The Golden Slipper Part 17

Violet left the fire-place after a glance at the mantel-shelf on which nothing stood but a casket of open fretwork, and two coloured photographs mounted on small easels. The casket was too open to conceal anything and the photographs lifted too high above the shelf for even the smallest paper, let alone a doc.u.ment of any size, to hide behind them.

The chairs, of which there were several in this part of the room, she pa.s.sed with just an inquiring look. They were all of solid oak, without any attempt at upholstery, and although carved to match the stalls on the other side of the room, offered no place for search.

Her delay in the third segment was brief. Here there was absolutely nothing but the door by which she had entered, and the books. As she flitted on, following the oval of the wall, a small frown appeared on her usually smooth forehead. She felt the oppression of the books--the countless books. If indeed, she should find herself obliged to go through them. What a hopeless outlook!

But she had still a segment to consider, and after that the immense table occupying the centre of the room, a table which in its double capacity (for it was as much desk as table) gave more promise of holding the solution of the mystery than anything to which she had hitherto given her attention.

The quarter in which she now stood was the most beautiful, and, possibly, the most precious of them all. In it blazed the five great windows which were the glory of the room; but there are no hiding-places in windows, and much as she revelled in colour, she dared not waste a moment on them. There was more hope for her in the towering stalls, with their possible drawers for books.

But Hetty was before her in the attempt she made to lift the lids of the two great seats.

"Nothing in either," said she; and Violet, with a sigh, turned towards the table.

This was an immense affair, made to accommodate itself to the shape of the room, but with a hollowed-out s.p.a.ce on the window-side large enough to hold a chair for the sitter who would use its top as a desk. On it were various articles suitable to its double use. Without being crowded, it displayed a pile of magazines and pamphlets, boxes for stationery, a writing pad with its accompaniments, a lamp, and some few ornaments, among which was a large box, richly inlaid with pearl and ivory, the lid of which stood wide open.

"Don't touch," admonished Violet, as Hetty stretched out her hand to move some little object aside. "You have already worked here busily in the search you made this morning."

"We handled everything."

"Did you go through these pamphlets?"

"We shook open each one. We were especially particular here, since it was at this table I saw Mrs. Quintard stop."

"With head level or drooped?"

"Drooped."

"Like one looking down, rather than up, or around?"

"Yes. A ray of red light shone on her sleeve. It seemed to me the sleeve moved as though she were reaching out."

"Will you try to stand as she did and as nearly in the same place as possible?"

Hetty glanced down at the table edge, marked where the gules dominated the blue and green, and moved to that spot, and paused with her head sinking slowly towards her breast.

"Very good," exclaimed Violet. "But the moon was probably in a very different position from what the sun is now."

"You are right; it was higher up; I chanced to notice it."

"Let me come," said Violet.

Hetty moved, and Violet took her place but in a spot a step or two farther front. This brought her very near to the centre of the table.

Hanging her head, just as Hetty had done, she reached out her right hand.

"Have you looked under this blotter?" she asked, pointing towards the pad she touched. "I mean, between the blotter and the frame which holds it?"

"I certainly did," answered Hetty, with some pride.

Violet remained staring down. "Then you took off everything that was lying on it?"

"Oh, yes."

Violet continued to stare down at the blotter. Then impetuously:

"Put them back in their accustomed places."

Hetty obeyed.

Violet continued to look at them, then slowly stretched out her hand, but soon let it fall again with an air of discouragement. Certainly the missing doc.u.ment was not in the ink-pot or the mucilage bottle.

Yet something made her stoop again over the pad and subject it to the closest scrutiny.

"If only nothing had been touched!" she inwardly sighed. But she let no sign of her discontent escape her lips, simply exclaiming as she glanced up at the towering s.p.a.ces overhead: "The books! the books! Nothing remains but for you to call up all the servants, or get men from the outside and, beginning at one end--I should say the upper one--take down every book standing within reach of a woman of Mrs. Quintard's height."

"Hear first what Mrs. Quintard has to say about that," interrupted the woman as that lady entered in a flutter of emotion springing from more than one cause.

"The young lady thinks that we should remove the books," Hetty observed, as her mistress's eye wandered to hers from Violet's abstracted countenance.

"Useless. If we were to undertake to do that, Carlos would be here before half the job was finished. Besides, Hetty must have told you my extreme aversion to nicely bound books. I will not say that when awake I never place my hand on one, but once in a state of somnambulism, when every natural whim has full control, I am sure that I never would. There is a reason for my prejudice. I was not always rich. I once was very poor. It was when I was first married and long before Clement had begun to make his fortune. I was so poor then that frequently I went hungry, and what was worse saw my little daughter cry for food. And why? Because my husband was a bibliomaniac. He would spend on fine editions what would have kept the family comfortable. It is hard to believe, isn't it? I have seen him bring home a Grolier when the larder was as empty as that box; and it made me hate books so, especially those of extra fine binding, that I have to tear the covers off before I can find courage to read them."

O life! life! how fast Violet was learning it!

"I can understand your idea, Mrs. Quintard, but as everything else has failed, I should make a mistake not to examine these shelves. It is just possible that we may be able to shorten the task very materially; that we may not have to call in help, even. To what extent have they been approached, or the books handled, since you discovered the loss of the paper we are looking for?"

"Not at all. Neither of us went near them." This from Hetty.

"Nor any one else?"

"No one else has been admitted to the room. We locked both doors the moment we felt satisfied that the will had been left here."

"That's a relief. Now I may be able to do something. Hetty, you look like a very strong woman, and I, as you see, am very little. Would you mind lifting me up to these shelves? I want to look at them. Not at the books, but at the shelves themselves."

The wondering woman stooped and raised her to the level of the shelf she had pointed out. Violet peered closely at it and then at the ones just beneath.

"Am I heavy?" she asked; "if not, let me see those on the other side of the door."

Hetty carried her over.

Violet inspected each shelf as high as a woman of Mrs. Quintard's stature could reach, and when on her feet again, knelt to inspect the ones below.

"No one has touched or drawn anything from these shelves in twenty-four hours," she declared. "The small acc.u.mulation of dust along their edges has not been disturbed at any point. It was very different with the table-top. That shows very plainly where you had moved things and where you had not."

"Was that what you were looking for? Well, I never!"

Violet paid no heed; she was thinking and thinking very deeply.

Hetty turned towards her mistress, then quickly back to Violet, whom she seized by the arm.

"What's the matter with Mrs. Quintard?" she hurriedly asked. "If it were night, I should think that she was in one of her spells."