints there, possibly, he thought, or he might make some other useful discovery.

But in the darkness, now growing more intense all the time as the oncoming clouds obscured the stars, there was little chance of that. A drop or two of rain was already falling, and Bobby decided it was time he returned to his room by the means by which he had quitted it. Turning the corner of the house again, he was just in time to hear, rather than see, the front door closing, and then, as he stood and listened, he heard its bolts cautiously pushed into place.

It seemed, then, there had been another wanderer in the garden, another witness to the secret meeting that had just concluded, and who could that have been, and what his motive?

Colin Ross? Cooper? Mrs. Cooper? Or was it possible, some other person altogether?

And had this further unknown been aware of Bobby's presence, or had he been as ignorant of that as Bobby had been of his? Unpleasant to reflect that, while he had been so intent and careful in his watch, another might have been as carefully and intently watching him. It was not comforting to think that perhaps every movement he had made had been spied upon and was known – but to whom?

Troubled and worried, Bobby made his way back to the spot where the rope still dangled from his window. He was a little relieved to find it still in position; he had been half afraid it might be gone. He climbed up easily enough, and was scarcely in his room when heavy rain began. His intention had been to keep watch and vigil to see if any mysterious motor-boat came gliding into the Cove to take off any emissary it had landed. But this darkness that had now come on, and the heavy rain like a falling curtain, made all observation impossible, as it also, Bobby hoped, would make the always difficult navigation of the Cove quite impossible. The wind was getting up, too, and it was plain that any footprints or tracks left in the garden would be soon obliterated. So, as there was nothing else to do, Bobby went to bed, to sleep and dream of his lost wrist-watch and the small chance there was of his ever seeing it again.

KEY WORD: “GOLD”