He questioned the servants one by one, beginning with Mrs. Smithson, the housekeeper, who was ready to declare that no living creature, except the members of the household, could have been within the castle walls on the night of Gertrude Eversleigh's disappearance.
"That anybody could have come into this house and gone out of it in a night, unknown to me, is a moral impossibility," said the housekeeper; "the doors were locked at half-past ten, and the keys were brought in a basket to my room. So, you see it's quite impossible that any one could have come in or gone out before the doors were open in the morning."
"What time was the child's disappearance discovered?"
"At a quarter to five in the morning," answered Mrs. Morden; "before any one in the house was a-stir. My darling has always been in the habit of waking at that hour, to take a little milk, which is left in a glass by her bedside. I woke at the usual time, and rose, in order to give her the milk, and when I looked at her cot, I saw that it was empty. The child was gone. The silk coverlet and one blanket had disappeared with her. I gave the alarm immediately, and in a quarter of an hour the whole household was a-stir."
"And did you hear nothing during that night?" asked the captain, turning suddenly to address Solomon Grundy, who had entered amongst the rest of the servants.
"Nothing, captain."
"Humph," muttered the old soldier, "a sorry watch-dog."
"There is only one entrance to the castle which is at all weakly guarded," said the magistrate, presently; "and that is a small door belonging to the bed-room occupied by one of the footmen. But this man tells me that he was in his room that night at his usual hour, and that the door was locked and bolted in the usual way."
As he said this, the magistrate looked towards the end of the apartment, where Stephen Plumpton stood amongst his fellow servants. The young man had been weak enough, or guilty enough, to commit himself to a false statement; first, because he did not want to betray the misdoings of Matthew Brook, and secondly, because he feared to admit his own culpable carelessness.
"My telling the truth won't bring the child back," he argued with himself. "If it would, I'd speak out fast enough."