Gradually I came to the conclusion that Gertrude, with the rest of the
world, believed her lover guilty, and--although I believed it myself,
for that matter--I was irritated by her indifference. Girls in my day
did not meekly accept the public's verdict as to the man they loved.
But presently something occurred that made me think that under
Gertrude's surface calm there was a seething flood of emotions.
Tuesday morning the detective made a careful search of the grounds, but
he found nothing. In the afternoon he disappeared, and it was late
that night when he came home. He said he would have to go back to the
city the following day, and arranged with Halsey and Alex to guard the
house.
Liddy came to me on Wednesday morning with her black silk apron held up
like a bag, and her eyes big with virtuous wrath. It was the day of
Thomas' funeral in the village, and Alex and I were in the conservatory
cutting flowers for the old man's casket. Liddy is never so happy as
when she is making herself wretched, and now her mouth drooped while
her eyes were triumphant.
"I always said there were plenty of things going on here, right under
our noses, that we couldn't see," she said, holding out her apron.
"I don't see with my nose," I remarked. "What have you got there?"
Liddy pushed aside a half-dozen geranium pots, and in the space thus
cleared she dumped the contents of her apron--a handful of tiny bits of
paper. Alex had stepped back, but I saw him watching her curiously.
"Wait a moment, Liddy," I said. "You have been going through the
library paper-basket again!"
Liddy was arranging her bits of paper with the skill of long practice
and paid no attention.
"Did it ever occur to you," I went on, putting my hand over the scraps,
"that when people tear up their correspondence, it is for the express
purpose of keeping it from being read?"
"If they wasn't ashamed of it they wouldn't take so much trouble, Miss
Rachel," Liddy said oracularly. "More than that, with things happening
every day, I consider it my duty. If you don't read and act on this, I
shall give it to that Jamieson, and I'll venture he'll not go back to
the city to-day."
That decided me. If the scraps had anything to do with the mystery
ordinary conventions had no value. So Liddy arranged the scraps, like
working out one of the puzzle-pictures children play with, and she did
it with much the same eagerness. When it was finished she stepped
aside while I read it.
"Wednesday night, nine o'clock. Bridge," I real aloud. Then, aware of
Alex's stare, I turned on Liddy.
"Some one is to play bridge to-night at nine o'clock," I said. "Is that
your business, or mine?"