Again I seemed to see that curious stain on the ceiling of the room in Belgrave Street, and once more I wondered what had caused it. It might be, of course, merely a stain caused by some leaking pipe, and yet—
I thought of that remarkable conversation I had heard in the hall of the unoccupied house. What had they meant when they said they must “bring Vera to her senses”? Also, why had they seemed averse from calling in a doctor to see the old man Taylor, and to—
Taylor! I had been so much engrossed with Vera and her bondage of terror for the past few hours that I had forgotten all about him. Taylor. Had he recovered consciousness, I wondered, or had he—
A cold shiver ran through me as this last thought occurred to me.
It must have been quite two o’clock in the morning before I fell asleep. I am not an early riser, and my first feeling when I was awakened by John shaking me rather roughly, was one of annoyance. With difficulty I roused myself thoroughly. My servant was standing by the bedside, looking very pale.
“There are two police-officers downstairs,” he said huskily. “They have come—they say they have come, sir—”
“Well, out with it,” I exclaimed wrathfully, as he checked himself abruptly. “What have they come for? Do they want to see me?”
He braced himself with an effort—
“They say, sir,” he answered, “that—that they’ve come to arrest you! It is something to do, I think, with some old man who’s been found dead in an unoccupied ’ouse.”