Chapter 7

"I'm hanged if I like the way he looks at me!" muttered the baronet, and once again Cicely caught that odd expression in his eye.

That afternoon Bisset informed Miss Farmond that her ladyship desired to see her. Lady Cromarty's face looked thinner than ever and her lips more tightly compressed. In her deep mourning and with her grave air, she seemed to Cicely a monumental figure of tragedy. Her thinness and pallor and tight lips, she thought only natural, but there was one note that seemed discordant with pure desolation. The note was sounded by Lady Cromarty's eyes. At all times they had been ready to harden upon an occasion, but Cicely thought she had never seen them as hard as they were now.

"What are your plans, Cicely?" she asked in a low, even voice that showed no feeling one way or the other.

"I have begun to pack already," said the girl. "I don't want to leave so long as I can be of any use here, but I am ready to go at any time."

She had expected to be asked where she was going, but Lady Cromarty instead of putting any question, looked at her for a few moments in silence. And it was then that a curious uncomfortable feeling began to possess the girl. It had no definite form and was founded on no reason, beyond the steady regard of those hard dark eyes.

"I had rather you stayed."

Cicely's own eyes showed her extreme surprise.

"Stayed--here?"

"Yes."

"But are you sure? Wouldn't you really rather be alone? It isn't for my sake, is it? because--"

"It is for mine. I want you to remain here and keep me company."

She spoke without a trace of smile or any softening of her face, and Cicely still hesitated.

"But would it really be convenient? You have been very kind to me, and if you really want me here--"

"I do," interrupted Lady Cromarty in the same even voice. "I want you particularly to remain."

"Very well then, I shall. Thank you very much--"

Again she was cut short.

"That is settled then. Perhaps you will excuse me now, Cicely."

The girl went downstairs very thoughtfully. At the foot the young baronet met her.

"Have you settled where to go?" he asked.

"Lady Cromarty has asked me to stay on with her."

His face fell.

"Stay on in this house of mourning? Oh, no, Cicely!"

"I have promised," she said.

The young man grew curiously agitated.

"Oh, don't stay here!" he besought her. "It keeps me in such dreadful suspense!"

"In suspense!" she exclaimed. "Whatever do you mean, Malcolm?"

Again she saw that look in his eye, and again he raised a sympathy-beseeching wail. Cicely's patience began to give way.

"Really, Malcolm!" she cried tartly, "if you have anything to say, say it, but don't go on like a baby!"

"Like a baby!" repeated the deeply affronted baronet. "Heavens, would you liken me to _that_, of all things! I had meant to confide in you, Cicely, but you have made it impossible. Impossible!" he repeated sombrely, and stalked to the door.

Next morning, Sir Malcolm left for London, his confidence still locked in his breast, and Cicely was alone with Lady Cromarty.

XVI

RUMOUR

One windy afternoon a man on a bicycle struggled up to the door of Stanesland Castle and while waiting for an answer to his ring, studied the front of that ancient building with an expression which would at once have informed his intimates that he was meditating on the principles of Scottish baronial architecture. A few minutes later Mr. Bisset was shown into the laird of Stanesland's smoking room and addressed Mr. Cromarty with a happy blend of consciousness of his own importance and respect for the laird's.

"I have taken the liberty of calling, sir, for to lay before you a few fresh datas."

"Fire away," said the laird.

"In the first place, sir, I understand that you have been making enquiries through the county yourself, sir; is that not so?"

"I've been through this blessed county, Bisset, from end to end to see whether I could get on the track of any suspicious stranger. I've been working both with the police and independent of the police, and I've drawn blank."

Bisset looked distinctly disappointed.

"I've heard, sir, one or two stories which I was hoping might have something in them."

"I've heard about half a dozen and gone into them all, and there's nothing in one of them."

"Half a dozen stories?" Bisset's eye began to look hopeful again. "Well, sir, perhaps if I was to go into some of them again in the light of my fresh datas, they might wear, as it were, a different aspect."

"Well," said Ned. "What have you found? Have a cigar and let's hear what you've been at."

The expert crackled the cigar approvingly between his fingers, lit it with increased approval, and began:

"Yon man was behind the curtains all the time."

"The devil he was! How do you know?"

"Well, sir, it's a matter of deduction. Ye see supposing he came in by the door, there are objections, and supposing he came in by the windie there are objections. Either way there are objections which make it difficult for to accept those theories. And then it struck me--the man must have been behind the curtains all the while!"

"He must have come either by the door or window to get there."

"That's true, Mr. Cromarty. But such minor points we can consider in a wee while, when we have seen how everything is otherwise explained. Now supposing we have the murderer behind the curtains; that brings him within six feet of where the wee table was standing. How did he get Sir Reginald to come to the table? He made some kind of sound. What kind of sound? Some imitation of an animal; probably of a cat. How did Sir Reginald not cry out when he saw the man? Because he never did see the man! How did he not see him?"

"Man was a ventriloquist and made a sound in the other direction," suggested Ned with extreme gravity.

"God, but that's possible, Mr. Cromarty! I hadna thought of that! Well, it'll fit into the facts all right, you'll see. My theory was that either the man threw something at the master and knocked him down that way, or he was able to reach out and give him a bat on the heid without moving from the curtains."

"He must have been an awkward customer."

"He was that! A great tall man with long arms. And what had he at the end of them? Either a club such as savages use or something to throw like a boomerang. And he could imitate animals, and as you say, he was probably a ventriloquist. And he was that active and strong he could get into the house through one of the windies, just like a great monkey. Now what's the history of that man?"

"Pretty wild, I guess."

"Ah, but one can say more than that, sir. He was not an ordinary Englishman or Scotchman. He was from the Colonies or America or one of thae wild places! Is that not a fair deduction, sir?"

"It all points to that," said Ned, with a curious look.

"It points to that indeed, sir. Now where's he hidden himself? It should not be difficult to find him with all that to go on."

"A tall active strong man who has lived in the Colonies or America; one ought to get him. Has he only one eye, by any chance?"

The reasoner gazed petrified at his counsellor.

"God, but I've just described yoursel', sir!" he cried in an unhappy voice.

"You're determined to hang one of us, Bisset."

For a moment Bisset seemed to find conversation difficult. Then he said miserably:

"So it's no good, and all the alternatives just fa' to pieces."

The extreme dejection of his voice struck the other sharply.

"Alternatives to what?" he asked.

For a few seconds Bisset did not answer.

"What's on your mind, man?" demanded Cromarty.

"The reason, sir, I've got that badly off the rails with my deductions is just that I _had_ to find some other theory than the story that's going about."

"What story?"

"You've no heard it, sir?"

Ned shook his head.

"I hardly like to repeat it, sir; it's that cruel and untrue. They're saying Sir Malcolm and Miss Farmond had got engaged to be married."

"Well?" said Ned sharply, and he seemed to control his feelings with an effort.

"A secret engagement, like, that Sir Reginald would never have allowed. But there I think they're right, sir. Sir Reginald was unco' taken up with Miss Farmond, but he'd have looked higher for his heir. And so as they couldn't get married while he was alive--neither of them having any money, well, sir, this story says--"

He broke off and neither spoke for an instant.

"Good God!" murmured Cromarty. "They actually accuse Malcolm Cromarty and Miss Cicely of--?"

He paused too, and Bisset nodded.

"Who is saying this?"

"It seems to be the clash of the haill country by this time, sir."

He seemed a little frightened at the effect of his own words; and it was small wonder. Ned Cromarty was a nasty looking customer at that moment.

"Who started the lie?"

"It's just ignorance and want of education of the people, I'm thinking, Mr. Cromarty. They're no able to grasp the proper principles--"

"Lady Cromarty must be told! She could put a stop to it--"

Something in Bisset's look pulled him up sharply.

"I'm afraid her ladyship believes it herself, sir. Maybe you have heard she has keepit Miss Farmond to stay on with her."

"I have."

"Well, sir," said Bisset very slowly and deliberately, "I'm thinking--it's just to watch her."

Ned Cromarty had been smoking a pipe. There was a crack now as his teeth went through the mouthpiece. He flung the pipe into the fire, jumped up, and began pacing the room without a word or a glance at the other. At last he stopped as abruptly as he had started.

"This slander has got to be stopped!"

And then he paced on.

"Just what I was saying to myself, sir. It was likely a wee thing of over anxiety to stop it that made me think o' the possibility of a wild man from America, which was perhaps a bit beyond the limits of what ye might call, as it were, scientific deduction."

"When did Lady Cromarty begin to take up this attitude?"

"Well, the plain truth is, sir, that her ladyship has been keeping sae much to herself that it's not rightly possible to tell what's been in her mind. But it was the afternoon when Mr. Rattar had been at the house that she sent for Miss Farmond and tellt her then she was wanting her to stop on."

"That would be after she knew the contents of the will! I wonder if the idea had entered her head before, or if the will alone started it? Old Simon would never start such a scandal himself about his best client. He knows too well which side his bread is buttered for that! But he might have talked his infernal jargon about the motive and the people who stood to gain by the death. That might have been enough to set her suspicions off."

"Or I was thinking maybe, sir, it was when her ladyship heard of the engagement."

"Ah!" exclaimed Ned, stopping suddenly again, "that's possible. When did she hear?"

Bisset shook his head.

"That beats me again, sir. Her own maid likely has been telling her things the time we've not been seeing her."

"Did the maid--or did you know about the engagement?"

"Servants are uneducated creatures," said Bisset contemptuously. "And women at the best have just the ae' thought--who's gaun to be fool enough to marry next? They were always gossiping about Mr. Malcolm and Miss Cicely, but there was never what I should call a data to found a deduction on; not for a sensible person. I never believed it myself, but it's like enough her ladyship may have suspected it for a while back."

"I suppose Lady Cromarty has been nearly distracted?"

"Very near, sir."

"That's her only excuse. But the story is such obvious nonsense, Bisset, that surely no one in their proper senses really believes it?"

The philosopher shook a wise head.

"I have yet to learn, Mr. Cromarty, what folks will not believe."

"They've got to stop believing this!" said Ned emphatically.

XVII

A SUGGESTION

Next morning Simon Rattar was again informed that Mr. Cromarty of Stanesland wished to see him, and again the announcement seemed to be unwelcome. He was silent for several seconds before answering, and when he allowed Mr. Cromarty to be shown in, it was with an air which suggested the getting over a distasteful business as soon as possible.

"Well, Mr. Cromarty?" he grunted brusquely.

Mr. Cromarty never beat about the bush.

"I've come to see you about this scandalous story that's going round."

The lawyer glanced at the papers he had been busy with, as if to indicate that they were of more importance than scandals.

"What story?" he enquired.

"That Sir Malcolm and Miss Farmond were concerned in Sir Reginald's murder."

There was something compelling in Ned's directness. Simon pushed aside the papers and looked at him fixedly.

"Oh," he said. "They say that, do they?"

"Haven't you heard?"

Simon's grunt was non-committal.

"Well anyway, this derned story is going about, and something's got to be done to stop it."

"What do you suggest?"

"Are you still working the case for all you know how?"

Simon seemed to resent this enquiry a little.

"I am the Procurator Fiscal. The police make the actual enquiries. They have done everything they could."

"'They have done'? Do you mean that they have stopped looking for the murderer?"

"Certainly not. They are still enquiring; not that it is likely to be much further use."

There seemed to be a sardonic note in his last words that deepened Cromarty's frown and kindled his eye.

"You mean to suggest that any conclusion has been reached?"

"Nothing is absolutely certain," said Simon.

Again the accent on the "absolutely" seemed to rouse his visitor's ire.

"You believe this story, do you?"

"If I _believed_ it, I should order an arrest. I have just told you nothing is absolutely certain."

"Look here," said Cromarty, "I don't want to crab Superintendent Sutherland or his men, but you want to get somebody better than them on to this job."

Though the Procurator Fiscal kept his feelings well in hand, it was evident that this suggestion struck him more unfavourably than anything his visitor had said yet. He even seemed for one instant to be a little startled by its audacity.

"I disagree," he muttered.

"Now don't you take offence, Mr. Rattar," said Ned with a sudden smile. "I'm not aiming this at you, but, hang it, you know as well as I do that Sutherland is no great shakes at detection. They are all just country bobbies. What we want is a London detective."

Simon seemed to have recovered his equanimity during this speech. He shook his head emphatically, but his voice was as dispassionately brusque as ever.

"London detective? Much over-rated people, I assure you. No use in a case of this kind."

"The very kind of case a real copper-bottomed expert would be some use in!"

"You are thinking of detectives in stories, Mr. Cromarty. The real men are no better than Sutherland--not a bit. I believe in Sutherland. Better man than he looks. Very shrewd, most painstaking. Couldn't have a better man. Useless expense getting a man from London."

"Don't you trouble about the expense, Mr. Rattar. That can be arranged all right. I want a first class man engaged."

The sudden glance which the lawyer shot at him, struck Ned as unusual in his experience of Simon Rattar. He appeared to be startled again, and yet it was not mere annoyance that seemed to show for the fraction of a second in his eye. And then the next instant the man's gaze was as cold and steady as ever. He pursed his lips and considered his answer in silence before he spoke.

"You are a member of the family, Mr. Cromarty; the actual head of it, in fact, I believe."

"Going by pedigrees, I believe I am, but being a member is reason enough for my wanting to get daylight through this business--and seeing somebody swing for it!"

"What if you made things worse?"

"Worse! How could they be?"

"Mr. Cromarty, I am the Procurator Fiscal in charge of this case. But I am also lawyer and factor to the Cromarty family, and my father was before me. If there was evidence enough--clear and proper evidence--to convict any person of this crime, it would be my duty as Procurator Fiscal to convict them. But there is no definite evidence, as you know yourself. All we can do, if we push this matter too far, is to make a family scandal public. Are you as the head of the Cromarty family, and I as their factor, to do this?"

It was difficult to judge with what feelings Ned Cromarty heard this deliberate statement and appeal. His mouth was as hard as the lawyer's and his eye revealed nothing.

"Then you propose to hush the thing up?"

"I said nothing about hushing up. I propose to wait till I get some _evidence_, Mr. Cromarty. It is a little difficult perhaps for a layman to realise what evidence means, but I can tell you--and any lawyer, or any detective, would tell you--we have nothing that can be called evidence yet."

"And you won't get any till you call in somebody a cut above Sutherland."

"The scent is too cold by this time--"

"Who let it cool?" interrupted Ned.

For a moment the lawyer's eyes looked unpleasant.

"Every effort was made to find a clue; by yourself as well as by the police. And let me tell you, Mr. Cromarty, that our efforts have not been as fruitless as you seem to think."

"What have we discovered?"

"In the first place that there was no robbery committed and no sign of anybody having entered the house from the outside."

Ned shook his head.

"That's a lot too strong. I believe the man _did_ come in by the window."

"You admit there is no proof?"

"Sure," said Ned candidly. "I quite admit there is no proof of anything--yet."

"No robbery, no evidence of anyone having come in by the window--"

"No proof," corrected Ned. "I maintain that the window being unsnibbed and that mud on the floor and the table near the window being upset is evidence; but not proof positive."

Simon's patience had by this time become exemplary. His only wish seemed to be to convince by irresistible argument this obstinate objector. It struck the visitor, moreover, that in this effort the lawyer was displaying a fluency not at all characteristic of silent Simon.

"Well, let us leave it at that. Suppose there be a possibility that entry was actually made by the window. It is a bare possibility against the obvious and easy entrance by the door,--near which, remember, the body was found. Then, as I have pointed out, there was no robbery, and not a trace has been found of anybody outside that house with a motive for the crime."

"Except me."

"Unless you care to except yourself. But neither you nor the police have found any bad characters in the place."

"That's true enough," Ned admitted reluctantly.

"On the other hand, there were within the house two people with a very strong motive for committing the crime."

"I deny that!" cried Ned with a sudden gleam of ferocity in his eye that seemed to disconcert the lawyer.

"Deny it? You can scarcely deny that two young people, in love with one another and secretly engaged, with no money, and no chance of getting married, stood to gain everything they wanted by a death that gave them freedom to marry, a baronetcy, a thousand a year, and two thousand in cash besides?"

"Damn it, Mr. Rattar, is the fact that a farmer benefits by a shower any evidence that he has turned on the rain?"

"I have repeatedly said, Mr. Cromarty, that there is no definite evidence to convict anybody. But nothing would have been easier than making an end of Sir Reginald Cromarty, to anybody inside that house whom he would never suspect till they struck the blow. All the necessary conditions are fulfilled by this view of the case, whereas every other view--every other view, mind you, Mr. Cromarty--is confronted with these difficulties:--no robbery, no definite evidence of entry, no explanation of Sir Reginald's extraordinary silence when the man appeared, no bad characters in the neighbourhood, and, above all, no motive."

At the end of this speech Simon shut his mouth tight and leaned back in his chair. For a moment it seemed as though Ned Cromarty was impressed by the lawyer's view of the case. But when he replied, his voice, though deliberate had a fighting ring in it, and his single eye, a fighting light.

"Then you propose to leave this young couple under the most damnable cloud of suspicion that a man and a woman could lie under--simply leave 'em there, and let that be the end of it?"

Simon seemed to be divided between distaste for this way of putting the case, and anxiety still to convince his visitor.

"I propose to avoid the painful family scandal which further disclosures and more publicity would almost certainly bring about; so long as I am justified as Procurator Fiscal in taking this course. And until I get more evidence, I am not only justified but forced to take this course."

Ned suddenly jumped to his feet.

"I'm no lawyer," said he, "but to me you seem to be arguing in the damnedest circle I ever met. You won't do anything because you can't get more evidence. And you won't look for more evidence because you don't want to do anything."

There was more than a hint of temper in Simon's eye and his answer was rapped out sharply.

"I certainly do not _want_ to cause a family scandal. I haven't said all I could say about Sir Malcolm if I were pressed."

"Why not?"

"I've told you. Suspicion is not evidence, but if I do get evidence, those who will suffer by it had better beware!"

Ned turned at the door and surveyed him with a cool and caustic eye.

"That's talk," he said, "and something has got to be _done_."

He was gone, and Simon Rattar was left frowning at the closed door behind him. The frown remained, but became now rather thoughtful than indignant. Then he sprang up and began to pace the floor, deliberately at first, and then more rapidly and with increasing agitation.

XVIII

L1200

Ned Cromarty had returned home and was going upstairs, when he heard a voice cry:

"Ned!"

The ancient stone stair, spiralling up round the time-worn pillar that seemed to have no beginning or end, gave at intervals on to doors which looked like apertures in a cliff. Through one of these he turned and at the end of a brief passage came to his sister's sitting room. In that mediaeval setting of ponderous stone, it looked almost fantastic in its daintiness. It was a small room of many cushions and many colours, its floor covered with the softest rugs and its walls with innumerable photographs, largely of country houses where Miss Cromarty had visited.

Evidently she was a lady accustomed to a comfortable life in her roving days, and her sitting room seemed to indicate very distinctly that she proposed to live up to this high standard permanently.

"Oh Neddy dear, I want to talk to you about something," she began in her brisk way and with her brightest smile.

Her brother, though of a simple nature, was by this time aware that when he was termed "Neddy dear" the conversation was apt to turn on Miss Cromarty's requirements.

"Well," said he, "how much is the cheque to be this time?"

"How clever you're getting!" she laughed. "But it isn't a cheque I want this time. It's only a motor car."

He looked at her doubtfully for a moment.

"Pulling my leg; or a real car?"

"Real car of course--nice one too!"

"But, my dear girl, we've just put down our car. You agreed it was necessary."

"I agreed then; but it isn't necessary now."

"Have you come into a fortune? I haven't!"

"You've come into L1200."

Again he looked at her, and this time his expression changed.

"That's only a debt wiped out."

"Well, and your great argument for economy was that you had to pay back that debt. Now you haven't. See, Neddy dear?"

Her brother began to shake his head, and her smile became a little less bright.

"I don't want to get my affairs into a tangle again just yet."