For a time she leaned against the hedge just outside the centre, trying to gather up enough energy to launch once more into the labyrinth. One horror had at least been banished. Howard said the murderer had escaped from the Maze; she need have no fear of meeting that demon in her wanderings. It seemed hours since she and Howard had come so light-heartedly into that daedalian web. She had no idea how long she had been unconscious; and when she looked back, she seemed to have spent an eternity in the paths of the Maze before she had blundered into the centre.
At last she pulled herself together and called again to Howard.
“Howard! I’m going to try for the way out now.”
“All right! Give me a call occasionally, so that I’ll know you’re all right. By the way, why don’t you blow the horn?”
“I’ve lost it. I dropped it when I thought the murderer was chasing me.”
“I wondered why you didn’t use it, after I’d told you he’d cleared out. Shouting’s no good. I’ve been yelling at the pitch of my voice for long enough, but there’s no one within earshot, evidently.”
Vera set off again. The rest had done her good. Now that the immediate terror of the murderer in the Maze was removed, she felt a different person. The horror through which she had passed began somehow to take on a tinge of unreality. Had she actually seen Roger Shandon’s body lying on the grass, or had it been a mere hallucination sweeping over her when she was on the verge of fainting? She had the feeling that the whole thing might be some walking nightmare which had passed.
And now, by that curious hazard which sometimes happens in mazes, she hit upon the shortest route to the exit. When she was least expecting it, a sudden turn in the corridor revealed one of the iron gates in the outermost hedge.
“Howard! I’ve come to the gate. What a relief!”
“Wait before you go,” Howard’s voice came to her over the intervening partitions. “Listen to me. Once you get outside, run to the house. If you meet anyone on the way, send him down to get me out of this tangle; I seem to have no luck. When you get to the house, find Stenness or one of the other men. Send the lot, if they’re there. Tell them about the murder and tell them to get the police on the ’phone at once. And get yourself some brandy or something. You’ll need it, poor thing!”