"Mr. Batterley," remarked the Earl, "means the panelled room which looks out on the garden. Mr. Horbury has used it as a study."
"The garden-room," continued the old antiquary, "should be particularly examined. It is into that room that the double staircase opens—by a door concealed in the recess at the side of the fire-place. There were, I am sure, recesses behind the panelling in that room. Now, Horbury may have known of them—he had tastes of an antiquarian disposition—in an amateur way, you know. At any rate, Mr. Polke, you should examine the house—and especially that room, for Horbury may have hidden Lord Ellersdeane's property there. A deeply interesting room that!" added the old man musingly. "I haven't been in it for some sixty years or so, but I remember it quite well. It was in that room that Jasper Chestermarke murdered Sir Gervase Rudd."
Starmidge, who, like the rest of them, had been listening eagerly to Batterley's talk, turned sharply to him.
"Did you say murdered, sir?" he said.
"A well-known story!" answered the old man half-impatiently, as he rose from his chair. "An ancestor of these Chestermarkes—he killed a man in that very room. Well—that's what I suggest, Mr. Polke. And—for another reason. As Lord Ellersdeane there knows—being, as his lordship is, a member of our society—the bank-house is so old that underneath it there may be such matters as old wells, old drains. Now, supposing Horbury had discovered some way under the present house, some secret passage or something, and that he went down into it on Sunday—eh? He may have fallen into one of these places—and be lying there dead or helpless. It's possible, Mr. Polke, it's quite possible. I make the suggestion to you for what it's worth, you know."
The old man bowed himself out and went away, and Polke turned to Lord Ellersdeane and Betty.
"I'm glad your lordship's come in," he said. "Quite apart from what Mr. Batterley suggests, we'll have to examine that bank-house. It's all nonsense—allowing the Chestermarkes to have their own way about everything! It's time we examined Horbury's effects."
Starmidge turned to Betty.
"Did you succeed in getting in there, Miss Fosdyke?" he asked.
"No!" replied Betty. "Mr. Joseph Chestermarke absolutely refused me admittance, and his uncle told me to go to a solicitor."