The Crime of the French Cafe and Other Stories Part 25

She told what she had been doing on the previous day while Mrs. Stevens was at lunch. She had not been in the dining-room all the time, but had come in twice or thrice when summoned.

During the remainder of the time she had been in the kitchen. n.o.body had been with her there.

When Nick left the house, he rode half a mile back along the road, and then dismounted and sat down under a big tree. In a few minutes a farmer's wagon came along. A young man, who looked like a farm laborer, was riding beside the farmer. He did not ride far beyond the place where Nick was sitting. In a few minutes they sat together under the tree. The young farm laborer was Patsy.

"I got your message," said Patsy. "I took the chance to ride over from the station with that fellow, and I've asked him a few questions about the house where you want me to go on duty. It seems that there's no show to get in there on any pretext. I'll have to camp around on the outside like a gra.s.s-eater."

"That won't hurt you, Patsy, my lad," said Nick. "The weather's good.

You're to keep an eye on the whole household, but on Miss Stevens especially.

"This is the way the case looks at present: The girl is doing the work on this end in connection with some confederate concealed in Colonel Richmond's house.

"You understand the game. It's to work the spirit racket on Colonel Richmond until he buys the jewels from his daughter or her husband, and gives them to Miss Stevens.

"You must watch for the system by which she communicates with her confederate in Richmond's house. They work the mails, but there must be some quicker means to use in emergencies.

"Try to snare a letter, or get a sight of the other party.

"And be sure not to jump at conclusions, Patsy. I've told you how the case looks, but it may be any other way. I haven't begun to work down to it yet."

Nick mounted his horse, and Patsy strolled away in the direction of the Stevens house.

When the detective got back to Colonel Richmond's, it was well along in the afternoon.

He spent the remainder of his day in exploring the secret recesses of the old house. It was, indeed, a marvelous place, and Nick got a very high opinion of the ingenuity of the man who had designed its mysterious pa.s.sages.

He got little else, however. One or two discoveries he certainly made.

They were important as indicating that somebody had recently been in the secret pa.s.sages.

There was nothing to show what that person had been doing there, but the probability was, of course, that he had concealed himself in the old part of the house while preparing for his operations in Mrs. Pond's room, or while escaping from them.

These indications were very vague, and did not point to the princ.i.p.al in this affair--that mysterious thief who worked invisibly and by such strange methods.

After dinner Horace Richmond took Nick aside, for what he termed a discussion of "this ghostly rot."

"The very devil is in this business," said Horace. "The servants are getting scared out of their wits.

"They all sleep in the old part of the house, you know, and there isn't one of them who hasn't some story to tell of what goes on there in the night.

"Some of these yarns are the old-fas.h.i.+oned business about sighs and groans, and doors opening and shutting without anybody to open and shut them.

"But under it all I must say that there seems to be a basis of fact.

There's John Gilder, the coachman. You've seen him, Does he look like a man who can be scared easily?"

"I should say not," laughed Nick. "He looks to me like a Yankee horse-trader, who is too intimate with the devil and his ways to be at all alarmed about them."

"Just so. Well, John Gilder came to me to-day, and told me just as calmly as I'd tell you the time of day, that he'd seen the ghost of Miss Lavina Richmond. He saw her right in this room where we are now."

They had gone to the large dining-hall in the old mansion. Horace sometimes used it as a smoking-room, but otherwise it was seldom visited, except when the house was full of guests and all the old part was thrown open.

It was a long and high room, finished in dark wood, and decorated with moldering portraits in the worst possible style of art.

At one end was a gigantic fire-place, which was closed by a screen of boards.

"He told me," continued Horace, "that he was pa.s.sing through here late last night--near midnight, he said--and that he saw Lavina Richmond standing just about where you stand now.

"He came in by that door, behind me, and she was directly facing him.

He says that he didn't move or yell, or do anything, but just stood staring at her.

"She paid no attention whatever to him, but pa.s.sed across the room and went out by that other door, which opened as she approached and closed after her of itself.

"Then he ran for his room. He claims that he wasn't scared--only a bit nervous.

"You can believe that if you want to. I tell you that he was scared, so that he won't get over it in a year.

"If it wasn't for that I might think he was lying; but when a man like Gilder quietly invites the footman--whom he always hated--to take half of his bed for a few weeks, it's a sure thing that he's seen something out of the ordinary.

"And the footman, as I learn, was mighty glad to accept the invitation, for he's been having a few experiences of his own.

"Now, Mr. Carter, you and I believe that these things are done by some clever trickster. It may be that some bogus medium who used to get the colonel's good money away from him, wants more of it, and is taking this means of driving my uncle back to the fold of true believers.

"I'm beginning to believe that that may be the fact. But whatever it is, the case is almighty serious.

"Here's a nice old man, living happily, and gradually getting away from his delusion. Here's an agent of the devil trying to drive this old man back to his delusion, and make a lunatic of him, for that's what the doctor says will certainly happen.

"I say it's too bad, not to mention the jewels at all. Now, what are we going to do about it?"

"Catch the rascal," said Nick, promptly, "and catch him mighty quick."

"Well, I hope you'll succeed. I tell you, Mr. Carter, I feel toward Colonel Richmond all the affection that I would give my father, if he were alive, and I can't bear to see him driven out of his wits in this infernal way."

"Have no fear," said Nick; "we'll save him. This trickery with the servants may give us a chance to catch our man."

They returned to the parlor in the new part of the house.

Colonel Richmond was not there.

"Where is he?" asked Horace, anxiously, of Mrs. Pond.

"He has gone to his room. He said that the excitement of this affair had worn him out completely."

Horace looked relieved.

Nick said that he, too, would go to his room.

He went, but he did not remain long in it. He had a fancy for a quiet stroll around the house on the outside. It would be interesting to know whether anybody entered or left it during the night.

One of the secret pa.s.sages of the old house communicated with a sort of tunnel, which had its outer extremity in an old well about twenty yards away. This tunnel had caved in long before, but had been restored by Colonel Richmond, who wished to preserve all the old-time peculiarities of the place.