“Can you tell me, doctor, where I can find an outside telephone?”
“There is one in the library,” replied Curtis. “Can I send a message for you?”
“No, thank you. I’ll get Lucille.” Mrs. Hull glanced nervously about. “You will think me absurd, doctor, but my husband was not well to-day. He was to call for me after dinner this evening, but he did not come, and it became so late that finally Lucille persuaded me to stay here all night.”
“Very rightly, Mrs. Hull,” responded Curtis sympathetically. “Is there anything I can do for you?”
“Oh, no! I couldn’t sleep thinking about Colonel Hull.” She spoke spasmodically in short, nervous jerks. “He has a new car and is so imprudent. I will get Lucille to call up our home and talk with her father. Don’t let me detain you. Good night.” And she stepped past him down the corridor on her way to her daughter’s bedroom as Curtis turned toward his door.
Curtis wasted little time in undressing. He was about to get into bed when a thought occurred to him. Going over to the chair where he had cast his suit, he took out the key which Anne had worn on the gold chain and put it inside the pocket of the jacket of his pajamas, fastening the flap with a safety pin. Then he climbed into bed. He had not troubled to switch on the electric light. Moving in perpetual darkness he had finally broken himself of the habit of pressing the button when entering a room at night.
The night seemed endlessly long to Curtis as he twisted and turned on his pillows, in sleepless unrest. He could not dismiss Anne from his thoughts. Was the key which he had taken from her Meredith’s? If so, how had it come into her possession? And what possible bearing could the key have on Meredith’s murder?
Bitterly Curtis regretted his lack of opportunity to question Anne about the key on their homeward journey in the farm truck. The presence of the farmer prevented anything like a private conversation, and immediately upon their arrival at Ten Acres Anne had been surrounded by her mother, Mrs. Hull, and Lucille, and hurried to her bedroom.
It was approaching two o’clock when Curtis finally dropped off into dreamless slumber, lulled to sleep by the soft breeze blowing through his open windows.
Nearly an hour later he awoke with a start. What had aroused him? Suddenly he caught a faint sound made by a padded footfall. Some one was moving about in his room. Curtis lay still, every faculty awake, his nerves tingling. By an effort of will only he kept his sightless eyes closed. Had the intruder switched on the electric light? If so, he was at an even greater disadvantage. At least in a darkened room he and the intruder would have an equal chance. A rustle of papers on his desk by the north window came to him with startling distinctness. He could not lie there like a bump on a log and be robbed—