How a rather large lady, of dignified aspect and deliberate movement, could have been spirited from her bed and carried out of the house, without anybody being aware of it, was something that neither of the partners could comprehend.
“If her doors had been unfastened,� grunted Savage, “there might have been some explanation. But all of them are locked and bolted within.�
“She’d gone to bed, you say?�
“So her maid says. But she had dressed herself before she went away.�
“That shows she wasn’t kidnaped,� remarked Mallory.
“It doesn’t show anything,� rejoined Savage. “How do you account for the doors being fastened inside, with the keys left in the locks in the rooms? You don’t suppose a lady leaving her rooms would have somebody inside to bolt and lock the doors and then get out of the window in a flying machine, do you?�
“Where is the maid?� asked Mallory.
“In hysterics in the housekeeper’s room,� was the disgusted reply. “She and the housekeeper got in with the housekeeper’s master key, and after one look at Mrs. van Dietrich’s bed, the girl darted at her employer’s trunks, of which she had the keys, and searched through them. All the jewelry was gone.�
“H’m! Perhaps the maid——â€�
“She had never left her own room from the time she went there, after putting her mistress to bed, until she went to call Mrs. van Dietrich this morning. We have the testimony of the maid who shares the room with her for that. This maid was awake with the toothache, practically all night, and she knows the other one never left the room.�