“No, but I will now. We've got to get busy on this case, and close it up. I've been too long on it now. Shag is getting impatient.”
“Shag?”
“Yes, he wants me to go fishing.”
“Oh, I see. Well, I'm ready. What are the orders?”
Two busy days on the part of Colonel Ashley and his assistant followed. They went on many mysterious errands and were out once all night. But where they went, what they did or who they saw they told no one.
It was early one evening that Colonel Ashley waited for his assistant in the library of The Haven. Jack had gone out to send a message and was to return soon. And as the colonel waited in the dim light of one electric bulb, much shaded, he saw a figure come stealing to the portieres that separated the library from the hall. Cautiously the figure advanced and looked into the room. A glance seemed to indicate that no one was there, for the colonel was hidden in the depths of a big chair, “slumping,” which was his favorite mode of relaxing.
“I wonder if some one is looking for me?” mused the colonel. “Well, just for fun, I'll play hide and seek. I can disclose myself later.” And so he remained in the chair, hardly breathing the silent figure parted the heavy curtains, within, dropped something white on the floor, and then quickly hurried away, the feet making no sound on the thick carpet of the hall.
“Now,” mused the colonel to himself, “I wonder that is a note for me, or a love missive for one the maids from the butler or the gardener, who too bashful to deliver it in person. I'd better look.”
Without turning on more light the colonel picked up the thing that had fluttered so silently to the floor. It was a scrap of paper, and as he held it under the dimly glowing bulb he saw, scrawled in printed letters:
“Viola Carwell has a poison book.”