§2
"That, then, was the position," the Old Man in the Corner continued after a while, "and the date of Lady Angela Buckley's marriage to Captain Denver Shillington had been actually fixed when the public was startled one afternoon towards the end of the summer by the sensational news in all the evening papers: 'Mysterious disappearance of a millionaire.' This highly coloured description applied, as it turned out, to Captain Shillington, the fiancé of Lady Angela Buckley. It seems that during the course of that same morning a young lady, apparently in deep distress and suffering from a streaming cold in the head, had called at Scotland Yard. She gave her name and address as Marion Shillington, of Mexfield House, Somerset Street, Mayfair, and stated that she and her mother were in the greatest possible anxiety owing to the disappearance of her brother, Captain Denver Shillington. They had last seen him on the previous Friday evening at about nine o'clock when he left home in order to pick up his fiancée, Lady Angela Buckley, whom he was escorting that night to a reception in Grosvenor Square. He was wearing full evening dress and a soft hat. Miss Shillington couldn't say whether he had any money in his pockets. She thought that probably he was carrying a gold cigarette case, which Lady Angela had given him, but, as a matter of fact, he never wore any jewellery.
"No one in the house had heard him come in again that night, and his bed had not been slept in. Questioned by the police, Miss Shillington explained that neither she nor her mother felt any alarm at first because there had been some talk of Captain Shillington going away with his fiancée to stay with friends over the week-end, somewhere near Newmarket. It was only this morning, Wednesday, that Mrs. Shillington first began to worry when there was still no sign or letter from him. 'My brother is a very good son,' Miss Shillington continued, explaining to the police, 'and always very considerate to mother. It was so unlike him to leave us without news all this while and not let us know when to expect him home. So I rang up Lady Angela Buckley, who is his fiancée, to see if I could get news through her, as I could see mother was beginning to get anxious. Mr. Henry Buckley, Lady Angela's brother, answered the 'phone. I asked after his sister and he told me that she was staying on in the country a day or two longer. He himself had come back to town the previous night. I then asked him, quite casually, if he knew whether Denver—that's my brother—would be returning with Angela. And his answer to me was, "Denver? Why, I haven't seen him since Friday. And I can tell you that he is in for a row with Angela. She was furious with him that he never wrote once to her while she was away." I was so upset that I hung up the receiver and just sat there wondering what to do next. But Mr. Buckley rang up a moment or two later and asked quite cheerily if there was anything wrong. "Good old Square-toes!" he said, meaning my brother, whom he always used to chaff by calling him "Square-toes," "don't tell me he has gone off on the spree without letting you know. I say, that's too bad of him, though. But I shouldn't be anxious if I were you. Boys, you know, Miss Shillington, will be boys, and I like old Square-toes all the better for it."'
"Miss Shillington," the Old Man in the Corner went on, "was as usual suffering from a streaming cold, and between spluttering and crying, she had reduced two or three handkerchiefs to wet balls. At best she was no beauty, and with a red nose and streaming eyes she presented a most pitiable spectacle. 'I made Mr. Buckley assure me once more,' she said, 'that he had seen nothing of Denver since Friday. That night he and Lady Angela and Denver were at a reception in Grosvenor Square. They all left about the same time. Angela and Denver went, presumably, straight home; at any rate, he, Mr. Buckley, saw nothing more of them after they got into their car. He himself went to spend an hour or two at his club and came home about two a.m. The next morning, after breakfast, he drove his sister out to Tatchford, near Newmarket, where they spent the week-end with some friends. And that was all Mr. Buckley could say to me,' Miss Shillington concluded, vigorously blowing her nose: 'He came home last night from Tatchford, and was expecting Lady Angela in a couple of days. Denver had not been at Tatchford at all, and he had not once written to Angela all the while she was away.'
"Of course the police inspector to whom Miss Shillington related all these facts had a great many questions to put to her. For one thing he wanted to know whether she had been in communication with Lady Angela Buckley since this morning.
"'No,' the girl replied, 'I have not, and so far, I haven't said anything to mother. As soon as I felt strong enough I put on my things and came along here.'
"Then the inspector wanted to know if she knew of any friends or acquaintances of her brother's with whom he might have gone off for a week-end jaunt without saying anything about it, either at home or to his fiancée. He put the questions as delicately as he could, but the sister flared up with indignation. It seems that the Captain's conduct had always been irreproachable. He was a model son, a model brother, and deeply in love with Lady Angela. Miss Shillington also refused to believe that he could have been enticed to a place of ill-fame and robbed by one of the usual confidence tricksters.
"'My brother is exceptionally shrewd,' she declared, 'and a splendid business man. Though he is not yet thirty, he has built up an enormous fortune out in Australia, and administers his estates himself to the admiration of every one who knows him. He is not the sort of man who could be fooled in that way.'
"But beyond all this, and beyond giving a detailed description of her brother's appearance, the poor girl had very little to say, and the detective who was put in charge of the case could only assure her that enquiries would at once be instituted in every possible direction, and that the police would keep her informed of everything that was being done. Obviously, the person most likely to be able to throw some light upon the mystery was Lady Angela Buckley, but as you know, the advent of this charming lady upon the scene only helped to complicate matters. It appears that Henry Buckley, delighted at what he jocosely called, 'Old "Square-toes" falling from grace,' had rung up his sister in order to tell her the startling news over the telephone. Lady Angela being a very modern young woman, her brother thought that she might storm for a bit but in the end see the humorous side of the situation. But not at all! Lady Angela took the affair entirely au tragique. Over the telephone she only exclaimed, 'Great Lord!' but at one o'clock in the afternoon she arrived at the flat, having taken the first train up to town and not even waiting for her maid to pack her things. Mr. Henry Buckley was just going out to lunch. Without condescending to explain anything, his sister dragged him off then and there to Scotland Yard. 'Something has happened to Denver,' was all that she would say. 'Something dreadful, I am sure.' In vain did her brother protest that she would only be making a fool of herself by rushing to the police like this, that old Square-toes had only gone on the spree, and that, anyway, she ought to consult with the Shillingtons before doing anything silly; Lady Angela would not listen to reason. 'You don't know! You don't know!' she kept on reiterating with ever-increasing agitation. 'He has been murdered, I tell you. Murdered!'
"By the time that the pair arrived at Scotland Yard, Lady Angela was in a state bordering on hysterics, and her brother appeared both sulky and perplexed. They saw the same Inspector who had interviewed Miss Shillington, and certainly his amazement was no whit less than that of Mr. Henry Buckley when Lady Angela having mentioned the disappearance of Captain Denver Shillington, said abruptly, 'Yes, he has disappeared, and incidentally, he had my pearls in his pocket.' The Inspector made no immediate comment; men of his calling are used to those kinds of surprises, but Henry Buckley gave a gasp of horror.