“I’ll catch the hack down the road and
hold it,” he said. “Is the gentleman
down in the town?”
“Mr. Jamieson,” Louise said impulsively,
“I can use the hack. Take my horse and
trap outside and drive like mad. Try to find
the Dragon Fly—it ought to be easy to trace.
I can think of no other way. Only, don’t
lose a moment.”
The new detective had gone, and a moment later Jamieson
went rapidly down the drive, the cob’s feet
striking fire at every step. Louise stood looking
after them. When she turned around she faced
Gertrude, who stood indignant, almost tragic, in the
hall.
“You know what threatens Halsey, Louise,”
she said accusingly. “I believe you know
this whole horrible thing, this mystery that we are
struggling with. If anything happens to Halsey,
I shall never forgive you.”
Louise only raised her hands despairingly and dropped
them again.
“He is as dear to me as he is to you,”
she said sadly. “I tried to warn him.”
“Nonsense!” I said, as briskly as I could.
“We are making a lot of trouble out of something
perhaps very small. Halsey was probably late—he
is always late. Any moment we may hear the car
coming up the road.”
But it did not come. After a half-hour of suspense,
Louise went out quietly, and did not come back.
I hardly knew she was gone until I heard the station
hack moving off. At eleven o’clock the
telephone rang. It was Mr. Jamieson.
“I have found the Dragon Fly, Miss Innes,”
he said. “It has collided with a freight
car on the siding above the station. No, Mr.
Innes was not there, but we shall probably find him.
Send Warner for the car.”
But they did not find him. At four o’clock
the next morning we were still waiting for news, while
Alex watched the house and Sam the grounds.
At daylight I dropped into exhausted sleep.
Halsey had not come back, and there was no word from
the detective.
HALSEY’S DISAPPEARANCE
Nothing that had gone before had been as bad as this.
The murder and Thomas’ sudden death we had
been able to view in a detached sort of way.
But with Halsey’s disappearance everything was
altered. Our little circle, intact until now,
was broken. We were no longer onlookers who
saw a battle passing around them. We were the
center of action. Of course, there was no time
then to voice such an idea. My mind seemed able
to hold only one thought: that Halsey had been
foully dealt with, and that every minute lost might
be fatal.
Mr. Jamieson came back about eight o’clock the
next morning: he was covered with mud, and his
hat was gone. Altogether, we were a sad-looking
trio that gathered around a breakfast that no one
could eat. Over a cup of black coffee the detective
told us what he had learned of Halsey’s movements
the night before. Up to a certain point the
car had made it easy enough to follow him. And
I gathered that Mr. Burns, the other detective, had
followed a similar car for miles at dawn, only to find
it was a touring car on an endurance run.
