"What can it be?" she said.
"I can't think," Eustace replied.
"You had better fetch Robertson," Mrs. Orban said. "There is something very odd about this."
"Don't you mind being left alone, mother?" Eustace asked, looking round anxiously, as if he thought an explanation of the mystery might jump from under a bed or out of a cupboard.
"Of course not, dear," Mrs. Orban replied gravely.
It amused her even in her anxiety that this slender scrap of fourteen should assume such an air of protection, but it touched her also, and she would not for worlds have let him fancy she could smile at him.
Robertson hurried to the spot immediately, and when he saw the condition of the coverlet he looked utterly nonplussed.
"Well, this is a queer state of things," he said, rubbing his head meditatively. "I never saw anything to equal it."
Further examination proved that not only was the coverlet burnt right through, but the under clothes were scorched and crumbled like tinder at a touch.
"It looks like the track of a shot," Robertson said; "but how could it come there?"