“Go on,” he said impatiently, as she paused.
“Presently we heard a crash upstairs—it was like breaking glass or china. Mr. Marsland said he would go upstairs and see what it was. I determined to go with him, as I was too frightened by that time to stay alone. On one of the stairs he picked up Grandfather Lumsden’s cryptogram. I felt then that Frank had been there, and that something dreadful had happened. We went upstairs, and there we found Frank’s dead body in the arm-chair. I thought at first that he had been taken ill after you and he got there that afternoon, and that he had died alone while you were away trying to get a doctor. But Mr. Marsland said he had been shot. Poor Frank! What a dreadful end.”
“What time did you leave?”
“We left almost at once. That would be about a quarter to seven. He went to Ashlingsea police station to report the discovery of the body. I asked him not to drag me into it—not to tell the police that I had been at the farm. I thought that was the best thing to do until I saw you—until I found where you had been.”
“Quite right, Elsie—everything you do is right, my dear girl. And while you and this Marsland were at the farm I was just recovering consciousness on the Staveley road after a bad smash. It was after five o’clock before I left Staveley; I had told Frank I would leave about three o’clock, but I was delayed by several things. He told me he would come along the road to meet me. I was driving along the road fairly fast in order to reach the farm before the storm broke, and I must have been dazed by a flash of lightning. The next thing I remember was being awakened by the rain falling on my face as I lay unconscious beside the car, which had been overturned.”
“Were you badly hurt, dear?”
“I was badly shaken and bruised, but the only cut was the one on my head. I didn’t know what to do at first. I thought I would walk back to Staveley and tell them at the garage about the car. But finally I decided to go on to the Cliff Farm, as it was so much nearer than Staveley, and then go to Staveley by train in the morning. It must have been nearly eight o’clock when I reached the farm and found the front door open.”
“We locked it,” she interposed. “That is, Mr. Marsland did: he told me that he was sure he heard the lock click.”
“It was open when I got there—wide open,” he persisted.
“Then Mr. Marsland was right. The murderer was in the house while we were there. The crash we heard was made by him, and after we went away he bolted and left the hall door open.”