“He is not in his room.”
“But how about the speaking trumpet?”
“I heard the night-bell. He is not in his chamber, and the passage door is locked. Perhaps—” a few moments’ pause; then in a firm decided tone, “Yes, you had better come in.”
The door was closed, so that the chain could be unfastened; and as the door was being reopened, John Whyley pulled himself together, and cleared his throat.
“Don’t be alarmed, Miss,” he said, as he stood in the large blank hall, and rubbed his shoes upon a very old mat. “I don’t like scaring you but its better to make sure than to let anything go wrong. That’s partly, you see, Miss, what we’re for.”
“Yes, yes, but come at once to the surgery.”
“One minute, Miss,” said the constable, examining carefully the handsome frightened face, and noting that its owner was tall, graceful, rather dark, and about three or four and twenty, while though her hair was in disorder as if from lying down, the lady was fully dressed.
“What do you want?” she said, with the wild look in her eyes intensifying.
“To do everything in order, Miss. First, who lives here?”
“My father, Dr Chartley.”