Nobody thought of the dagger. It seemed to have vanished completely. Abbershaw hesitated, wondering if he should mention it, but finally decided not to, and he joined in the half-hearted, fitful conversation.
By common consent everyone went to bed early. A depression had settled over the spirits of the company, and it was well before midnight when once again the great candle-ring was let down from the ceiling and the hall left again in darkness.
Up in his room Abbershaw removed his coat and waistcoat, and, attiring himself in a modestly luxurious dressing-gown, settled down in the armchair before the fire to smoke a last cigarette before going to bed. The apprehension he had felt all along had been by no means lessened by the events of the last hour or so.
He believed Meggie’s story implicitly: she was not the kind of girl to fabricate a story of that sort in any circumstances, and besides the whole atmosphere of the building after he had returned from the garage had been vaguely suggestive and mysterious.
There was something going on in the house that was not ordinary, something that as yet he did not understand, and once again the face of the absurd young man with the horn-rimmed spectacles flashed into his mind and he strove vainly to remember where he had seen it before.
His meditations were cut short by the sound of footsteps in the passage outside, and the next moment there was a discreet tap at his door.
Abbershaw rose and opened it, to discover Michael Prenderby, the young, newly qualified M.D., standing fully dressed in the doorway.
The boy looked worried, and came into the room quickly, shutting the door behind him after he had glanced up and down the corridor outside as if to make certain that he had not been followed.
‘Forgive the melodrama,’ he said, ‘but there’s something darn queer going on in this place. Have a cigarette?’
Abbershaw looked at him shrewdly. The hand that held the cigarette-case out to him was not too steady, and the facetiousness of the tone was belied by the expression of anxiety in his eyes.