“Just as I bent down to the door, I could have sworn I heard footsteps going softly away. It must have been somebody actually at the keyhole.”
“Why didn’t you run out?”
“Well, it makes it so dashed awkward to find somebody listening and catch them at it. In some ways it’s much better to know that somebody has been listening and for them not to know whether you know or not. It’s confoundedly awkward, all the same.”
“Idiotic of us not to have remembered that we were in a country pub, and that servants in country pubs still do listen at keyholes.”
“Servants? Well, ye-es. But Pulteney’s room is only just round that corner.”
“Miles, I will not have you talking of poor old Edward like that.”
“Who told you his name was Edward?”
“It must be; you’ve only to look at him. Anyhow, he will always be Edward to me. But he simply couldn’t listen at a keyhole. He would regard it as a somewhat unconventional proceeding” (this with a fair imitation of Mr. Pulteney’s voice). “Besides, he can’t nearly have finished that cross-word yet. He’s very stupid without me to help him; he will always put down ‘EMU’ when there’s a bird of three letters.”
“Well, anyhow, Brinkman’s room is only up one flight of stairs. As you say, it may be the servants, or even Mrs. Davis herself; but I’d like to feel sure of that. I wonder how much of what we said was overheard.”
“Well, Miles dear, you ought to know. Don’t you remember how you listened at the kitchen door in old Solomon’s house, and thought you heard a man’s voice and found out afterward it was only the loud-speaker?”