It was heavy, but it moved. She heard it creak. Then she heard something else-a footstep just outside, crossing the pavement, coming quickly up to the door. She pressed her face to the glass. Suddenly, terribly, she was afraid. She couldn’t really see anything. There was no lamp very near, and the porch run out over the steps with pillars upon either side. They cut off what light there was. She had only seen a shadow, but she heard a horrifying and familiar sound, the little rattle which a latchkey makes when it is put into the lock, and hard upon that the click of the latch. The door swung in, swung back. The inner door swung in. A cold air came with it into the hall-through the open dining-room door. Sylvia turned round, flattening herself behind the curtain, because it was Francis who had come into his own house in the middle of the night-it couldn’t be anyone else but Francis.

And he would want to know what she was doing down here in her dressing-gown. Sylvia, whose stupidity had driven Gay to desperation, was not at all stupid about this. She ceased in fact to be Sylvia Colesborough at all. She was immemorial woman, and there, on the other side of the open door, was immemorial man, a creature to be deceived. If she had been capable of thought at all, she would have thought, “I must hide,” and have remained cowering behind her curtain. But she did not think. She ran out into the middle of the dining-room and called in a plaintive voice,

“Oh, Francis, is that you? Do put on the light. I can’t see where I am.”

The light went on. Francis Colesborough stood by the door with his hand on the switch. At this moment he looked his age. He had fair hair with a sprinkle of grey in it, grey eyes, hard and intent, a certain elegance of bearing. His skin lacked colour. The light which he had turned on picked out the lines of fatigue about eyes and mouth. He said with a kind of angry impatience,

“What are you doing, Sylvia?”

She smiled that lovely vague smile of hers.

“I wanted a biscuit-I thought I could find them in the dark. And then I heard you and went to look out of the window.”

His hand dropped rather heavily from the switch.

“You weren’t expecting me?”

She had found the biscuits. She picked out two or three and turned with them in her hand.

“Did you say you were coming back?”

“No, I didn’t.”

She began to tell him about the Westgates’ party.

“Are you glad to see me?” he said abruptly in the middle of a sentence.

Sylvia trailed towards him in her lovely white wrap, offered a cheek to be kissed, yawned a little and said,

“But I’m always pleased to see you, darling.”

XII

It was in my pocket,” said Algy Somers.

Montagu Lushington looked at the creased envelope which had come out of Algy’s tail-pocket the night before. He said nothing. Algy went on.

“It’s that envelope-there isn’t any doubt about it at all. I didn’t read the address, as I told you. I didn’t know that I had looked at the envelope, but as soon as I saw that blot I knew I had seen it before, and where. It’s shiny where the ink has dried, and I suppose that must have caught my eye, and I remembered it afterwards, though I didn’t notice it at the time.”

Montagu Lushington looked up.

“The envelope that was taken out of my despatch-case.”

“Yes, sir.”

“The empty envelope.” There was a little weight on the second word.

Algy’s face was set and grave. He said “Yes, sir” again.

“And planted on you-put into your tail-pocket-” The slow almost meditative tone quickened suddenly. “With what object?”

Algy’s face did not change, or his voice. He said,

“I’ve thought about that. It would support the theory that the papers were taken before you went down to Wellings.”

“If it had been found on you-yes.”

“It was intended to be found. I found it too soon, that’s all. Or perhaps I was meant to find it. It may have been part of an attempt to stampede me-I don’t know. There’s a lot of talk going on. I was at the Westgates’ last night. All Linda’s crowd had got the story.”

Mr. Lushington wished-profanely-that someone would tell him how people got hold of these things.

“Well, they do,” said Algy. “The men tell their wives, and the women tell each other-everyone adds a little. But they all know that important papers have gone missing, and most of them are half way to believing I took them. Somewhere about day after tomorrow they’ll be quite sure I did. Then it’s finish for me.”

Montagu Lushington looked down at the envelope again.

“I don’t see why this was planted on you.”

Algy had one of those flashes. He said,

“Has no one suggested having my rooms searched?”

He got a quick upward glance. There was a pause, and Lushington said,

“I should not have entertained such a suggestion.”

“But it was made?” Algy’s tone warmed a little.

“I think that is a question which should not be put.”

“But I do put it, sir. I don’t see how I’m to meet this thing unless I know what I’m up against.”

“Very well then, you may take it that the suggestion has been made.”

“By whom?” Algy was pale.

“Do you expect me to tell you that?” said Montagu Lushington.

“Yes, I do, sir. You have just asked me why this envelope should have been planted in my pocket. I say it was planted in order that it might be found there. How was it going to be found there? My rooms were to be searched. Don’t you think I have a right to know who has been suggesting that my rooms should be searched?”

Montagu Lushington said abruptly, “It was Carstairs. That makes nonsense of your suggestion, but the person who planted the envelope might have had knowledge of the line which Carstairs was taking-there is that.”

“I’m not making any suggestion about Mr. Carstairs-he’s out of the question. But someone thought, or hoped, that there would be a search, and was willing to take a risk in order to make sure that something would be found. If you had authorized the search, and that envelope had been found in my coat, no one in the world would have believed that I was innocent. It would have been absolutely damning.”

Montagu Lushington said, “Yes.” Then, after a pause, “When do you think it was planted, and how?”

“Well, I found it last night when I was dressing to go to the Westgates‘, and it wasn’t there the day before. At least, it wasn’t there till four o’clock, because Barker-that’s the man at my rooms-had the suit to press and lay out. I’ve asked him, and he’s quite sure that there was nothing in any of the pockets. He put the things out for me somewhere about four o’clock, and then he and his wife went out. They go over to see her mother, and if I’m dining out they don’t hurry back. I meant to dine out, but Mr. Carstairs gave me the Babington stuff to type, and when I saw I wasn’t going to get done in time, I rang up and said I couldn’t get round till after dinner-and I didn’t get done till a quarter to nine. The point is that I had to rush back and dress in a hurry. If the envelope had been in my pocket then, I don’t think I should have noticed it.”

“You mean someone might have got into your rooms between four and nine and have planted it then?”

“Yes, sir.”

Montagu Lushington looked at him keenly.

“Very anxious to prove that it wasn’t so likely to have been done later, aren’t you, Algy?”

The blood came up into Algy’s face. He said,

“No, sir.”

“Oh, not unnaturally. Now I think we’ll have the rest of your evening.”

Algy stiffened a little.

“I called for a girl, and we went to the Ducks and Drakes.”

“Her name?”

“Gay Hardwicke.”

Montagu frowned slightly.

“Hardwicke-there’s a Miss Agatha Hardwicke who bombards me and the papers with letters on the subject of capital punishment. She’s secretary of some society or other. Rather a terrifying female.”