“Lady Castlecourt and I are going to dinner,” he said, looking at his watch. “We will have to leave, at the latest, within the next twenty minutes.”
Lady Castlecourt cried out at that:
“Herbert, I don’t see how I can go to that dinner. I am altogether too upset, and, besides, it will be too late. It’s eight o’clock now.”
“We can make the time up in the carriage,” my lord said; and he went into the next room with the policeman, where they talked together in low voices. I helped my lady on with her cloak, and she stood waiting, her eyebrows drawn together, looking very pale and worried. When my lord came back he said nothing, only nodded to my lady that he was ready, and, without a word, they left the room.
I tried to tidy the bureau and pick up the bottles as well as I could, and every time I looked at the door into the sitting-room I saw that policeman’s head peering round the door-post at me.
That was an awful night. I did not know it till afterward, but both Chawlmers and I were under what they call “surveillance.” I did not know either that Lord Castlecourt had told the policeman he believed us to be innocent; that we were of excellent character, and nothing but positive proof would make him think either of us guilty. All I felt, as I tossed about in bed, was that I was suspected, and would be arrested and probably put in jail. Fifteen years of honest service in noble families wouldn’t help me much if the detectives took it into their heads I was guilty.
The next morning we heard about the disappearance of Sara Dwight, and things began to look brighter. Sara had left the hotel at a little after seven the evening before, speaking to no one, and carrying a small portmanteau. When they came to examine her room and her box they found a jacket and skirt hanging on the wall, some burnt papers in the grate, and the box almost empty, except for some cheap cotton underclothes and a dirty wadded quilt put in to fill up. Sara had given no notice, and had not at any time told any of her fellow servants that she was dissatisfied with her place or wanted to leave.
That morning Mr. Brison, the Scotland Yard detective, had us up in the sitting-room asking us questions till I was fair muddled, and didn’t know truth from lies. Lord Castlecourt and my lady were both present, and Mr. Brison was forever politely asking my lady questions till she got quite angry with him, and said she wasn’t at all sure the diamonds were stolen; they might have been mislaid, and would turn up somewhere. Mr. Brison was surprised, and asked my lady if she had any idea where they were liable to turn up; and my lady looked annoyed, and said it was a silly question, and that she “wasn’t a clairvoyant.”
Three days after this Mr. John Gilsey, who is a detective, and, I have heard since, a very famous gentleman, was engaged by Lord Castlecourt to “work upon the case.” Mr. Gilsey was very soft-spoken and pleasant. He did not muddle you, as Mr. Brison did, and it was very easy to tell him all you knew or could remember, which he always seemed anxious to hear. He had me up in the sitting-room twice, once alone and once with Mr. Brison, and they asked me a host of questions about Sara Dwight. I told them all I could think of; and when I came to her hands, and how they were white and fine, like a lady’s, I saw Mr. Brison look at Mr. Gilsey and raise his eyebrows.
“Does it seem to you,” he says, scribbling words in his note-book, “that this sounds like Laura the Lady?”