Colonel Thorndyke's Secret

by G. A. Henty

“I expect the fellow was prowling about here for some time,” Mark said. “I was chatting with my father in the library when I thought I heard a noise, and I threw open the window, which had by some carelessness been left a little open, and went out, and listened for nearly an hour, but I could hear nothing, and put it down to the fact that I was nervous owing to what had happened early in the evening, and that the noise was simply fancy, or that the frost had caused a dry branch of one of the shrubs to crack.”

“How was it you did not notice the window was open as you went in?”

“The curtains were drawn, sir. I glanced at that when I went into the room with my father. After being shot at once from outside, it was possible that we might be again; though I own that I did not for a moment think that the fellow would return after the hot chase that I gave him. I suppose after I went in he looked about and found the ladder; it is likely enough that he would have had a file with him in case he had any bars to cut through to get into the house, but to my mind it is more likely that he knew where to find the ladder without any looking for it; it has hung there as long as I can remember.”

“Yes, sir,” the gardener said, “I have worked for the Squire ever since he came here, and the ladder was bought a week or two after he took me on, and the Squire settled where it should be hung, so that it might be handy either in case of fire or if wanted for a painting job. This aint the first ladder; we got a new one four years ago.”

“It is singular that the man should have known which was the window of your father's room.”

“Very singular,” Mark said.

Shortly after the doctor left, and Mark had a long talk with the magistrate in the library, and told him his reasons for suspecting that the murderer was Arthur Bastow.

“It certainly looks like it,” the magistrate said thoughtfully, after he had heard Mark's story, “though of course it is only a case of strong suspicion, and not of legal proof. Your father's recognition of the voice could have scarcely been accepted as final when he heard but three words, still the whole thing hangs together. The fellow was, I should say, capable of anything. I don't know that I ever had a prisoner before me whose demeanor was so offensive and insolent, and if it can be proved that Bastow is in England I should certainly accept your view of the case. He would probably have known both where the ladder was to be found and which was the window of your father's bedroom.”

“I should certainly think that he would know it, sir. The bedroom was the same that my grandfather used to sleep in, and probably during the years before we came here young Bastow would have often been over the house. The first year or two after we came he was often up here with his father, but I know that my father took such an objection to him, his manner and language were so offensive, that he would not have me, boy as I was—I was only about eleven when he came here—associate with him in the smallest degree. But during those two years he may very well have noticed where the ladder was.”

“Do you intend to say anything about all this tomorrow at the inquest, Mark?”