“There may be several answers to that question. The right one may be difficult to name. When the revolver was fired the book was sent spinning from the murderer’s hand! Possibly Stewart himself replaced it on the shelf in the bookcase. Also—after the murder, the paramount question was to get away, remember!” He opened the book and examined it with some care. “There’s one thing, Daventry, if this book has been in constant use recently, and I’m convinced it has—there shouldn’t be too much difficulty in discovering the particular page or pages that have been pored over so many times so very assiduously. Remarkable how the Stuart connection keeps cropping up, isn’t it?”
“I’d like to know what we’re on the track of,” interjected Peter. “It’s a positive strain to keep on wondering like we do—or like I do—to be properly precise.”
Anthony smiled at him. “Include me, Daventry——for the time being at least.” He walked to the chair by the desk and sat down. “The question of ‘how long’ depends on what success I have with the estimable de St. Maure—let’s have a preliminary look.”
Peter went to his side and sprawled on the table—his elbows supporting his head. It was a ponderous and bulky book, and the ravages made by the passage of the bullet only served to make its examination more awkward.
“M. Réné was blessed with an unusually prodigal fund of reminiscence,” remarked Mr. Bathurst—“what has he handed down in the pages of this dainty little treatise that has turned men’s minds to murder—I wonder?” He turned to Peter. “I’m going to try a little experiment—yet another one.”
Peter still watched him with interest. He inserted the forefinger of each hand at the back of the book—between the binding and the massed pages—the left finger holding the top and the right the bottom. The book, of course, hung down loosely—the pages swinging a trifle and presenting openings in three or four places. “Put a thin slip of paper where you see the pages separating,” said Anthony, “a book invariably opens at the places where it has been well used. See that they hold, Daventry.” When the book was turned over, the first two marked places yielded nothing that seemed to have the slightest bearing on their quest. At the third, Anthony let go a whoop of triumph. Peter bent over him and read the printed matter with avidity. The passage that was pointed out to him read as follows: “Now in these days the knowledge came to my Queen-Mistress that her Cause had been betrayed, and that nothing short of a miracle from High Heaven could succor it. Whereupon there was much secret to-do and conniving amongst her chief adherents. I happened more times than once to find the Queen in her Seton’s arms or whispering to Mary Fleming. At four o’clock of the tenth day of the six month the Queen-Mistress sent for Thibaut Girardier—he that had been her Chief Armorer since she left my beloved country—and it was bruited abroad in the household both that night and during the days that followed that much wealth had been very secretly disposed of in many secret places of Wild Scotland. Messengers that carried her full faith and trust were employed and despatched to many of these secret spots. But Girardier was summoned so it was whispered by them that should have known, in the matter of the Cardinal’s great gift—‘the Black Twenty-Two.’ I know not, for it was never my practice to seek out or spy, what handiwork it was that he did. Sufficient be it to say that he made the Queen-Mistress two screens—one of Tapestrie and one of some specimen of beaten metal—and they twain shall tell the generations that are to come all that is deemed necessary of the ‘Black Twenty-Two.’ But the riddle of this message cannot be read from one of the twain alone. Thibaut had special audience of the Queen for many of these days.”
“Well?” inquired Anthony—“and what do you make of all that?”
“Dashed if I know,” replied Peter. “Who is this St. Maure Johnny anyway, and what is it that he’s gassing about?”
Anthony pointed to the title page again. “ ‘One-time Page to Mary Stuart,’ ” he quoted; “I presume he escaped from the wreck of that lady’s fortunes and lived to a ripe old age to inflict these memories on us.”
“What the hell does he mean by the ‘Black Twenty-Two’?” questioned Peter irreverently.