“Miss Edwards isn’t in her room, Miss Vane.”

“Oh! The scouts are all in bed, I suppose.”

“Yes, miss. Shall I ask Mrs. Padgett to see if she can find her?”

“No-see if you can get Miss Lydgate.”

Another pause. Was Miss Lydgate also out of her room? Was every reliable don in College out, or out of her room? Yes-Miss Lydgate was out, too; and then it occurred to Harriet that, of course, they were dutifully patrolling the College before turning in to bed. However, there was Padgett. She explained matters as well as she could to him.

“Very good, miss,” said Padgett, comfortingly. “Yes, miss-I can leave Mrs. Padgett on the Lodge. I’ll get down to the private gate and have a look round. Don’t you worry, miss. If there’s anybody a-laying in wait for you, miss, I’m sorry for ’em, that’s all. No, miss, there ain’t been no disturbance tonight as I knows on; but if I catches anybody a-laying in wait, miss, then the disturbance will proceed according to schedule, miss, trust me.”

“Yes, Padgett; but don’t make a row about it. Slip down quietly and see if there’s anybody hanging round-but don’t let them see you. If anybody attacks me when I come in, you can come to the rescue; but if not, keep out of sight.”

“Very good, miss.”

Harriet hung up again and stepped out of the call-box. A center light burned dimly in the entrance-hall. She looked at the clock. Seven minutes to eleven. She would be late. However, the assailant, if there was one, would wait for her. She knew where the trap would be-must be. Nobody would start a riot just outside the Infirmary or the Warden’s Lodgings, where people might overhear and come out. Nor would anyone hide under or behind the walls on that side of the path. The only reasonable lurking-place was the bushes in the Fellows’ Garden, near the gate, on the right side of the path as you went up.

One would be prepared, and that was an advantage; and Padgett would be somewhere at hand; but there would be a nasty moment when one had to turn one’s back and lock the private gate from the inside. Harriet thought of the bread-knife in the dummy, and shuddered.

If she bungled it and got killed-melodramatic, but possible, when people weren’t quite sane-Peter would have something to say about it. Perhaps it would be only decent to apologize beforehand, in case. She found somebody’s notebook astray on a window-seat, borrowed a sheet of it, scribbled half a dozen words with the pencil from her bag, folded the note, addressed it and put it away with the pencil. If anything happened, it would be found.

The Somerville porter let her out into the Woodstock Road. She took the quickest way: by St. Giles’ Church, Blackball Road, Museum Road, South parks Road, Mansfield Road, walking briskly, almost running. When she turned into Jowett Walk, she slowed down. She wanted her breath and her wits.

She turned the corner into St. Cross Road, reached the gate and took out her key. Her heart was thumping.

And then, the whole melodrama dissipated itself into polite comedy. A car drew up behind her; the Dean deposited the Warden and drove on round to the tradesmen’s entrance to garage her Austin, and Dr. Baring said pleasantly:

“Ah! it’s you, Miss Vane? Now I shan’t have to look for my key. Did you have an interesting evening? The Dean and I have been indulging in a little dissipation. We suddenly made up our minds after dinner…”

She walked on up the path with Harriet, chatting with great amiability about the play she had seen. Harriet left her at her own gate, refusing an invitation to come in and have coffee and sandwiches. Had she, or had she not, heard something stir behind the bushes? At any rate, the opportunity was by now lost. She had offered herself as the cheese, but, owing to the slight delay in setting the trap, the Warden had innocently sprung it.

Harriet stepped into the Fellows’ Garden, switched on her torch and looked round. The garden was empty. She suddenly felt a complete fool. Yet, when all was said and done, there must have been some reason for that telephone call.

She made her way towards the St. Cross Lodge. In the New Quad she met Padgett.

“Ah!” said Padgett, cautiously. “She was there right enough, miss.” His right hand moved at his side, and Harriet fancied it held something suspiciously like a cosh. “Sittin’ on the bench be’ind them laurels near the gate. „„ I crep’ along careful, like it was a night reconnaissance, miss, and ’id be’ind them centre shrubs. She didn’t tumble to me, miss. But when you an’ Dr. Baring come through the gate a-talking, she was up and orf like a shot.”

“Who was it, Padgett?”

“Well, miss, not to put too fine a point upon it, miss, it was Miss Hillyard. She come out at the top end of the Garden, miss, and away to her own rooms. I follered ’er and see ’er go up. Going very quick, she was. I stepped out o’ the gate, and I see the light go up in her window.”

“Oh!” said Harriet. “Look here, Padgett. I don’t want anything said about this. I know Miss Hillyard does sometimes take a stroll in the Fellows’ Garden at night. Perhaps the person who sent the telephone call saw her there and went away again.”

“Yes, miss. It’s a funny thing about that there telephone call. It didn’t come through the Lodge, miss.”

“Perhaps one of the other instruments was through to the Exchange.”

“No, they wasn’t, miss. I ’ad a look to see. Afore I goes to bed at 11 o’clock, I puts the Warden, the Dean, and the Infirmary and the public box through, Miss, for the night. But they wasn’t through at 10:40, miss, that I’ll swear.”

“Then the call must have come from outside.”

“Yes, miss. Miss ’Illyard come in at 10:50, miss, jest afore you rang up.”

“Did she? Are you sure?”

“I remember quite well, miss, because of Annie passing a remark about her. There’s no love lost between her and Annie,” added Padgett, with a chuckle. “Faults o’ both sides, that’s what I say, miss, and a ’asty temper-”

“What was Annie doing in the Lodge at that hour?”

“Jest come in from her half-day out, miss. She set in the Lodge a bit with Mrs. Padgett.”

“Did she? You didn’t say anything about this business to her, did you, Padgett? She doesn’t like Miss Hillyard, and if you ask me, I think she’s a mischief-maker.”

“I didn’t say one word, miss, not even to Mrs. Padgett, and nobody could ’ave ’eard me on the ’phone, because, after I couldn’t find Miss Lydgate and Miss Edwards and you begins to tell me, I shuts the door between me an’ the settin’room. Then I jest puts me ’ead in afterwards and says to Mrs. Padgett, ‘Look after the gate, would you?’ I says, ‘I jest got to step over and give Mullins a message.’ So this here remains wot I might call confidential between you an’ me, miss.”

“Well, see that it stays confidential, Padgett. I may have been imagining something quite absurd. The ’phone call was certainly a hoax, but there’s no proof that anybody meant mischief. Did anybody else come in between 10.40 and 11?”

“Mrs. Padgett will know, miss. I’ll send you up a list of the names. Or if you like to step into the Lodge now-”

“Better not. No-give me the list in the morning.”

Harriet went away and found Miss Edwards, of whose discretion and common-sense she had a high opinion, and told her the story of the ’phone call.

“You see,” said Harriet, “if there had been any disturbance, the call might have been intended to prove an alibi, though I don’t quite see how. Otherwise, why try to get me back at eleven? I mean, if the disturbance was due to start then, and I was brought there as a witness, the person might have wangled something so as to appear to be elsewhere at the time. But why was it necessary to have me as a witness?”

“Yes-and why say the disturbance had already happened, when it hadn’t? And why wouldn’t you do as a witness when you had the Warden with you?”