I must say, for all Alex’s anxiety to set me
free, he paid little enough attention to my plight.
He jumped through the opening into the secret room,
and picked up the portable safe.
“I am going to put this in Mr. Halsey’s
room, Miss Innes,” he said, “and I shall
send one of the detectives to guard it.”
I hardly heard him. I wanted to laugh and cry
in the same breath—to crawl into bed and
have a cup of tea, and scold Liddy, and do any of
the thousand natural things that I had never expected
to do again. And the air! The touch of
the cool night air on my face!
As Alex and I reached the second floor, Mr. Jamieson
met us. He was grave and quiet, and he nodded
comprehendingly when he saw the safe.
“Will you come with me for a moment, Miss Innes?”
he asked soberly, and on my assenting, he led the
way to the east wing. There were lights moving
around below, and some of the maids were standing
gaping down. They screamed when they saw me,
and drew back to let me pass. There was a sort
of hush over the scene; Alex, behind me, muttered
something I could not hear, and brushed past me without
ceremony. Then I realized that a man was lying
doubled up at the foot of the staircase, and that Alex
was stooping over him.
As I came slowly down, Winters stepped back, and Alex
straightened himself, looking at me across the body
with impenetrable eyes. In his hand he held
a shaggy gray wig, and before me on the floor lay
the man whose headstone stood in Casanova churchyard—Paul
Armstrong.
Winters told the story in a dozen words. In
his headlong flight down the circular staircase, with
Winters just behind, Paul Armstrong had pitched forward
violently, struck his head against the door to the
east veranda, and probably broken his neck. He
had died as Winters reached him.
As the detective finished, I saw Halsey, pale and
shaken, in the card-room doorway, and for the first
time that night I lost my self-control. I put
my arms around my boy, and for a moment he had to
support me. A second later, over Halsey’s
shoulder, I saw something that turned my emotion into
other channels, for, behind him, in the shadowy card-room,
were Gertrude and Alex, the gardener, and—there
is no use mincing matters—he was kissing
her!
I was unable to speak. Twice I opened my mouth:
then I turned Halsey around and pointed. They
were quite unconscious of us; her head was on his
shoulder, his face against her hair. As it happened,
it was Mr. Jamieson who broke up the tableau.
He stepped over to Alex and touched him on the arm.
“And now,” he said quietly, “how
long are you and I to play our little comedy,
Mr. Bailey?”
THE ODDS AND ENDS
