"Not much to tell—very little, indeed."
It appeared to Horne that both men looked puzzled and vaguely excited. But their story was soon told. They had seen Richard Stimson, a labourer, who reported having noticed a strange lady crossing the park in the direction of the wood, which, however, she had not entered, having finally changed her course so as to bear towards the Western Lodge and the allotments.
"That, you will observe, was about ten o'clock," interjected French, "and I saw my lady about eight." Buntingford found a chair, lit a cigarette, and resumed:
"She appeared in the village some time yesterday morning and went into the church. She told the woman who was cleaning there that she had come to look at an old window which was mentioned in her guide-book. The woman noticed that she stayed some time looking at the monuments in the church, and the tombs in the Buntingford chantry, which all the visitors go to see. She ordered some sandwiches at the Rose-and-Crown and got into talk with the landlord. He says she asked the questions strangers generally do ask—'Who lived in the neighbourhood?'—If she took a lodging in the village for August were there many nice places to go and see?—and so on. She said she had visited the Buntingford tombs in the chantry, and asked some questions about the family, and myself—Was I married?—Who was the heir? etc. Then when she had paid her bill, she enquired the way across the park to Feetham Station, and said she would have a walk and catch a six o'clock train back to London. She loved the country, she said—and liked walking. And that really is—all!"
"Except about her appearance," put in Geoffrey. "The landlord said he thought she must be an actress, or 'summat o' that sort.' She had such a strange way of looking at you. But when we asked what that meant, he scratched his head and couldn't tell us. All that we got out of him was he wouldn't like to have her for a lodger—'she'd frighten his missus.' Oh, and he did say that she looked dead-tired, and that he advised her not to walk to Feetham, but to wait for the five o'clock bus that goes from the village to the station. But she said she liked walking, and would find some cool place in the park to sit in—till it was time to catch the train."
"She was well-dressed, he said," added Buntingford, addressing himself to Cynthia Welwyn, who sat beside him; "and his description of her hat and veil, etc., quite agreed with old Stimson's account."
There was a silence, in which everybody seemed to be trying to piece the evidence together as to the mysterious onlooker of the night, and make a collected whole of it. Buntingford and Geoffrey were especially thoughtful and preoccupied. At last the former, after smoking a while without speaking, got up with the remark that he must see to some letters before post.
"Oh, no!"—pleaded Helena, intercepting him, and speaking so that he only should hear. "To-morrow's Whitsunday, and Monday's Bank Holiday. What's the use of writing letters? Don't you remember—you promised to show me those drawings before dinner—and may Geoffrey come, too?"
A sudden look of reluctance and impatience crossed Buntingford's face. Helena perceived it at once, and drew back. But Buntingford said immediately:
"Oh, certainly. In half an hour, I'll have the portfolios ready."