The servants filed in, five or six of them, one after another; an expression on each face which seemed to ask, "Why are we wanted here at this uncanny hour?"
In a few quiet sentences Mrs. Carlyon detailed her loss, and questioned each of them in turn as to whether they could throw any light on the affair. One and all denied all knowledge of it: as indeed their mistress had quite expected that they would do. No one save Higson had set foot either in the bedroom or dressing-room since ten o'clock the previous forenoon. There was nothing for it but to let them go back. Higson, who was crying by this time, was told a few minutes later that she too had better go: Mrs. Carlyon would to-night undress herself. The woman went out with her apron to her eyes.
"I shan't get a wink of sleep all this blessed night," she cried with a sob. "Hanging would be too good, ma'am, for them that have robbed you."
Mrs. Carlyon and Ella sat and looked at each other. The uncertainty was growing painfully oppressive. Had there been any strange waiters in the house, they might have been suspected: but, except on some very rare and grand occasion, Mrs. Carlyon employed only her own servants. And those servants were above suspicion.
"Was the door that opens from the dressing-room into the boudoir locked, or otherwise?" asked Ella.
"To my certain knowledge it was locked till past ten o'clock: and I will tell you how I happen to know it," replied Mrs. Carlyon. "Some time after the exhibition of Mr. Conroy's sketches I went into the boudoir and found it empty of everybody except Philip Cleeve; he was lying on the sofa with one of his bad headaches. Thinking that my salts might be of service to him, I came into the dressing-room to get them. I have a clear recollection of finding the door between the two rooms locked then. I unlocked it, and having found the salts, I went back and gave them to Philip; but whether I relocked the door after me is more than I can say. Probably I did not. After a few words to Philip I left him, still lying on the sofa, and did not go near the boudoir again."
A pause ensued. It seemed as if there was nothing more to be said. Not the slightest shadow of suspicion could rest on Philip Cleeve; the idea was preposterous. Both the ladies had known him since he was a boy, and his mother, Lady Cleeve, was one of Mrs. Carlyon's oldest friends. And, that suspicion could attach itself to any of the guests, was equally out of the question. Still, the one strange fact remained, that the casket could not be found.
"We had better go to bed, I think," said Mrs. Carlyon at last, in a fretful voice. "If we sit up all night the case won't come back to us of its own accord."
"I am ready to say with Higson that I shan't get a wink of sleep," remarked Ella, as she rose to obey. "One thing seems quite certain, Aunt Gertrude--that there must be a thief somewhere."