The girl nodded and turned bewildered eyes on Arnesson.
“Well, it’s gone, Belle,” he told her, with a shrug. “Can’t be helped. Probably one of your young archers took it to blow out his brains with after he’d foozled at shooting arrows up the alley.”
“Do be serious, Sigurd,” she pleaded, a little frightened. “Where could it have gone?”
“Ha! Another dark mystery,” scoffed Arnesson. “Strange disappearance of a discarded .32.”
Seeing the girl’s uneasiness Vance changed the subject.
“Perhaps, Miss Dillard, you’d be good enough to take us to Mrs. Drukker. There are one or two matters we want to speak to her about; and I assume, by your presence here, that the ride in the country has been postponed.”
A shadow of distress passed over the girl’s face.
“Oh, you mustn’t bother her to-day.” Her tone was tragically appealing. “Lady Mae is very ill. I can’t understand it—she seemed so well when I was talking with her up-stairs. But after she’d seen you and Mr. Markham she changed: she became weak and . . . oh, something terrible seemed to be preying on her mind. After I’d put her to bed she kept repeating in an awful whisper: ‘Johnny Sprig, Johnny Sprig.’ . . . I phoned her doctor and he came right over. He said she had to be kept very quiet. . . .”
“It’s of no importance,” Vance assured her. “Of course we shall wait.—Who is her doctor, Miss Dillard?”
“Whitney Barstead. He’s attended her as long as I can remember.”