You can’t tell ’em apart. But there are two lengths in a furlongbetween them when it comes to a gallop. He thinks of nothing butthe horse and the race. His whole life is on it. He’s holding off theJews till then. If the Prince fails him he is done.”
“It seems a rather desperate gamble, but where does themadness come in?”
“Well, first of all, you have only to look at him. I don’t believehe sleeps at night. He is down at the stables at all hours. His eyesare wild. It has all been too much for his nerves. Then there is hisconduct to Lady Beatrice!”
“Ah! What is that?”
“They have always been the best of friends. They had the sametastes, the two of them, and she loved the horses as much as hedid. Every day at the same hour she would drive down to seethem—and, above all, she loved the Prince. He would prick uphis ears when he heard the wheels on the gravel, and he wouldtrot out each morning to the carriage to get his lump of sugar. Butthat’s all over now.”
“Why?”
“Well, she seems to have lost all interest in the horses. For aweek now she has driven past the stables with never so much as‘Good-morning’ ! “
“You think there has been a quarrel?”
“And a bitter, savage, spiteful quarrel at that. Why else wouldhe give away her pet spaniel that she loved as if he were her child?
He gave it a few days ago to old Barnes, what keeps the GreenDragon, three miles off, at Crendall.”
“That certainly did seem strange.”
“Of course, with her weak heart and dropsy one couldn’t expectthat she could get about with him, but he spent two hours everyevening in her room. He might well do what he could, for she hasbeen a rare good friend to him. But that’s all over, too. He nevergoes near her. And she takes it to heart. She is brooding and sulkyand drinking, Mr. Holmes—drinking like a fish.”
“Did she drink before this estrangement?”
“Well, she took her glass, but now it is often a whole bottle ofan evening. So Stephens, the butler, told me. It’s all changed, Mr.Holmes, and there is something damned rotten about it. But then,again, what is master doing down at the old church crypt at night?
And who is the man that meets him there?”
Holmes rubbed his hands.
“Go on, Mr. Mason. You get more and more interesting.”
“It was the butler who saw him go. Twelve o’clock at nightand raining hard. So next night I was up at the house and, sureenough, master was off again. Stephens and I went after him,but it was jumpy work, for it would have been a bad job if he hadseen us. He’s a terrible man with his fists if he gets started, and norespecter of persons. So we were shy of getting too near, but wemarked him down all light. It was the haunted crypt that he wasmaking for, and there was a man waiting for him there.”
“What is this haunted cryp?”
“Well, sir, there is an old ruined chapel in the park. It is so oldthat nobody could fix its date. And under it there’s a crypt whichhas a bad name among us. It’s a dark, damp, lonely place by day,but there are few in that county that would have the nerve to gonear it at night. But master’s not afraid. He never feared anythingin his life. But what is he doing there in the night-time?”
“Wait a bit!” said Holmes. “You say there is another man there.
It must be one of your own stablemen, or someone from thehouse! Surely you have only to spot who it is and question him?”
“It’s no one I know.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because I have seen him, Mr. Holmes. It was on that secondnight. Sir Robert turned and passed us—me and Stephens, quakingin the bushes like two bunny-rabbits, for there was a bit of moonthat night. But we could hear the other moving about behind. Wewere not afraid of him. So we up when Sir Robert was gone andpretended we were just having a walk like in the moonlight, and sowe came right on him as casual and innocent as you please. ‘Hullo,mate! who may you be?’ says I. I guess he had not heard us coming,so he looked over his shoulder with a face as if he had seen thedevil coming out of hell. He let out a yell, and away he went ashard as he could lick it in the darkness. He could run! —I’ll givehim that. In a minute he was out of sight and hearing, and who hewas, or what he was, we never found.”
“But you saw him clearly in the moonlight?”
“Yes, I would swear to his yellow face—a mean dog, I should say.
What could he have in common with Sir Robert?”
Holmes sat for some time lost in thought.
“Who keeps Lady Beatrice Falder company?” he asked at last.
“There is her maid, Carrie Evans. She has been with her this fiveyears.”
“And is, no doubt, devoted?”
Mr. Mason shuffled uncomfortably.
“She’s devoted enough,” he answered at last. “But I won’t say towhom.”
“Ah!” said Holmes.
“I can’t tell tales out of school.”
“I quite understand, Mr. Mason. Of course, the situation is clearenough. From Dr. Watson’s deion of Sir Robert I can realizethat no woman is safe from him. Don’t you think the quarrelbetween brother and sister may lie there?”
“Well, the scandal has been pretty clear for a long time.”
“But she may not have seen it before. Let us suppose that shehas suddenly found it out. She wants to get rid of the woman. Herbrother will not permit it. The invalid, with her weak heart andinability to get about, has no means of enforcing her will. Thehated maid is still tied to her. The lady refuses to speak, sulks,takes to drink. Sir Robert in his anger takes her pet spaniel awayfrom her. Does not all this hang together?”
“Well, it might do—so far as it goes.”
“Exactly! As far as it goes. How would all that bear upon thevisits by night to the old crypt? We can’t fit that into our plot.”
“No, sir, and there is something more that I can’t fit in. Whyshould Sir Robert want to dig up a dead body?”
Holmes sat up abruptly.
“We only found it out yesterday—after I had written to you.
Yesterday Sir Robert had gone to London, so Stephens and I wentdown to the crypt. It was all in order, sir, except that in one cornerwas a bit of a human body.”
“You informed the police, I suppose?”
Our visitor smiled grimly.
