"Nothing of consequence, major. Of course we all felt uncomfortable when it was known that Holmes had lost a porte-monnaie from his overcoat-pocket as it hung here on the rack that night. Though he protests there was nothing in it, the thing might have been serious. You remember you thought the hall-door had been opened during our dinner. I believe I was telling some story or other at the time,—bad habit of mine,—and we sent Robert out to look. He came back and said it was tight shut, and couldn't have been open, because he had fixed it so that the latch could not be turned from outside. But Holmes showed us next day that it could be."
"Then you think it had been tampered with,—that some garrison sneak-thief had got in?"
"Well, that's what Holmes says and what Robert stoutly maintains, though you can't see a scratch or a mark or anything to indicate that such means had been used. No, major," and the doctor shook his head ominiously. "I—I have another theory, but it's one too shadowy, too unsubstantial to speak of. It is nothing but suspicion."
And Miller would not ask him what it was. Well knowing how the doctor had been devoting himself to Miss Forrest, it was with nothing short of amaze that the old soldier now heard him speak. After all his wife had told him, whom could Bayard mean but the Queen of Bedlam?
Abruptly the major changed the subject, even while thinking how in his own experience he had had recent opportunity to realize the truth of what the doctor said. Somebody had indeed "got fooled on that latch" the night he sat there in the dim light of the doctor's library,—somebody who evidently expected to enter as readily as before, and had worked ineffectually for several minutes before abandoning the attempt, and then only to be caught in the act and unblushingly to repudiate the same.
"Bayard," said the major, "I am the last man to interfere in the details of my subordinates' management of affairs, but there's a matter I want to ask you about while we are out here. What is the reason Dr. Weeks refuses to let Mrs. Miller go in and see McLean? She has been always very fond of him, and naturally wants to be of service now. Of course, if there be any good and sufficient reason, I've nothing to say, but I think I've a right to know."
Bayard hesitated a moment. "Come out here on the piazza, major," he presently said. "I don't want them to hear in the parlor." And together the two officers walked over to the wooden railing and stood there looking at each other. It was evident to the post commander in an instant that what his surgeon had to tell was something of no little importance and something, furthermore, that he shrank from mentioning. Bayard's eyes fell before the major's earnest and troubled gaze; he was plainly studying how to put his information fairly and without prejudice. Suddenly he looked up.
"First, while we are on the subject, let me finish about this latch business, major. It is not entirely—entirely irrelevant to the other matter. You see I had to tell Robert why we made such particular inquiries about the door. Now the boy has been with me for years, and came to me with a most unblemished character. Why, he was body-servant for the adjutant and quartermaster of the First Artillery in the lively old days at Fort Hamilton, and had unlimited opportunities for peculation; but those gentlemen said he was simply above suspicion. But he is sensitive, and it worried him fearfully lest Mr. Holmes should think he or some of his assistants in the kitchen had been searching those pockets. Now it was simply on his account—to convince him it was somebody from outside that surreptitiously entered the hall while we were all at dinner—that Holmes took the trouble to test the latch, and with a little bit of stiff wire he showed us how Robert's device could be circumvented."
"And Holmes has no doubt it was so accomplished?" asked the major, tentatively.
Bayard looked embarrassed. "I cannot say just what he does think, major, because he utterly refuses to speak of it. He said it was absurd to make such an ado about nothing, and declared he would be seriously annoyed if I pursued the subject."