"Open?"
"I mean unlocked, not ajar. There was no one stirring in the lower floor. I wondered whether Hodgkins had come and the safe was opened. Then I went upstairs to the study."
"Your glove in your left hand?"
"As I remember it, yes. I forgot to mention the barking of the dog upstairs. When I got to the study door the barking was louder and the dog seemed to be pawing at the door inside. Smoke was streaming out through the keyhole and I could hear a loud crackling inside. I looked at my watch"—here Harry's delivery grew broken and he stuttered over the words—"I looked at my watch and saw that I had time to catch the 3:29. So I ran out the way I had come, slammed the door, knocked over some boys that were blocking up the alleyway, crossed Broad street and dove into the little passage called Marketman's row, which opens at the other end opposite the door of the depot.
"The 3:29 train was just steaming out when I caught the last car. At Woodlawn I jumped off on the unused side of the station and crossed the meadows to my house. Dr. Whipple had just come and had been directed to my room. I doubt if even the servants knew of my departure and arrival."
There was a pause when Harry finished. He looked straight at Shagarach, flush-cheeked and ashamed, but with all the Arnold boldness.
"You have left out the vital part of your story," said the lawyer, when it appeared that the witness had nothing more to add. "Why did you fly from a stream of smoke issuing through a keyhole?"
"There were two reasons, shameful both of them, but I ask you to remember that I had recently risen from a fever and that I was greatly excited at the time. In the first place, the image of the safe in that study had haunted me for days."
"Although you have testified that you did not know you were disinherited. Is that another lie?"
"No, sir; it is the truth. I had absolutely no knowledge of the terms of my uncle's will."