The Lady Sleuths MEGAPACK TM(244)
Something else beside the striking of the clock almost simultaneously caught her ear—the whining and scratching of a dog at one of the windows. These, like those of the dining-room, opened as doors into an outside verandah. They were, however, closely shuttered, and Loveday had to ring for a servant to undo the patent fastener.
So soon as the window was opened Dryad rushed into the room, plastered with mud, and dripping with water from every hair.
“He must have been in the stream,” said the footman, trying to collar the dog and lead him out of the room.
“Stop! one moment!” cried Loveday, for her eye had caught sight of something hanging in shreds between the dog’s teeth. She bent over him, patting and soothing him, and contrived to disentangle those shreds, which a closer examination proved to be a few tattered fragments of dark blue serge.
“Is your letter-writing nearly ended, Miss Brooke?” asked Mr. Golding, at that moment entering the room.
For reply, Loveday held up the shreds of blue serge. His face grew ashen white; he needed no explanation; those shreds and the dripping dog seemed to tell their own tale.
“Great heavens!” he cried, “why did I not follow the dog out! There must be a search at once. Get men, lanterns, ropes, a ladder—the dog, too, will be of use.”
A terrible energy took possession of him. “Find, Dryad, find!” he shouted to the dog, and then, hatless and thin-shoed as he was, he rushed out into the darkness with Dryad at his heels.
In less than five minutes afterwards the whole of the men-servants of the house, with lanterns, ropes, and a ladder long enough to span the stream, had followed him. The wind had fallen, the rain had ceased now, and a watery half-moon was struggling through the thin, flying clouds. Loveday and Mrs. Greenhow, standing beneath the verandah, watched the men disappear in the direction of the trout stream, whither Dryad had led the way. From time to time shouts came to them, through the night stillness, of “This way!” “No, here!” together with Dryad’s sharp bark and the occasional distant flash of a bull’s-eye lantern. It was not until nearly half an hour afterwards that one of the men came running back to the house with a solemn white face and a pitiful tale. He wanted something that would serve for a stretcher, he said in a subdued tone—the two-fold oak screen in the hall would do—and please, into which room was “it” to be brought?—
On the following evening Mr. Dyer received a lengthy dispatch from Miss Brooke, which ran as follows:—
“LANGFORD HALL.
“This is to supplement my telegram of an hour back, telling you of the finding of Miss Golding’s body in the stream that runs through her father’s grounds. Mr. Golding has himself identified the body, and has now utterly collapsed. At the present moment it seems rather doubtful whether he will be in a fit state to give evidence at the inquest, which will be held to-morrow. Miss Golding appears to be dressed as she was when she left home, with this notable exception—the marquise ring has disappeared from the third finger of her left hand, and in its stead she wears a plain gold wedding-ring. Now this is a remarkable circumstance, and strikes a strange keynote to my mind. I am writing hurriedly, and can only give you the most important points in this very singular case. The maid, Lena, a reserved, self-contained woman, gave way to a passion of grief when the young lady’s body was brought in and laid upon her own bed. She insisted on performing all the last sad offices for the dead, however, in spite of her grief, and is now, I am glad to say, calmer and capable of a little quiet conversation with me. I keep her continually in attendance on me, as I am rather anxious to keep my eye on her just now. I have telegraphed to Lord Guilleroy, asking him, in spite of the terrible news which will in due course reach him, to be good enough to remain in Paris awaiting directions from me, which may have to be carried out at a minute’s notice. I hope to have further news to send a little later on.”