The keen interest had passed out of Holmes’s expressive face,and I knew that with the mystery all the charm of the case haddeparted. There still remained an arrest to be effected, but whatwere these commonplace rogues that he should soil his hands withthem? An abstruse and learned specialist who finds that he hasbeen called in for a case of measles would experience somethingof the annoyance which I read in my friend’s eyes. Yet the scene inthe dining-room of the Abbey Grange was sufficiently strange toarrest his attention and to recall his waning interest.
It was a very large and high chamber, with carved oak ceiling,oaken panelling, and a fine array of deer’s heads and ancientweapons around the walls. At the further end from the door wasthe high French window of which we had heard. Three smallerwindows on the right-hand side filled the apartment with coldwinter sunshine. On the left was a large, deep fireplace, with amassive, overhanging oak mantelpiece. Beside the fireplace was aheavy oaken chair with arms and cross-bars at the bottom. In andout through the open woodwork was woven a crimson cord, whichwas secured at each side to the crosspiece below. In releasing thelady, the cord had been slipped off her, but the knots with whichit had been secured still remained. These details only struck ourattention afterwards, for our thoughts were entirely absorbed bythe terrible object which lay upon the tigerskin hearthrug in frontof the fire.
It was the body of a tall, well-made man, about forty yearsof age. He lay upon his back, his face upturned, with his whiteteeth grinning through his short, black beard. His two clenchedhands were raised above his head, and a heavy, blackthorn sticklay across them. His dark, handsome, aquiline features wereconvulsed into a spasm of vindictive hatred, which had set hisdead face in a terribly fiendish expression. He had evidently beenin his bed when the alarm had broken out, for he wore a foppish,embroidered nightshirt, and his bare feet projected from histrousers. His head was horribly injured, and the whole room borewitness to the savage ferocity of the blow which had struck himdown. Beside him lay the heavy poker, bent into a curve by theconcussion. Holmes examined both it and the indescribable wreckwhich it had wrought.
“He must be a powerful man, this elder Randall,” he remarked.
“Yes,” said Hopkins. “I have some record of the fellow, and he isa rough customer.”
“You should have no difficulty in getting him.”
“Not the slightest. We have been on the look-out for him, andthere was some idea that he had got away to America. Now thatwe know that the gang are here, I don’t see how they can escape.
We have the news at every seaport already, and a reward will beoffered before evening. What beats me is how they could havedone so mad a thing, knowing that the lady could describe themand that we could not fail to recognize the description.”
“Exactly. One would have expected that they would silence LadyBrackenstall as well.”
“They may not have realized,” I suggested, “that she hadrecovered from her faint.”
“That is likely enough. If she seemed to be senseless, they wouldnot take her life. What about this poor fellow, Hopkins? I seem tohave heard some queer stories about him.”
“He was a good-hearted man when he was sober, but a perfectfiend when he was drunk, or rather when he was half drunk, for heseldom really went the whole way. The devil seemed to be in himat such times, and he was capable of anything. From what I hear,in spite of all his wealth and his title, he very nearly came our wayonce or twice. There was a scandal about his drenching a dog withpetroleum and setting it on fire—her ladyship’s dog, to make thematter worse—and that was only hushed up with difficulty. Thenhe threw a decanter at that maid, Theresa Wright—there wastrouble about that. On the whole, and between ourselves, it willbe a brighter house without him. What are you looking at now?”
Holmes was down on his knees, examining with great attentionthe knots upon the red cord with which the lady had been secured.
Then he carefully scrutinized the broken and frayed end where ithad snapped off when the burglar had dragged it down.
“When this was pulled down, the bell in the kitchen must haverung loudly,” he remarked.
“No one could hear it. The kitchen stands right at the back ofthe house.”
“How did the burglar know no one would hear it? How dared hepull at a bell-rope in that reckless fashion?”
“Exactly, Mr. Holmes, exactly. You put the very question whichI have asked myself again and again. There can be no doubt thatthis fellow must have known the house and its habits. He musthave perfectly understood that the servants would all be in bed atthat comparatively early hour, and that no one could possibly heara bell ring in the kitchen. Therefore, he must have been in closeleague with one of the servants. Surely that is evident. But thereare eight servants, and all of good character.”
“Other things being equal,” said Holmes, “one would suspectthe one at whose head the master threw a decanter. And yet thatwould involve treachery towards the mistress to whom this womanseems devoted. Well, well, the point is a minor one, and when youhave Randall you will probably find no difficulty in securing hisaccomplice. The lady’s story certainly seems to be corroborated, if itneeded corroboration, by every detail which we see before us.” Hewalked to the French window and threw it open. “There are no signshere, but the ground is iron hard, and one would not expect them. Isee that these candles in the mantelpiece have been lighted.”
“Yes, it was by their light and that of the lady’s bedroom candle,that the burglars saw their way about.”
“And what did they take?”
“Well, they did not take much—only half a dozen articles ofplate off the sideboard. Lady Brackenstall thinks that they werethemselves so disturbed by the death of Sir Eustace that they didnot ransack the house, as they would otherwise have done.”