"Very well. Mr. Thornton went out from the hotel late that Friday night—the 30th of July was a Friday—and on his way out he spoke to the porter, saying he would go along Holborn and take a turn, it might be, up and down Chancery Lane, if it was pretty quiet."
"The porter remembered that distinctly, I presume?"
"Yes, perfectly. He did not see Mr. Thornton return, but he thought nothing of this, imagining that Mr. Thornton had gone back into the hotel when he, the porter, happened to be away for a minute from the door."
"I must see that porter," Gilbert broke in. Was he, he wondered, the last man to see Thornton alive? For, already, a conviction was springing up within him that Thornton was no more, and that this was the mournful intelligence he would have to carry to Kitty.
"Certainly you must," assented the manager.
"Well, next day a chambermaid, on going into Mr. Thornton's room, found that his bed had not been slept in; she reported it, but nothing beyond taking a note of the circumstance was done at the moment by the hotel people. They supposed, naturally enough, that Mr. Thornton would turn up in the course of the day."
"But surely," said Gilbert, "they should have felt some alarm seeing that they knew how frightfully ill he had been two days before, don't you think?"
"You must bear in mind, in fairness to them, that they do not care to appear to limit in any way the liberty of their guests—and also, Mr. Eversleigh, that they never suspected anything was wrong; it is easy to be wise after the event."
"Yes, yes," Gilbert agreed, but he spoke with some impatience.
"At first," the manager went on, "they were under no apprehension as to his safety, but when he did not return that day at all, nor the next, they began to think it a little strange; they thought it very singular, too, that they did not hear from him. They waited, however, till the Tuesday, and then they communicated with the police, and the affair is now in the latter's hands. A detective-inspector came to see if I could throw any light on the mystery. Of course, I was greatly interested, as you may imagine, but I could tell him nothing. I went round to the hotel in Holborn, and there learned what I have told you. I am afraid there is nothing more known at present."