"You have yet to explain," resumed the inspector sternly, "what took you to Geralton in the middle of the night. Under the circumstances I should have thought your Ladyship would hardly have cared to visit his Lordship's relations."
Ignoring Griggs, Amy turned to her husband.
"My going there was the purest accident," she began in a dull, monotonous voice, almost as if she were reciting a lesson, but as she proceeded, her excitement increased till finally she became so absorbed in her story that she appeared to forget her hearers completely. "I was horribly restless, so we spent most of our time motoring and often stayed out very late. One night a tire burst. I noticed that we had stopped within a short walk of the castle. As I had never seen it except at a distance, it occurred to me that I would like to have a nearer view of the place. In my boy's clothes I found it fairly easy to climb the low wall which separates the gardens from the park. Not a light was to be seen, so, as there seemed no danger of my being discovered, I ventured on to the terrace. As I stood there, I heard a faint cry. My first impulse was to retrace my footsteps as quickly as possible, but when I realised that it was a woman who was crying for help, I felt that I must find out what was the matter. Running in the direction from which the sound came, I turned a corner and found myself confronted by a lighted window. The shrieks were now positively blood-curdling and there was no doubt in my mind that some poor creature was being done to death only a few feet away from me. The window was high above my head, but I was determined to reach it. After several unsuccessful attempts I managed to gain a foothold on the uneven surface of the wall and hoist myself on to the window-sill. Luckily the window was partially open, so I was able to slip noiselessly into the room and hide behind the curtain. Peering through the folds, I saw a woman lying on the floor. Her bodice was torn open, exposing her bare back. Over her stood a man who was beating her with a piece of cord which was attached to the waist of a sort of Eastern dressing-gown he wore.
"'So you thought you would leave me, did you?' he cried over and over again as the lash fell faster and faster. 'Well, you won't! Not till I send you to hell, which I will some day.'
"At last he paused and wiped the perspiration from his brow. He was very fat and his exertions were evidently telling on him.
"'Why shouldn't I kill you now? I have my pistol within reach of my hand. It is here on my desk. Ah, you didn't know that, did you?' He gave a fiendish laugh.
"The woman shuddered but made no attempt to rise.
"I was slowly recovering from the terror which had at first paralysed me. I realised I must act at once if I meant to save Lady Wilmersley's life. The desk was behind him.
"Dropping on my hands and knees, I crept cautiously toward it. 'Kill you, kill you, that is what I ought to do,' he kept repeating.
"I reached the desk. No pistol was to be seen; yet I knew it was there. As I fumbled among his papers, my hand touched an ancient steel gauntlet. Some instinct told me that I had found what I sought. But how to open it was the question. Some agonising moments passed before I at last accidentally pressed the spring and a pistol lay in my hand.