 CHAPTER XIX. A PLAN FRUSTRATED. The road curled like a paper ribbon round the shoulder of a hill and dropped into a shallow valley. To the left, a little below the level of the road, a stream ran swiftly through an arrow meadow of lush green grass. Beyond the meadow, the wall of the valley rose rough, without croppings of rock, and with every tuft of its herbage already brown from the sun. On the right, the northern wall rose almost from the road's edge. The valley was long and curved slowly, and halfway along, to the point where it disappeared, a secondary road, the sort of road which is indicated in the motorist handbook by a dotted line, branched off to the left, crossed the stream by a stone bridge, and vanished in a cleft of the southern wall. Beyond this branching road grew trees. The stream disappeared under them as though it ran into a cavern. The slopes on either side were hidden behind trees, trees so thick that here, at this end, the valley looked bare in the strong sunlight, but low trees as if they had determined to harmonize with their environment. Indeed, the whole valley had a sort of doll's house effect. It was so shallow and narrow and stunted. It tried to be a valley, and succeeded in being a depression. When the little two-seater car swooped round the shoulder of the hill and descended, the white ribbon of road was empty but for one tiny speck at the far end, behind which a stream of dust spurted and spread like smoke from the runnel of an engine. That motor dust is going to smother us when we pass, said Jim. We shall do as much for him, said Betty, looking over her shoulder from the steering wheel. No worse. Behind the car the dust was a screen, but I don't mind, do you, Jim? She asked with a laugh, at which for the first time, with a heart of thankfulness, Jim heard a note of gaiety. To be free of that town, if only for an hour. Oh, and Betty opened her lungs to the sunlight and the air. This is my first hour of liberty for a week. Frobisher was glad, too, to be out upon the slopes of the Côte d'Or. The city of Dijon was ringing that morning with the murder of Jean Gladelle. You could not pass down a street, but you heard his name mentioned, and some sarcasms about the police. He wished to forget that nightmare of a visit to the street of Campetta and the dreadful twisted figure on the floor of the back room. You will be leaving it for good very soon, Betty, he said significantly. Betty made a little grimace at him and laid her hand upon his sleeve. Jim, she said, and the color rose into her face, and the car swerved across the road. You mustn't speak like that to the girl at the wheel, she said, with a laugh, as she switched the car back into its course. Or I shall run down the motorcyclist and that young lady in the sidecar. The young lady, said Jim, happens to be at Montau. The motorcyclist, indeed, was slowing down as he came nearer to the branching road, like a tourist unacquainted with the country, and when he actually reached it he stopped altogether and dismounted. Betty brought her car to a standstill beside him and glanced at the clock and the speedometer in front of her. Can I help you? she asked. The man standing beside the motorcycle was a young man, slim, dark, and of a pleasant countenance. He took off his helmet and bowed politely. Madame, I'm looking for des gens, he said, in a harsh accent, which struck froberger as somehow familiar to his ears. Monsieur, you can see the tip of it through that gap across the valley. Betty returned. In the very center of the cleft, the point of the soaring spire of the cathedral stood up like a delicate lance, but I warn you that that way, though short, is not good. Through the gradually thinning cloud of dust which hung behind the car, they heard the jug jug of another motorcycle. The road by which we have come is the better one, she continued. But how far is it? the young man asked. Betty once more consulted her speedometer, 40 kilometers, and we have covered them in 40 minutes so that you can see the going is good. We started at 11 punctually and it is now 20 minutes to 12. Surely we started before 11, Jim interposed. Yes, but we stopped for a minute or two to tighten the strap of the toolbox on the edge of the town, and we started from there at 11. The motorcyclist consulted his wrist watch. Yes, it's 20 minutes to 12 now, he said, but 40 kilometers, I doubt if I have the essence. I think I must try the nearer road. The second motorcycle came out of the dust like a boat out of a sea mist and slowed down in turn at the side of them. The rider jumped out of his saddle, pushed his goggles up on his forehead, and joined in the conversation. That little road, Missure, it is not one of the national highways that shows itself at a glance, but it is not so bad. From the stone bridge, one can be at the Hotel de Villa of Dijon in 25 minutes. Oh, I thank you, said the young man. You will pardon me. I have been here for seven minutes and I am expected. He replaced his helmet, mounted his machine, and with a splutter and half a dozen explosions ran down into the bed of the valley. The second cyclist readjusted his goggles. Will you go first, Madame, he suggested? Otherwise I give you my dust. Thank you, said Betty with a smile, and she slipped in the clutch and started. Beyond the little forest and the curve, the ground rose and the valley flattened out. Across their road, a broad highway set with kilometer stones ran north and south. The road to Paris, said Betty as she stopped the car in front of a little inn with a tangled garden at the angle. She looked along the road, Paris words. There, she said, and drew a breath of longing whilst her eyes kindled and her white strong teeth clicked as though she was biting a sweet fruit. Soon, Betty said, Jim, very soon. Betty drove the car into a little yard at the side of the river. We will lunch here in the garden, she said, all amongst the earwigs and the roses. An amulet, a cutlet perfectly cooked and piping hot, with a salad and a bottle of clove de France of the 1904 vintage, brought the glowing city of Paris immeasurably nearer to them. They sat in the open under the shade of a tall hedge. They had the tangled garden to themselves. They laughed and made merry in the golden May, and visions of wonder trembled and opened before Jim Frobischer's eyes. Betty swept them away, however, when he had lit a cigar and she a cigarette, and their coffee steamed from the little cups in front of them. Let us be practical, Jim, she said. I want to talk to you. The sparkle of gaiety had left her face. Yes, he asked. About Anne, her eyes swept round and rested on Jim's face. She ought to go. Run away, cried Jim with a start. Yes, at once and as secretly as possible. Jim turned the proposal over in his mind while Betty waited in suspense. It could not be managed, he objected. It could. Even if it could, would she consent? She does. Of course, it's pleading guilty, he said slowly. Oh, it isn't, Jim. She wants time. That's all. Time for my necklace to be traced. Time for the murderer of Jean Claudel to be discovered. You remember what I told you about Hanot? He must have his victim. You wouldn't believe me, but it's true. He's got to go back to Paris and say, You see, they sent from Chidon for me and five minutes. That's all I needed. Five little minutes and there's your murder rest. All tied up and safe. He tried to fix it on me first. No. He did, Jim. And now that has failed. He has turned on Anne. She'll have to go. Since he can't get me, he'll take my friend. Yes, Anne, manufacture the evidence into the bargain. Daddy, Hanot wouldn't do that, Frobisher protested. But Jim, he has done it, she said. When? When he put that Edinburgh man's book about the arrow poison and back upon the bookshelf in the library. Jim was utterly taken aback. Did you know that he had done that? I couldn't help knowing, she answered. The moment he took the book down, it was clear to me. He knew it from end to end as if it was a primer. He could put his finger on the plates, on the history of my uncle's arrow, on the effect of the poison, on the solution that could be made of it in an instant. He pretended that he had learned all that in the half hour he waited for us. It wasn't possible. He had found that book the afternoon before somewhere and had taken it away with him secretly and sat up half the night over it. That's what he had done. Jim Frobisher was sunk in confusion. He had been guessing first this person, then that, and in the end had had to be told the truth, whereas Betty had reached it in a flash by using her wits. He felt that he had been just one minute and a half in the bullring. Betty added in a hot scorn. Then when he had learned it all up by heart, he puts it back secretly in the bookshelf and accuses us. But he admits he put it back, said Jim slowly. Betty was startled. When did he admit it? Last night, to me, replied Jim, and Betty laughed bitterly. She would hear no good of Hano. Yes, now that he has something better to go upon. Something better? The disappearance of my necklace. Oh, Jim, Anne has got to go. If she could get to England, they couldn't bring her back, could they? They haven't evidence enough. It's only suspicion and suspicion and suspicion. But here in France it's different, isn't it? They can hold people on suspicion, keep them shut up by themselves, and question them again and again. Oh, yesterday afternoon in the hall. Don't you remember, Jim? I thought Hano was going to arrest her there and then. Jim Frobisher nodded. Well, I thought so too. He had been a little shocked by Betty's proposal, but the more familiar he became with it, the more it appealed to him. There was an overpowering argument in its favor of which neither he nor Hano had told Betty a word. The shaft of the arrow had been discovered in Anne Upcott's room, and the dart in the house of Jean Claudel. These were overpowering facts. On the whole, it was better that Anne should go now, whilst there was still time, if that is, Hano did undoubtedly believe her to be guilty. But it is evident that he does, cried Betty. Jim answered slowly. I suppose he does. We can make sure anyway. I had a doubt last night, so I asked him point blank. And he answered you? Betty asked with a gasp. Yes and no. He gave me the strangest answer. What did he say? He told me to visit the church of Notre Dame. If I did, I should read upon the façade whether Anne was innocent or not. Slowly, every tinge of color ebbed out of Betty's face. Her eyes stared at him, horror-stricken. She sat, a figure of ice, except for her eyes which blazed. That's terrible, she said with a low voice. And again, that's terrible. Then, with a cry, she stood erect. You shall see, come. And she ran towards the motor car. The sunlit day was spoiled for both of them. Betty drove homewards, bending over the wheel, her eyes fixed ahead. But Frobisher wondered whether she saw anything at all of that white road, which the car devoured. Once, as they dropped from the highland and the forest to the plains, she said, we shall abide by what we see. Yes, if Hano thinks her innocent, she should stay. If he thinks her guilty, she must go. Yes, said Frobisher. Betty guided the car through the streets of the city and into a wide square. A great church of the Renaissance type, with octagonal cupolas upon its two towers, and another little cupolas surmounted by a logia above its porch, confronted them. Betty stopped the car and led Frobisher into the porch. Above the door was a great bar relief of the last judgment. God amongst the clouds, angels blowing trumpets, and the damned rising from their graves to undergo their torments. Both Betty and Frobisher gazed at the representation for a while in silence. To Frobisher, it was a cruel and brutal piece of work, which well matched Hano's revelation of his true belief. Yes, the message is easy to read, he said, and they drove back in a melancholy silence to the Maison Grinnell. The chauffeur, Georges, came forward from the garage to take charge of the car. Betty ran inside the house and waited for Jim Frobisher to join her. I am so sorry, she said in a broken voice. I kept a hope somewhere that we were all mistaken. I mean, as to the danger Anne was in. I don't believe for a moment in her guilt, of course, but she must go. That's clear. She went slowly up the stairs, and Jim saw no more of her until dinner was served long after its usual hour. And up caught he had not seen at all that day, nor did he even see her then. Betty came to him in the library a few minutes before nine. We are very late, I am afraid. There are just the two of us, Jim, she said with a smile, and she led the way into the dining room. Through the meal, she was anxious and preoccupied, nodding her assent to anything that he said with her thoughts far away and answering him at random, or not answering him at all. She was listening, Frobisher fancied, for some sound in the hall, an expected sound which was overdue. For her eyes went continually to the clock, and a flurry and agitation, very strange, in one naturally so still, became more and more evident in her manner. At length, just before 10 o'clock, they both heard the horn of a motor car in the quiet street. The car stopped, as it seemed to Frobisher, just outside the gates, and upon that there followed the sound for which Betty had so anxiously been listening, the closing of a heavy door by someone careful to close it quietly. Betty shot a quick glance at Jim Frobisher and colored when he intercepted it. A few seconds afterwards, the car moved on and Betty drew a long breath. Jim Frobisher leaned forward to Betty, though they were alone in the room. He spoke in a low voice of surprise. An up-cott has gone then. Yes, so soon you had everything already arranged then. It was all arranged yesterday evening. She should be in Paris tomorrow morning, England tomorrow night, if only all goes well. Even in the stress of her anxiety, Betty had been sensitive to a tiny note of discontent in Jim Frobisher's questions. He had been left out of the counsels of the two girls. Their arrangements had been made without his participation. He had only been told of them at the last minute, just as if he was a babbler not to be trusted, and an incompetent whose advice would only have been a waste of time. Betty made her excuses. It would have been better, of course, if we had got you to help us, Jim, but Anne wouldn't have it. She insisted that you had come out here on my account, and that you mustn't be dragged into such an affair as her flight and escape at all. She made it a condition, so I had to give way. But you can help me now tremendously. Jim was appeased. Betty at all event had wanted him, was still alarmed lest their plan undertaken without his advice might miscarry. How can I help? You can go to the cinema and keep Monsieur Hanot engaged. It's important that he should know nothing about Anne's flight until late tomorrow. Jim laughed at the futility of Hanot's devices to hide himself. It was obviously all over the town that he spent his evenings in the Grand Tabana. Yes, I'll go, he returned, I'll go now. But Hanot was not that night in his accustomed place, and Jim sat there alone until half past ten. Then a man strolled out from one of the billiard rooms, and standing behind Jim with his eyes upon the screen, said in a whisper, Do not look at me Monsieur, it is moral, I go outside, will you please to follow? He strolled away. Jim gave him a couple of minutes grace. He had remembered Hanot's advice and had paid for his box when it had been brought to him. The little saucer was turned upside down to show that he owed nothing. When two minutes had elapsed, he sauntered out, and looking neither to the right nor to the left, strolled indolently along the Rue de la Guerre. When he reached the Place d'Arthée, Nicolas Marot passed him without a sign of recognition, and struck off to the right along the Rue de la Liberté. Probisher followed him with a sinking heart. It was folly, of course, to imagine that Hanot could be so easily eluded. No doubt that motor car had been stopped. No doubt Hanot caught was already under lock and key. Why, the last words he had heard and know speak were, I must be quick. Marot turned off into the boulevard Saint-Venier, and doubling back to the station square, slipped into one of the small hotels which cluster in that quarter. The lobby was empty. A staircase, an arrow and steep led from it to the upper stories. Marot now ascended it with Probisher at his heels and opened a door. Probisher looked into a small and dingy sitting room at the back of the house. The windows were open, but the shutters were closed. A single pendant in the center of the room gave it light, and at a table under the pendant, Hanot sat pouring over a map. The map was marked with red ink in a curious way. A sort of hoop, very much the shape of a tennis racket without its handle, was described upon it, and from the butt to the top of the hoop, an irregular line was drawn, separating the hoop roughly into two semi-circles. Marot left Jim Probisher standing there, and in a moment or two, Hanot looked up. Did you know, my friend, he asked very gravely, that an upcott has gone to night to Madame Levet's fancy dress ball? Probisher was taken completely by surprise. Oh, I see that you didn't, Hanot went on. He took up his pen and placed a red spot at the edge of the hoop, close by the butt. Jim recovered from his surprise. A Madame Levet's ball was the spot from which the start was to be made. The plan, after all, was not so ill-devised, if only Han could have got to the ball unnoticed. Masked and in fancy dress, amongst a throng of people, similarly accoutred, in a house with a garden, no doubt thrown open upon this hot night, and lit only by lanterns discreetly dim, she had thus her best chance of escape. But the chance was already lost. For Hanot lay down his pen again, and said in ominous tones, Though water lilya, that pretty water lily, my friend, will not dance very gaily to night. He asked, and Jim drew up a chair and sat down to examine it. He made, first of all, a large scale map of Dijon and its environments, the town itself lying at the bottom of the red hoop, and constituting the top of the handle of the tennis racket. As to the red circle, it seemed to represent a tour which someone had made out from Dijon, round a good tract of outlying country, and back again to the city. But there was more to it than that. The wavy dividing line, for instance, from the top of the circle to the handle, that is, to Dijon, and on the left hand edge of the hoop, as he bent over the map, and just outside Dijon, the red mark, a little red square which Hanot had just made. Against this square an hour was marked. 11 a.m. he read. He followed the red curve with his eyes, and just where this dividing line touched the rim of the hoop, another period was inscribed. Here, Frobischer read 11.40. Frobischer looked up at Hanot in astonishment. Good God, he exclaimed, and he bent again over the map. The point where the dividing line branched off was in a valley, as he could see by the contours. Yes, he had found the name now, the Val des Hommes. Just before 11 o'clock, Betty had stopped the car just outside Dijon, opposite a park with a big house standing back, and had asked him to tighten the strap of the toolbox. They had started again exactly at 11. Betty had taken note of the exact time, and they had stopped where the secondary road branched off and doubled back to Dijon at the top of the hoop, at the junction of the rim and the dividing line exactly at 11.40. This is a chart of the expedition we made today, he cried. We were followed then. He remembered suddenly the second motorcyclist who had come up from behind through the screen of their dust and had stopped by the side of their car to join in their conversation with the tourist. The motorcyclist, he asked, and again he got no answer. But the motorcyclist had not followed them all the way round. On their homeward course, they had stopped to lunch in the tangled garden. There had been no sign of the man. Jim looked at the map again. He followed the red line from the junction of the two roads round the curve of the valley to the angle where the great national road to Paris cut across and where they had lunched. After luncheon, they had continued along the national road into Dijon, whereas the red line crossed it and came back by a longer and obviously a less frequented route. I can't imagine why you had us followed this morning, Monsieur Hanot. He exclaimed with some heat. But I can tell you this, the chase was not very efficiently contrived. We didn't come home that way at all. I haven't an idea how you came home. An O answered imperturbably. The line on that side of the circle has nothing to do with you at all, as you can see for yourself, by looking at the time marked where the line begins. The red hoop at the bottom was not complete. There was a space where the spliced handle of the racket would fit in. This space filled by the town of Dijon, and at the point on the right hand side where the line started, Frobisher read in small but quite clear figures, 10 at 25 a.m. Jim was more bewildered than ever. I don't understand one word of it, he cried. Hanot reached over and touched the point with the tip of his pen. This is where the motorcyclist started, the cyclist who met you at the branch road at 1140. The tourist asked Jim a second ago, and it seemed to him impossible that the fog could thicken about his wits anymore, and yet it had. Let it stay the man with the apartment tow on his trailer. An O corrected. You see that he left his starting point in Dijon 35 minutes before you left yours. The whole maneuver seems to have been admirably planned, for you met precisely at the arranged spot at 1140. Neither the car nor the cycle had to wait one moment. Maneuver, arranged spot, Frobisher exclaimed, looking about him in a sort of despair. Has everyone gone crazy? Why in the world should a man start out with an apartment tow and a sidecar from Dijon at 1025, run 30 or 40 miles into the country by a roundabout road, and then return by a bad straight track? There's no sense in it. No doubt it is perplexing, An O agreed. He nodded to Marot who went out of the room by a communicating door towards the front of the house. But I can help you, An O continued. At the point where you started after tightening the strap of the toolbox on the edge of the town, a big country house stands back in a park. Yes, said Jim. That is the house of Madame Levet, where this fancy dress wall takes place tonight. Madame Levet's chateau, Frobisher repeated, where he began a question and caught it back. But An O completed it for him. Yes, where An O caught now is. You started from it at precisely 11 in the morning. He looked at his watch. It is not yet 11 at night, so she is still there. Frobisher started back in his chair. An O's words were like the blade of silver light cutting through the darkness of the cinema hall and breaking into a sheet of radiance upon the screen. The meaning of the red diagram upon An O's map, the unsuspected emotive of Betty's expedition this morning, were revealed to him. It was a rehearsal. He cried. An O nodded. A time rehearsal. Yes, the sort of thing which takes place in theaters, without the principal members of the company, thought Frobisher. But a moment later he was dissatisfied with that explanation. Wait a moment, he said. That won't do, I fancy. The motorcyclist with a sidecar had brought his argument to a standstill. His times were marked upon the map. They were therefore of importance. What had he to do with An O's escape? But he visualized the motorcyclist and his sidecar and his connection with the affair became evident. The big appointment though gave Frobisher the clue. An O would be leaving Madame Levet's house in her bald dress just as if she was returning to the Maison Grinnell and without any luggage at all. She could not arrive in Paris in the morning like that if she were to avoid a probably suspicion and certainly remark. The motorcyclist was to meet her at the Val-de-Don, transfer her luggage rapidly to her car, and then returned to Dijon by the straight, quick road whilst An turned off at the end of the valley to Paris. He remembered now that seven minutes had elapsed between the meeting of the cycle and the motorcar and their separation. Seven minutes then were allowed for the transference of the luggage. Another argument flashed into his thoughts. Betty had told him nothing of this plan. It had been presented to him as a mere excursion on the summer day, her first hours of liberty naturally employed. Her silence was all of a peace with the determination of Betty and an up-got to keep him altogether out of the conspiracy. Every detail fitted like the blocks in a picture puzzle. Yes, there had been a time rehearsal, and Hano knew all about it. That was the disturbing certainty which first overwhelmed Frobitur when he had got the better of his surprise at the scheme itself. Hano knew, and Betty had so set her heart on Anne's escape. Let her go, he pleaded earnestly. Let Anne up-got, get away to Paris and to England. And Hano leaned back in his chair with a little gasp. The queerest smile broke over his face. I see, he said. Oh, I know, Frobitur exclaimed, hotly appealing. You are of the Syrite, and I am a lawyer, an officer of the High Court in my country, and I have no right to make such a petition. But I do, without a scruple. You can't get a conviction against Anne up-got. You haven't a chance of it. But you can throw such a net of suspicion about her that she'll never get out of it. You can ruin her, yes, but that's all you can do. You speak very eagerly, my friend, Hano interposed. Jim could not explain that it was Betty's anxiety to save her friend, which inspired his idea. He fell back upon the scandal which such a trial would cause. There has been enough publicity already owing to Boris Wabersky, he continued. Surely Miss Harlow has had distress enough. Why must she stand in the witness box and give evidence against her friend in a trial which can have no result? That's what I want you to realize, Monsieur Hano. I have had some experience of criminal trials. Oh, shade of Mr. Haslott. Why was that punctilious man not there in the flesh to wipe out with an indignant word the slur upon the firm of Frobyshire and Haslott? And I assure you that no jury could convict upon such evidence. Why, even the pearl necklace has not been traced. And it never will be. You can take that from me, Monsieur Hano. It never will be. Hano opened a drawer in the table and took out one of those little cedar wood boxes made to hold a hundred cigarettes, which the better class of manufacturers use in England for their wares. He pushed this across the table towards Jim, something which was more substantial than cigarettes rattled inside of it. Jim seized upon it in a panic. He had not a doubt that Betty would for sooner lose her necklace altogether than that her friend, Ann Upcott, should be destroyed by it. He opened the lid of the box. It was filled with cotton wool. From the cotton wool, he took a string of pearls perfectly graded in size and gleaming softly with a pink luster, which even to his untutored eyes was indescribably lovely. It would have been more correct if I had found them in a matchbox, said Hano. But I shall point out to Monsieur Bex that after all, matches and cigarettes are again. Jim was still staring at the necklace in utter disappointment when Marot knocked upon the other side of the communicating door. Hano looked again at his watch. As it is eleven o'clock, we must go. The car has started from the house of Madame Levet. He rose from his chair, buried the necklace again within the layers of cotton wool, and locked it up once more in the drawer. The room had faded away from Jim Frobischer's eyes. He was looking at a big, brilliantly illuminated house and a girl who slipped from a window and wrapping a dark cloak about her glistening dress ran down the dark avenue in her dancing slippers to where a car waited, hidden under trees. The car may not have started, Jim said, with sudden hopefulness. There may have been an accident to it. The chauffeur may be late. Oh, a hundred things may have happened. With a scheme so carefully devised, so meticulously rehearsed? No, my friend. Hano took an automatic pistol from the cabinet against the wall and placed it in his pocket. You are going to leave that necklace just like that in a table drawer? Jim asked. We ought to take it first to the prefecture. This room is not unwatched, replied Hano. It will be safe. Jim hopefully tried another line of argument. We shall be too late now to intercept an upcott at the branch road, he argued. It is past eleven, as you say, well past eleven, and thirty-five minutes on a motorcycle in the daytime means fifty minutes in a car at night, especially with a bad road to travel. We don't intend to intercept an upcott at the branch road, Hano returned. He folded up the map and put it aside upon the mantel shelf. I take a big risk, you know, he said softly, but I must take it. And no, I cannot be wrong. But he turned from the mantel shelf with a very anxious and troubled face. Then, as he looked at Jim, a fresh idea came into his mind. By the way, he said, the facade of Notre Dame? Jim nodded. The bow relief of the last judgment. We went to see it. We thought your way of staying, what you believed, a little brutal. Hano remained silent with his eyes upon the floor for a few seconds, and then he said quietly, I am sorry. He tacked on a question. You say, we. Madam Iselle Harlow and I, Jim explained. Oh, yes, to be sure, I should have thought of that. And once more, his troubled cry broke from him. It must be that. No, I can't be wrong. Anyway, it's too late to change now. A second time, a row wrapped upon the communicating door. Hano sprang to alertness. That's it, he said. Take your hat and stick, Mishir-Frobisher. Good, you are ready. And the room was at once plunged into darkness. Hano opened the communicating door, and they passed into the front room, a bedroom looking out upon the big station square. This room was in darkness too, but the shutters were not closed, and there were patches of light upon the walls from the lamps in the square and the grand tabana in the corner. The three men that could see one another and to Jim in this dusk, the faces of his companions appeared of a ghastly pallor. Donné took his position when I first knocked, said Marot. Patineau has just joined him. He pointed across the square to the station buildings. Some cabs were waiting for the Paris train, and in front of them, two men dressed like artisans were talking. One of them lit a cigarette from the stump of a cigarette held out to him by his companion. The watchers in the room saw the end of the cigarette glow red. The way is clear, monsieur, said Marot, we can go. And he turned and went out of the end to the staircase. Jim started to follow him. Whether they were going, Jim had not a notion, not even a conjecture, but he was gravely troubled. All his hopes and Abeddy's hopes for the swift and complete suppression of the Wabersky Affair had seemingly fallen to the ground. He was not reassured when Hanot's hand was laid on his arm and detained him. You understand, monsieur Frobisher, said Hanot, with a quiet authority, his eyes shining very steadily in the darkness, his face glimmering very white, that now the law of France takes charge. There must not be a finger raised or a word spoken to hinder officers upon their duty. On the other hand, I make you in return the promise you desire. No one shall be arrested on suspicion. Your own eyes shall bear me out. The two men followed Marot down the stairs into the street. End of Chapter 20 Chapter 21 of the House of the Arrow by A. E. W. Mason This liberal act recording is in the public domain. Chapter 21 The Secret House It was a dark, clear night. The air very still and warm, and the sky bright with innumerable stars. The small company penetrated into the town by the back ways and narrow alleys. Doné going on ahead, about to know the last by some thirty yards, and Marot keeping on the opposite side of the street. Once they had left behind them the lights of the station square. They walked amongst the closed doors and the blind faces of unlit houses. Frobisher's heart raced within his bosom. He strained his eyes and ears for some evidence as flies upon their heels. But no one was concealed in any porch, and not the stealthiest sound of a pursuit was born to their hearing. On a night like this, he said in tones, which thrive as he might to study them, were still a little tremulous. One could hear a footstep on the stones a quarter of a mile away, and we hear nothing. Yet if there is a gang, it can hardly be that we are unwatched. Heno disagreed. This is a night for alibis. He returned, lowering his voice, good sound incontestable alibis. All but those engaged will be publicly with their friends, and those engaged do not know how near we are to their secrets. They turned into a narrow street and kept on its left-hand side. Do you know where we are, Heno asked? No. Yet we are near to the Maison Colonel. On the other side of these houses to our left runs the street of Charles Robert. Jim Frobisher stopped dead. It was here then that you came last night after I left you at the Préfecture, he exclaimed. You recognized me then. Heno returned imperturbably. I wondered whether you did when you turned at the gates of your house. On the opposite side of the street the houses were broken by a high wall in which two great wooden doors were set. Behind the wall, at the end of a courtyard, the upper story and the roof of a considerable house rose in a steep ridge against the stars. Heno pointed towards it. Look at that house, monsieur. There Madame Raviat came to live while she waited to be set free. It belongs to the Maison Colonel. After she married Simon Harlow, they would never let it. They kept it, just as it was, the shrine of their passion, that strange romantic couple. But there was more romance in that, to be sure. It has been unoccupied ever since. Jim Frobisher felt a chill close about his heart. Was that house the goal to which Heno was leading him with so confident a step? He looked at the gates and the house. Even in the night it had a look of long neglect and decay, the paint peeling from the doors and not a light in any window. Someone in the street, however, was awake for just above their heads a window was raised with the utmost caution and a whisper floated down to them. No one has appeared. Heno took no open notice of the whisper. He did not pause in his walk, but he said to Frobisher, and as you hear it is still unoccupied. At the end of the street, Doné melted away altogether. Heno and Frobisher crossed the road and with Maraud just ahead turned down a passage between the houses to the right. Beyond the passage they turned again to the right into a narrow lane between high walls and when they had covered 30 yards or so, Frobisher saw the branches of leafy trees over the wall upon his right. It was so dark here under the shade of the boughs that Frobisher could not even see his companions and he knocked against Maraud before he understood that they had come to the end of their journey. They were behind the garden of the house in which Madame Rabiat had lived and loved. Heno's hand tightened upon Jim Frobisher's arm, constraining him to absolute immobility. Batenot had banished as completely and noiselessly as Doné. The three men left stood in the darkness and listened. A sentence which Ann Upcott had spoken in the garden of the Maison-cranel when she had been describing the terror with which she had felt the face bending over her in the darkness came back to him. He had thought it false then. He took back his criticism now for he too imagined that the beating of his heart must wake all Dijon. They stood there motionless for the space of a minute and then at a touch from Heno, Nicolas Maraud stooped. Frobisher heard the palm of his hand sliding over wood and immediately after the tiniest little click as a key was fitted into a lock and turn. A door in the wall swung silently open and let a glimmer of light into the lane. The three men passed into the garden of weeds and rank grass and overgrown bushes. Maraud closed and locked the door behind them. As he locked the door, the clocks of the city struck the half hour. Heno whispered in Frobisher's ear, they had not yet reached the Val-taison. Come. They crept over the mat of grass and weeds to the back of the house. A short flight of stone steps patched with mold descended from a terrace. At the back of the terrace were shuttered windows but in the corner of the house on a level with a garden there was a door. Once more Maraud stooped and once more a door swung inwards without a sound. But whereas the garden door had let through some gleam of twilight, this door opened upon the blackness of the pit. Jim Frobisher shrank back from it, not in physical fear but in an appalling dread that some other man than he wearing his clothes and his flesh would come out of that door again. His heart came to a standstill and then Heno pushed him gently into the passage. The door was closed behind them and almost in audible sound told him that now the door was locked. Listen, Heno whispered sharply. His trained ear had caught a sound in the house above them and in a second Frobisher heard it too, a sound regular and continuous and very slight but in that uninhabited house filled with uttermost blackness very daunting. Gradually the explanation dawned upon him. It's a clock ticking, he said under his breath. Yes, a clock ticking away in the empty house returned Heno and though his answer was rather breathed then whispered there was a queer thrill in it, the sound of which Jim could not mistake. The hunter had picked up his spore. Just beyond the quarry would come in view. Suddenly a thread of light gleamed along the passage, lit up a short flight of stairs and a door on the right at the head of them and went out again. Heno slipped his electric torch back into his pocket and a passing morrow took the lead. The door at the head of the stairs opened with a startling whine of his hinges. Frobischer stopped with his heart in his throat though what he feared he could not have told even himself. Again the thread of light shone and at this time it explored. The three found themselves in a stone flagged hall. Heno crossed it, extinguished his torch and opened the door. Broken shutter swinging upon a hinge enabled them dimly to see a gallery which stretched away into the gloom. The faint light penetrating from the window showed them a high double door leading to some room at the back of the house. Heno stole over the boards and laid his ear to the panel. In a little while he was satisfied. His hand dropped to the knob and a leaf of the door opened noiselessly. Once more the torch glowed. It's being played upon the high ceiling the tall windows shrouded in heavy curtains of red silk brocade and revealed to Frobischer's amazement a room which had a look of daily use. All was orderly and clean. The furniture polished and in good repair. There were fresh flowers in the vases whose perfume filled the air and it was upon the marble chimney piece of this room that the clock ticked. The room was furnished with lightness and elegance except for one fine and massive press with double doors and marquetry which occupied a recess near to the fireplace. During those with mirrors and gilt frames now fitted with electric lights were fixed upon the walls with a few pictures in watercolor. A chandelier glittering with lusters hung from the ceiling an empire writing table stood near the window a deep cushioned van stretched along the wall opposite the fireplace. So much had Frobischer noticed when the light again went out and all closed the door upon the room again. We shall be hidden in the embrasure of any of these windows and no whisper when they were once more in the long gallery. No light will be shown here with that shutter hanging loose we may be sure. Meanwhile let us watch and be very silent. They took their stations in the deep shadows by the side of the window with the broken shutter. They could see dimly the courtyard and the great carriage doors in the wall at the end of it and they waited. Jim Frobischer under such a strain of dread and expectancy that each second seemed an hour and he wondered at the immobility of his companions. The only sound of breathing that he heard came from his own lungs. In a while Hano laid a hand upon his sleeve and the clasp of the hand tightened and tightened. Motionless though he stood like a man in a seizure Hano too was in the grip of an intense excitement. For one of the great leaves of the courtyard door was opening silently. It opened just a little way and as silently closed again. But someone had slipped in. So vague and swift and noiseless a figure that Jim would have believed his imagination had misled him but for a thicker blot of darkness at the center of the great door. There someone stood now who had not stood there a minute before. As silent and still as any of the watchers in the gallery and more still than one. For Hano moved suddenly away on the tips of his toes into the deepest of the gloom and sinking down upon his heels drew his watch from his pocket. He drew his coat closely about it and for a fraction of a second flashed his torchlight on the dial. It was now five minutes past well. It is the time. He breathed as he crept back to his place. Listen now. A minute passed and another. Froescher found himself shivering as a man shivers at a photographer's when he is told by the operator to keep still. He had a notion that he was going to fall. Then a distant noise caught his ear and at once his nerves grew steady. It was the throb of a motorcycle and it grew louder and louder. He felt Hano stiffen at his side. Hano had been right then. The conviction deepened in his mind when all that had been darkness and confusion to him Hano from the first had seen clearly. But what had he seen? Froescher was still unable to answer that question and whilst he fumbled among conjectures a vast relief swept over him for the noise of the cycle had ceased altogether. It had roared through some contiguous street and gone upon its way into the open country. Not the faintest pulsation of its engine was any longer audible. That late fairing traveller had taken Dijon in his stride. In a revulsion of relief he pictured him devouring the road the glow of his lamp putting the stars to shame the miles leaping away behind him and suddenly the pleasant picture was struck from before his vision and his heart fluttered up into his throat. For the leaf of the great coach door was swung wider and closed again and the motorcycle with its sidecar was within the courtyard. The rider had slipped out his clutch and stopped his engine more than a hundred yards away in the other street. His own impetus had been enough and more than enough to swing him round the corner along the road and into the courtyard. The man who had closed the door moved to his side as he dismounted. Between them they lifted something from the sidecar and laid it on the ground. The watchman held open the door again. The cyclist wheeled out his machine. The door was closed. A key turned in the lock. Not a word had been spoken. Not an unnecessary movement made. It had all happened within the space of a few seconds. The man waited by the gate and in a little while from some other street the cyclist engine was heard once more to throb. His work was done. Jim Frobischer wondered that Hano should let him go. But Hano had eyes for no one but the man who was left behind and the big package upon the ground under the blank side wall. The man moved to it, stooped, raised it with an appearance of effort, then stood upright holding it in his arms. It was something shapeless and long and heavy. So much the watchers in the gallery could see but no more. The man in the courtyard moved towards the door without a sound and Hano drew his companions back from the window of the broken shutter. Quick as they were, they were only just in time to escape from that revealing twilight. Already the intruder with his burden stood within the gallery. The front door was unlatched. That was clear. It had needed but a touch to open it. The intruder moved without a sound to the double door of which Hano had opened one leaf. He stood in front of it, pushed it with his foot and both the leaves swung inwards. He disappeared into the room but the faint misty light had fallen upon him for a second and though none could imagine who he was they all three saw that what he carried was a heavy sack. Now at all events Hano would move, thought Frobischer, but he did not. They all heard the man now but not his footsteps. It was just the brushing of his clothes against furniture. Then came a soft almost inaudible sound as though he had laid his burden down upon the deep cushioned couch. Then he himself reappeared in the doorway, his arms empty, his hat pressed down upon his forehead and a dim whiteness where his face should be. But dark as it was they saw the glitter of his eyes. It will be now, Frobischer said to himself, expecting that Hano would leap from the gloom and bear the intruder to the ground. But this man too Hano let go. He closed the doors again, drawing the two leaves together and stole from the gallery. No one heard the outer door close but with a startling loudness some metal thing rang upon stone and within the house. Even Jim Frobischer understood that the outer door had been locked and the key dropped through the letter slot. The three men crept back to their window. They saw the intruder cross the courtyard, open one leaf of the coach door, peer this way and that and go. Again a key tinkled upon stones. The key of the great door had been pushed or kicked underneath it back into the courtyard. The clocks suddenly chimed the quarter. To Frobischer's amazement it was a quarter past twelve. Between the moment when the cyclist rode his car in at the doors and now just five minutes had elapsed. And again but for the three men the house was empty or was it empty? For Hano had slipped across to the door of the room and opened it and a slight sound broke out of that black room as of some living thing which moved uneasily. At Jim Frobischer's elbow Hano breathed a sigh of relief. Something it seemed had happened for which he had hardly dared to hope. Some great dread he knew with certainty had not been fulfilled. On the heels of that sigh a sharp loud click rang out. The release of a spring the withdrawal of a bolt. Hano drew the door swiftly to and the three men fell back. Someone had somehow entered that room. Someone was moving quietly about it. From the corner of the corridor in which they had taken refuge the three men saw the leaves of the door swing very slowly in upon their hinges. Someone appeared upon the threshold and stood motionless listening and after a few seconds had passed across the gallery to the window. It was a girl. So much they could determine from the contours of her head and the slim neck. To the surprise of those three a second shadow flitted to her side. Both of them peered from the window into the courtyard. There was nothing to tell them there whether the midnight visitors had come and gone or not yet come at all. One of them whispered the key and the other the shorter one crept into the hall and returned with the key which had been dropped through the letter slot in her hand. The taller of the two laughed and the sound of it so clear so joyous like the thrill of a bird it was impossible for Jim Frobischer even for a second to mistake. The second girl standing at the window of this dark and secret house with the key in her hand to tell her that all that had been plotted had been done was Betty Harlow. Jim Frobischer had never imagined a sound so sinister so alarming as that clear joyous laughter lilting through this silent gallery. It startled him. It set his whole faith in the world shattering. There must be some good explanation he argued but his heart was sinking amidst terrors of what dreadful event was that laughter to be the prelude. The two figures at the window flitted back across the gallery. It seemed that there was no further reason for precautions. Shut the door Francine said Betty in her ordinary voice and when that was done within the room the lights went on. But time and disuse had warped the doors. They did not quite close and between them a golden strip of light showed like a wand. Let us see now. cried Betty. Let us see. And again she laughed and under the cover of her laughter the three men crept forward and looked in. Maro upon his knees Frobischer stooping above him and no at his full height behind them all. End of Chapter 21 Chapter 22 of the House of the Arrow by A. E. W. Mason this Liberbox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 22 The Corona Machine The detective's hand fell softly upon Frobischer's shoulder warning him to silence and this warning was needed. The lusters of the big glass chandelier were so many flashing jewels. The mirrors of the gendals multiplied their candle lamps. The small gay room was ablaze and in the glare Betty stood and laughed. Her white shoulders rose from a slim evening frock of black velvet from her carefully dressed copper hair to her black satin shoes. She was as trim as if she had just been unpacked from a band box and she was laughing wholeheartedly at a closed sack on the deban a sack which jerked and flapped grotesquely like a fish on a beach. Someone was imprisoned within that sack. Jim Frobischer could not doubt who that someone was and it seemed to him that no sound more soulless and cruel had ever been heard in the world than Betty's merriment. She threw her head back. Jim could see her slender white throat working, her shoulders flashing and shaking. She clapped her hands with a horrible glee. Something died within Frobischer's breast as he heard it. Was it in his heart he wondered? It was, however, to be the last time that Betty Harlow laughed. You can get her out Francine, she said, and whilst Francine with a pair of scissors cut the end of the sack loose, she sat down with her back to it at the writing table and unlocked a drawer. The sack was cut away and thrown upon the floor and now on the deban an upcott lay in her gleaming dancing dress, her hands bound behind her back and her ankles tied cruelly together. Her hair was dishevelled, her face flushed, and she had the look of one quite dazed. She drew in deep breaths of air with her bosom laboring but she was unaware for the moment of her predicament or surroundings and her eyes rested upon Francine and traveled from her to Betty's back without a gleam of recognition. She wrenched a little at her wrists but even that movement was instinctive and then she closed her eyes and lay still. So still that, but for her breathing the watchers at the door would hardly have believed that she still lived. Betty, meanwhile, lifted from the open drawer first a small bottle have filled with a pale yellow liquid and next a small case of Morocco leather. From the case she took a hyperdermic syringe and its needle and screwed the two parts together. Is she ready? Betty asked as she removed the stopper from the bottle. Quite, mademoiselle answered Francine. She began with a giggle but she looked at the prisoner as she spoke and she ended with a startled gasp. For Anne was looking straight at her with the strangest disconcerting stare. It was impossible to say whether she knew Francine or knowing her would not admit her knowledge but her gaze never faltered. It was actually terrifying by its thick city and in a sharp hysterical voice Francine suddenly cried out turn your eyes away from me will you? And she added with a shipper it's horrible mademoiselle it's like a dead person watching you as you move about the room. Betty turned curiously towards the divan and Anne's eyes wandered off to her. It seemed as though it needed just that interchange of glances to awaken her. For as Betty resumed her work of filling the hypodermic syringe from the bottle a look of perplexity crept into Anne up God's face. She tried to sit up and finding that she could not tour at the cords which bound her wrists. Her feet kicked upon the divan. A moan of pain broke from her lips and with that consciousness returned to her. Betty she whispered and Betty turned with the needle ready in her hand. She did not speak but her face spoke for her. Her upper lip was drawn back a little from her teeth and there was a look in her great eyes which appalled Jim Frobischer outside the door. Once before he had seen just that look when Betty was lying on Mrs. Harlow's bed for Hano's experiment and he had lingered in the treasure room with Anne up God. It had been inscrutable to him then but it was as plain as print now. It meant murder and so Anne up God understood it. Helpless as she was she shrank back upon the divan. In a panic she spoke with faltering lips and her eyes fixed upon Betty with a dreadful fascination. Betty you had me taken and brought here. You sent me to Adam Leves on purpose. Oh the letter then the anonymous letter and a new light broke in upon Anne's mind a new terror shook her. You wrote it Betty you you the scourge. She sank back and again struggled vainly with her bonds. Betty rose from her chair and crossed the room towards her the needle shining bright in her hand. Her hapless prisoner saw it. What's that? She cried and she screamed aloud. The extremity of her horror led to her an unnatural strength. Somehow she dragged herself up and got her feet to the ground. Somehow she stood upright swaying as she stood. You were going to she began and broke off. Oh no you couldn't you couldn't. Betty put out a hand and laid it on Anne's shoulder and held her so for a moment savoring her vengeance. Whose face was it bending so close down over yours in the darkness? She asked in a soft and dreadful voice. Whose face Anne gasped? She shook her swaying prisoner with a gentleness as dreadful as her quiet voice. You talked too much. Your tongue's dangerous Anne. You are too curious Anne. What were you doing in the treasure room yesterday evening with your watch in your hand? Can't you answer you pretty fool? Then Betty's voice changed. It remained low and quiet but hatred crept into it. A deep, whole-hearted hatred. You have been interfering with me too, haven't you Anne? Oh, we both understand very well. Anne Heno's hand tightened upon Frobischer's shoulder. Here was the real key and explanation of Betty's hatred. Anne Upcott knew too much and was getting to know more might at any moment light upon the whole truth. Yes, Anne Upcott's disappearance would look like a panic-stricken flight. Would have the effect of a confession, no doubt. But above all these considerations at Paramount and Betty Harlow's mind was the resolve at once to punish and rid herself of a rival. All this week you have been thrusting yourself in my way, she said. And here's your reward for it, Anne. Yes, I had you bound hand and foot and brought here. The water lily. She looked her victim over as she stood in her delicate, bright frock. Her white silk stockings and satin slippers swaying in terror. Fifteen minutes, Anne. That fool of a detective was right. Fifteen minutes, that's all the time the arrow poison takes. Anne's eyes opened wide. The blood rushed into her white face and ebbed, leaving it whiter than it was before. Arrow poison, she cried. Betty, it was you then. Oh! She would have fallen forward, but Betty Harlow pushed her shoulder gently and she fell back upon the deban. That Betty had been guilty of that last infamy, the murder of her benefactress, not until this moment had Anne up caught for one moment suspected. It was clear to her, too, that there was not the slightest hope for her. She burst suddenly into a storm of tears. Betty Harlow sat down on the deban opposite her and watched her closely and curiously with a devilish enjoyment. The sound of the girl sobbing was music in her ears. She would not let it flag. You shall lie here in the dark all night, Anne, and alone. She said in a low voice, bending over her. Tomorrow Espinosa will put you under one of the stone flags in the kitchen. But tonight you shall lie just as you are. Come. She bent over Anne up caught, gathering the flesh of her arm with one hand and advancing the needle with the other and a piercing scream burst from Francine Royal. Look! she cried and she pointed to the door. It was open and Anneau stood upon the threshold. Betty looked up at the cry and the blood receded from her face. She sat like an image of wax staring at the open doorway and a moment afterwards with a gesture swift as lightning she drove the needle into the flesh of her own arm and emptied it. Frobuchar with a cry of horror started forward to prevent her. But Anneau roughly thrust him back. Warned you, monsieur, not to interfere. He said with a savage note in his voice, which Jim had not heard before. And Betty Harlow dropped the needle onto the couch whence it ruled to the floor. She sprang up now to her full height. Her heels together, her arms stretched from her sides. Fifteen minutes, monsieur Anneau, she cried with bravado. I am safe from you. Anneau laughed and wagged his forefinger contemptuously in her face. Coloured water, mademoiselle, doesn't kill. Betty swayed upon her feet and steadied herself. Bluff, monsieur Anneau, she said. We shall see. The confidence of his tone convinced her. She flashed across the room to her writing table. Swift as she was, Anneau met her there. Oh no, he cried. That's quite a different thing. He seized her wrist. Maraud, he called, with a nod towards Francine. And you, monsieur Frobisher, will you release that young lady, if you please? Maraud dragged Francine Royade from the room and locked her safely away. Jim seized upon the big scissors and cut the cords about Anne's wrist and ankles and unwound them. He was aware that Anneau had flung the chair from the writing table into an open space. That Betty was struggling and then was still that Anneau had forced her into the chair and snatched up one of the cords which Frobisher had dropped upon the floor. When he had finished his work, he saw that Betty was sitting with her hands and handcuffs and her ankles tied to one of the legs of the chair. And Anneau was staunching with his handkerchief a wound in his hand which bled. Betty had bitten him like a wild animal caught in a trap. Yes, you warned me, mademoiselle. The first morning I met you, Anneau said with his savage irony, that you didn't wear a wristwatch because you hated things on your wrist. My apologies, I had forgotten. He went back to the writing table and thrust his hand into the drawer. He drew out a small cardboard box and removed the lid. Five, he said. Yes, five. He carried the box across the room to Frobisher who was standing against the wall with a face like death. Look, there were five white tablets in the box. We know where the sixth is, or rather we know where it was, for I had it analyzed today, cyanide of potassium, my friend. Crunch one of them between your teeth and fifteen minutes, not a bit of it, a fraction of a second. That's all. Frobisher leaned forward and whispered in Anneau's ear, leave them within her reach. His first instinctive thought had been to hinder Betty from destroying herself. Now he prayed that she might, and with so desperate a longing that a deep pity softened Anneau's eyes. I must not, monsieur, he said gently. He turned to Marot. There is a cab waiting at the corner of the Maison-Granelle, and Marot went in search of it. Anneau went over to Anne Upcott, who was sitting upon the devan, her head about, her body shivering. Every now and then, she handled and eased one of her tortured wrists. Madame Azeu, he said standing in front of her, I owe you an explanation and an apology. I never from the beginning, no, not for one moment, believed that you were guilty of the murder of Madame Arlo. I was sure that you had never touched the necklace of pink pearls. Oh, at once I was sure, long before I found it, I believed every word of the story you told us in the garden. But none of this dared I show you, for only by pretending that I was convinced of your guilt, could I protect you during this last week in the Maison-Granelle. Thank you, monsieur, she replied, with a one effort at a smile. But for tonight, I owe you an apology, he continued. I make it with shame that you were to be brought back here to the tender mercies of Madame Azeu Bedi. I hadn't a doubt, and I was here to make sure you should be spared them. But I have never in my life had a more difficult case to deal with, so clear a conviction in my own mind, so little proof to put before a court. I had to have the evidence which I was certain to find in this room tonight. But I ask you to believe me that if I had imagined for a moment the cruelty with which you were to be handled, I should have sacrificed this evidence. I beg you to forgive me. An up-god held out her hand. Monsieur Hanno, she replied simply, but for you I should not now be alive. I should be lying here in the dark and alone as it was promised to me, waiting for Espenosa and his fade. Her voice broke, and she shuddered violently so that the demand shook on which she sat. You must forget these miseries, he said gently. You have youth, as I told you once before, a little time, and the return of Nicholas Marot interrupted them. And with Marot came a couple of jantons, and a jure d'eau, the commissaire. You have Francine Rouard? Hanno asked. You can hear her, Marot returned dryly. In the corridor a commotion arose, the scuffling of feet, and a woman's voice screaming abuse. It died away. Mademoiselle here will not give you so much trouble, said Hanno. Betty was sitting huddled in her chair, her face averted and sullen, her lips muttering in audible words. She had not once looked at Jim Frobisher since he had entered the room, nor did she now. Marot stooped and untied her ankles, and a big janton raised her up. But her knees failed beneath her. She could not stand. Her strength and her spirit had left her. The janton picked her up as if she had been a child. And as he moved to the door, Jim Frobisher planted himself in front of him. Stop! he cried, and his voice was strong and resonant. Missure, Hanno, you have said just now that you believed every word of Mademoiselle's story. It is true. You believed then that Madame Harlow was murdered at half past ten on the night of the twenty-seventh of April, and at half past ten Mademoiselle here was at Monsieur de Puyat's ball. You will set her free. Hanno did not argue the point. And what of tonight, he asked? Stand aside, if you please. Jim held his ground for a moment or two, and then drew aside. He stood with his eyes closed in such a look of misery upon his face as Betty was carried out that Hanno attempted some clumsy word of condolence. This has been a bitter experience for you, Monsieur Frobisher, he began. Would that you had taken me into your competence at the first, Jim cried voluble. Would you have believed me if I had, asked Hanno, and Jim was silent. As it was, Monsieur Frobisher, I took a grave risk which I know now I had not the right to take, and I told you more than you think. He turned away towards Marot, locked the courtyard doors and the door of the house after they have gone and bring the keys here to me. Giroudot had made a bundle of the solution, the hypodermic syringe, the tablets of cyanide, and the pieces of cord. There is something here of importance, Hanno observed, and stooping at the writing table, he picked up a square, flat-topped black case. You will recognize this, he remarked to Jim as he handed it to Giroudot. It was the case of a corona typewriting machine, and from its weight, the machine itself was clearly within the case. Yes, Hanno explained, as the door closed upon the commissaire, this pretty room is the factory where all those abominable letters were prepared. Here the information was filed away for use. Here the letters were typed. From here they were issued. Blackmailing letters, cried Jim, letters demanding money. Some of them, answered Hanno. But Betty Harlow had money, all that she needed, and more as she chose to ask for it. All that she needed? No, answered Hanno with a shake of the head. The blackmailer never has enough money, for no one is so blackmailed. A sudden and irrational fury seized upon Frobisher. They had agreed, he and Hanno, that there was a gang involved in all these crimes. It might be that Betty was of them. Yes, even led them, but were they all to go scot-free? There are others, he explained. The man who rode this motorcycle, young as Spinoza, replied Hanno, did you notice his accent when you stopped at the fork of the roads in the Bountesson? He did not mount his cycle again. No. And the man who carried in the sack, Maurice Thévenet, said Hanno, that promising young novice, he is now at the depot. He will never get that good word from me, which was to unlock Paris for him. And Spinoza himself, who was to come here tomorrow, he stopped abruptly with his eyes on end, and who murdered Jean Gredel, Hanno went on. A fool, that fellow, why use the Catalan's knife in the Catalan's way? Hanno looked at his watch. It is over. No doubt, as Spinoza is under lock and key by now, and there are others misure of whom you have never heard. The net has been cast wide tonight. Have no fear of that. Monroe returned with the keys and handed them to Hanno. Hanno put them into a pocket and went over to Anne Upcott. Madame Azale, I shall not trouble you with any explanations tonight. Tomorrow you will tell me why you went to Madame Lebespaul. It was given out that you meant to run away. That, of course, was not true. You shall give me the real reason tomorrow and an account of what happened to you there. Anne shivered at the memories of that night, but she answered quietly, yes, I will tell you everything. Good, then we can go, said Hanno cheerfully. Go, Anne Upcott asked in wonderment, but you have had us all walked in. Hanno laughed. He had a little surprise to spring on the girl, and he loved surprises so long as they were of his own contriving. Monsieur Frobisher, I think, must have guessed the truth. This house, Madame Azale, the Hotel de Brevizzard, is very close as the crow flies to the Maison Grinnell. There is one row of houses, the houses of the street of Charles Robert, between. It was built by Etienne Bouchard de Grinnell, president of the parliament, during the reign of Louis XV, a very dignified and important figure. And he built the Madame Azale, this is the point, at the same time that he built the Maison Grinnell. Having built it, he installed in it a joyous lady of the province from which it takes its name, Madame de Brevizzard. There was no scandal, for the president never came visiting Madame de Brevizzard, and for the best of reasons, between this house and the Maison Grinnell, he had constructed a secret passage in the age of secret passages. Frobisher was startled, and no had given credit to him for an astuteness which he did not possess. He had been occupied, heart and brain, by the events of the evening, so rapidly had they followed one upon the other, so little time had they allowed for speculations. How in the world did you discover this, yes? You shall know in due time. For the moment, let us content ourselves with the facts, and oh continued, after the death of Etienne de Grinnell, at some period or other, the secret of this passage was lost. It is clear too, I think, that it fell into disrepair and became blocked. At all events, at the end of the 18th century, the Hotel de Brevizzard passed into other hands than those of the owner of the Maison Grinnell. Simon Harlow, however, discovered the secret. He bought back the Hotel de Brevizzard, restored the passage, and put it to the same use as old Etienne de Grinnell had done. For here Madame Rabiat came to live during the years before the death of her husband, set her free to marry Simon. There, my little lecture is over. Let us go. He bowed low to Anne, like a lecturer to his audience, and unlatched the double doors of the Big Bull cabinet in the recess of the wall. A cry of surprise broke from Anne, who had risen unsteadily to her feet. The cabinet was quite empty. There was not so much as a shelf, and all could see that the floor of it was tilted up against one end, and that a flight of steps ran downwards in the thickness of the wall. Come, said Hanot, producing his electric torch, will you take this, M. Frobisher, and go first with Mme Azel. I will turn out the lights and follow. But Anne, with a little frown upon her forehead, drew sharply back. She put a hand to Hanot's sleeve and steadied herself by it. I will come with you, she said. I am not very steady on my legs. She laughed her action off, but both men understood it. M. Frobisher had thought her guilty, guilty of theft and murder. She shrank from him to the man who had no doubt that she was innocent, and even that was not all. She was wounded by Jim's distrust more deeply than anyone else could have wounded her. Frobisher inclined his head in acknowledgment, and pressing the button of the torch descended five or six of the narrow steps. Marot followed him. You are ready, Mme Azel? So, said Hanot, he put an arm about her to steady her and pressed up a switch by the open doors of the cabinet. The room was plunged in darkness, guided by the beam of light. They followed Frobisher onto the steps. Hanot closed the doors of the cabinet and fastened them together with the bolts. Forward he cried, and you, Mme Azel, be careful of your heels on these stone steps. When his head was just below the level of the first step, he called upon Frobisher to halt and raise the torch. Then he slid the floorboard of the cabinet back into its place. Beneath this a trap door hung downwards. Hanot raced it and bolted it in place. We can go on. Ten more steps brought them to a tiny vaulted hall. From that a passage, bricked and paved, led into the darkness. Frobisher led the way along the passage until the foot of another flight of steps was reached. Where do these steps lead, my friend? Hanot asked of Frobisher, his voice sounding with a strange hollowness in that tunnel. You shall tell me. Gem, with memories of that night when he and Anne and Betty had sat in the dark of the perfumed garden, and Anne's eyes had searched this way and that amidst the gloom of the sycamores, answered promptly into the garden of the Maison Cannelle. Hanot chuckled, and you, Mme Azel, what do you say? Anne's face clouded over. I know now, she said gravely. Then she shivered and drew her cloak slowly about her shoulders. Let us go up and see. Hanot took the lead. He lowered a trap door at the top of the steps, touched a spring, and slid to back a panel. Wait, said he, and he sprang out and turned on a light. Anne upcaught, Gem Frobisher and Mme Rowe climbed out of Simon Harlow's sedent chair into the treasure room. End of Chapter 22 Chapter 23 of The House of the Arrow by A. E. W. Maison, this LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 23 The Truth About the Clock To the amazement of them all, Mme Rowe began to laugh. Up till now he had been alert, confident and without expression. Stolidity had been the mark of him. And now he laughed in great gusts, holding his sides, and then ringing his hands, as though the humor of things was altogether unbearable. Once or twice he tried to speak, but laughter leapt upon the words and drowned them. What in the world is a matter with you, Nicholas? Anne O. asked. But I beg your pardon. Mme Rowe stammered, and again Mme Rowe seized and mastered him. At last two intelligible words were, we jure do, he cried, settling an imaginary pair of glasses on the bridge of his nose, and went off into a fit. Gradually the reason of his paroxysms was explained in broken phrases, we jure do, we fix the seals upon the doors, and all the time there is a way in and out under our nose. Those rooms must not be disturbed. No, the great Mme Shura, no, is coming from Paris to look at them. Though we seal them tight, we jure do, my God, but we jure do, look the fool, so careful and pompous with our linen bands. We jure do, shall make the laughter at the yes-i's court. Yes, yes, yes, I think we jure do, shall hand in our resignation before the trial is over. Perhaps Mme Rowe's humor was a little too professional for his audience. Perhaps, too, the circumstances of that night had dulled their appreciation. Certainly Mme Rowe had all the laughter to himself. Jim Frobisher was driven to the little Louis Kahn's clock upon the marketry cabinet. He never could, for a moment, forget it. So much hung for Betty Harlow upon its existence. Whatever wild word she might have used tonight, there was the incontrovertible testimony of the clock to prove that she had had no hand whatever in the murder of Mrs. Harlow. He drew his own watch from his pocket and compared it with the clock. It is exact to the minute, he declared, with a little accent of triumph, it is now twenty-three minutes past one, and suddenly Hanoe was at his side with a curious air of alertness. Is it so? Yes. And he, too, made sure, by a comparison with his own watch that Frobisher's statement was correct. Yes, twenty-three minutes past one. That is very fortunate. He called an up-caught Mme Rowe to him, and they all now stood grouped about the cabinet. The key to the mystery about this clock, he remarked, is to be found in the words which Madame Iselle Anne used when the seals were removed from the doors, and she saw this clock again in the light of day. She was perplexed. Isn't that so, Madame Iselle? Yes, and returned. It seemed to me, it seems to me still, that the clock was somehow placed higher than it actually is. Exactly. Let us put it to the test. He looked at the clock and saw that the hands now reached twenty-six minutes past one. I will ask you all to go out of this room and wait in the hall in the dark. For it was in the dark, you will remember that Madame Iselle descended the stairs. I shall turn the lights out here and call you in. When I do, Madame Iselle will switch the lights on and off swiftly, just as she did on the night of the 27th of April. Then I think all will be clear to you. He crossed to the door leading into the hall and found it locked with the key upon the inside. Of course, he said, when the passage is used to the hotel de Brabizarre, this door would be locked. He turned the key and drew the door towards him. The hall gaped before them, black and silent. Hanot stood aside. If you please. Moreau and Ferobecher went out. Anne Upcott hesitated and cast a look of appeal towards Hanot. Her perplexities were to be set at rest. She did not doubt that. This man had saved her from death when it seemed that nothing could save her. Her trust in him was absolute. But her perplexities were unimportant. Some stroke was to be delivered upon Betty Harlow, from which there could be no recovery. Anne Upcott was not a good hater of Betty's stamp. She shrank from the thought that it was to be her hand that would deliver that stroke. Garage, Madame Iselle. Hanot exhorted her with a friendly smile and Anne joined the others in the dark hall. Hanot closed the door upon them and returned to the clock. It was twenty-eight minutes past one. I have two minutes, he said to himself, that will just do if I am quick. Outside the three witnesses waited in the darkness. One of the three shivered suddenly so that her teeth rattled in her mouth. Anne, Jim Ferobecher, whispered and he put his hand within her arm. Anne Upcott had come to the end of her strength. She clung to his hand spasmodically. Jim, she answered under her butt, oh, but you were cruel to me. Hanot's voice called to them from within the room. Come. Anne stepped forward, felt for, and found the handle. She threw open the door with a nervous violence. The treasure room was pitch dark like the hall. Anne stepped through the doorway and her fingers reached for the switch. Now she warned them in a voice which shook. Suddenly the treasure room blazed with light as suddenly it was black again and in the darkness rose a clamour of voices. Half past ten I saw the hour, cried Jim, and again the clock was higher, exclaimed Anne. That is true, Merobe agreed. Hanot's voice from the far corner of the room joined in. Is that exactly what you saw Madam Iselle on the night of the 27th? Exactly, Mishur. Then turn on the lights again and know the truth. The injunction was uttered and toned so grave that it sounded like a knell. For a second or two Anne's fingers refused their service. Once more the conviction forced itself into her mind. Some irretrievable calamity waited upon the movement of her hand. Garage, mademoiselle. Again the light shone and this time they remained burning. The three witnesses advanced into the room and as they looked again from close at hand and with a longer gaze a cry of surprise broke from all of them. There was no clock upon the marketry cabinet at all. But high above it on the long mirror before which it stood there was the reflection of a clock, its white face so clear and bright that even now it was difficult to disbelieve that this was the clock itself. And the position of the hands gave the hour as precisely half past ten. Now turn about and see said Anne-o. The clock itself stood upon the shelf of the Adam mantelpiece and there staring at them the true hour was marked. It was exactly half past one. The long minute hand appointing to six the shorter hour hand on the right hand side of the figure twelve. Half way between the one and the two. With a simultaneous movement they all turned again to the mirror and the mystery was explained. The shorter half hour hand seen in the mirror was on the left hand side of the figure twelve and just where it would have been if the hour had been half past ten and the clock actually where its reflection was. The figures on the dial were reversed and difficult at first glance to read. You see Anne-o explained it is the law of nature to save itself from effort even in the smallest things. We live with clocks and watches. They are as customary as our daily bread. And with the instinct to save ourselves from effort we take our time from the position of the hands. We take the actual figures of the hours for granted. Mademoiselle comes out of the dark. In the one swift flash of light she sees the hands upon the clock's face. Half past ten. She herself you will remember M. Frobischer was surprised that the hour was so early. She was cold as though she had slept long in her arm chair. She had the impression that she had slept long and Mademoiselle was right. For the time was half past one and Betty Harlow had been twenty minutes home from M. Cuiac's ball. Anne-o ended with a note of triumph in its voice which exasperated Frobischer. Aren't you going a little too fast? He asked. When the seals were removed and we entered this room for the first time the clock was not upon the mantel shelf but upon the marketry cabinet. Anne-o nodded. Mademoiselle Upcott told us her story before luncheon. We entered this room after luncheon. During the luncheon hours the position of the clock was changed. He pointed to this at hand chair. You know now with what ease that could be done. Could, could, Frobischer repeated impatiently. It doesn't follow that it was done. That is true, Anne-o replied. So I will answer now one of the questions in your memorandum. What was it that I saw from the top of the terrace tower? I saw the smoke rising from this chimney into the air. Oh, miss sure! I had paid attention to this house, its windows and its doors and its chimney stacks. And there at midday in all the warmth of late May the smoke was rising from the chimney of the sealed room. There was an entrance then of which we knew nothing. And somebody had just made use of it. Who? Ask yourself that. Who went straight out from the Maison-Colonel the moment I had gone and went alone? That clock had to be changed. Apparently some letters also had to be burnt. Jim hardly heard the last sentence. The clock still occupied his thoughts. His great argument had been riddled. His one dream of establishing Betty's innocence in despite of every presumption in fact, which could be brought against her, had been dispelled. He dropped on to a chair. You understood it all so quickly, he said, with bitterness. Oh, I was not quick. Heno answered, ascribed to me no gifts out of the ordinary run, miss sure. I am trained. That is all. I have been my twenty minutes in the bullring. Listen how it came about. He looked at Frouwisher with a comical smile. It is a pity our eager young friend, Mora Stevenet, is not here to profit by the lesson. First of all, then, I knew that Mademoiselle Betty was here doing something of great importance. It may be only burning those letters in the hearth. It may be more. I must wait and see. Good. There, standing before the mirror, Mademoiselle Anne makes her little remark that the clock seemed higher. Do I understand yet? No. No. But I am interested. Then I notice a curious thing, a beautiful specimen of Benavanuto Gelini's work set up high and flat on that mantle shelf, where no one can see it. So I take it down and I carry it to the window and I admire it very much, and I carry it back to the mantle shelf. And then I notice four little marks upon the wood, which had been concealed by the flat case of the jewel. And those four little marks are just the marks which the feet of that very pretty Louis Keynes clock might have made had it stood regularly there in its natural place. Yes, at the top of that marketry cabinet, so much lower than the mantle shelf is, to the natural place for the Gelini jewel. Everyone can see it there. So I say to myself, my good Hano, this young lady, has been rearranging her ornaments. But do I guess why? No, my friend. I told you once and I tell you again very humbly that we are the servants of Chance. Chance is a good mistress if her servants do not go to sleep, and she treated me well that afternoon. See, I'm standing in the hall in great trouble about this case, for nothing leads me anywhere. There is a big old-fashioned barometer like a frying pan on the wall behind me and a mirror on the opposite wall in front of me. I raise my eyes from the floor, and by chance I see in the mirror the barometer behind me. By chance my attention is arrested, for I see that the indicator in the barometer points to stormy weather, which is ridiculous. I turn me about so. It is to find weather that the indicator points, and in a flash I see. I look at the position of the hand without looking at the letters. If I look the barometer in the face, the hand points to the fair weather. If I turn my back and look into the mirror, the hand points to the stormy weather. Now, indeed, I have it. I run into the treasure room. I lock the door, for I do not wish to be caught. I do not move the clock. No, no, for nothing in the world will I move that clock. But I take out my watch. I face the mirror. I hold my watch, facing the mirror. I open the glass, and I move the hands until, in the mirror, they seem to mark half past ten. Then I look at my watch itself. It is half past one. So now I know. Do I want more proof? Miss sure, I get it. For as I unlock the door and open it again, there is Madame Iselle Betty face to face with me. That young girl. Even though already I suspect her, I get a shock, I can tell you. The good God knows that I am hardened enough against surprises. But for a moment the mask had slipped from her face. I felt a trickle of ice down my spine. For out of her beautiful great eyes, murder looked. He stood, held, and a spell by the memory of that fierce look. He grunted, and he shook himself like a great dog coming out of the water. But you are talking too much, Miss sure, for sure. He cried in a different voice, and you are keeping Madame Iselle from her bed where she should have been an hour ago. Come. He drove his companions out into the hall, turned on the lights, locked the door of the treasure room, and pocketed the key. Madame Iselle, we will leave these lights burning, he said, gently to Anne. And Marot will keep watch in the house. You have nothing to fear. He will not be far from your door. Good night. Anne gave him her hand with a wands smile. I shall thank you tomorrow, she said. Anne, she mounted the stairs slowly, her feet dragging, her body swaying with her fatigue. And oh, watched her go. And then he turned to Frobisher with a whimsical smile. What a pity, he said. You, gee, no. After all, perhaps, and he broke off very idly, Frobisher was growing red and beginning to look proper. And the last thing which an old wish to do was to offend him in this particular. I make my apologies, he said. I am impertinent and a gossip. If I err, it is because I wish you very well. You understand that? Good. Then a further proof. Tomorrow, Madame Iselle will tell us what happened to her tonight, how she came to go to the house of Madame Lavet. Everything. I wish you to be present. You shall know everything. I shall tell you myself, step by step, how my conclusions were reached. All your questions shall be answered. I will give you every help, every opportunity. I shall see to it that you are not even called as a witness of what you have seen tonight. And when it is all over, Mishir, you will see with me that whatever there may be of pain and distress, the law must take its course. It was a new Hano, whom Frobisher was now contemplating. The tricks, the gasconades, the buffooneries had gone. He did not even triumph. A dignity shown out of the man like a strong light, and with it he was gentle and considerate. Good night, Mishir, he said, and bowed, and Jim, on an impulse, thrust out his hand. Good night, he returned. Hano took it with a smile of recognition, and went away. Jim Frobisher locked the front door, and, with a sense of desolation, turned back to the hall. He heard the big iron gate swing too. They had been left open, of course, he recognized in the usual way when one of the household was going to be late. Yes, everything had been planned with the care of a commander planning a battle. Here, in this house, the servants were all tucked up in their beds, but for Hano, Betty Harlow, might at this very moment, have been stealing up these stairs noiselessly to her own room, her dreadful work accomplished. The servants would have wait tomorrow to the knowledge that Anne Upcott had fled rather than face a trial. Sometime in the evening, Espinosa would have called, would have been received in the treasure room, would have found the spade waiting for him in the great stone vaulted kitchen of the Hotel de Brabizarre. Oh yes, all dangers had been foreseen, except Hano. Nay, even he, in a measure, had been foreseen, for a panic-stricken telegram had reached Frobisher and Haslett before Hano had started upon his work. I shall be on the stairs, Monsieur, below Madame Iselle's door, if you should want me, said Marot. Jim Frobisher roused himself from his reflections. Thank you, he answered, and he went up the stairs to his room. A lot of use to Betty that telegram had been, he reflected bitterly. Where was she tonight? He asked, and shut up his mind, against the question. He was to know that it was precisely that panic-stricken telegram and nothing else which had brought Betty Harlow's plans crashing about her ears.