"As you know, Harry was secretary to your friend Elcombe. Well, I happen to know that his pretty stepdaughter, Enid Orlebar, was over head and ears in love with him. My daughter Ethel and she are friends, and she confided this fact to Ethel only a month before the tragedy."

"Then you actually suggest that a--a certain woman murdered him?" gasped Fetherston.

"Well--there is no actual proof--only strong suspicion!"

Walter Fetherston held his breath. Did the suspicions of this man, from whom no secret was safe, run in the same direction as his own?

"There was in the evidence given before the coroner a suggestion that the captain had dined somewhere in secret," he said.

"I know. But we have since cleared up that point. He was not given poison while he sat at dinner, for we know that he dined at the Bachelors' with a man named Friend. They had a hurried meal, because Friend had to catch a train to the west of England."

"And afterwards?"

"He left the club in a taxi at eight. But what his movements exactly were we cannot ascertain. He returned to his chambers at a quarter past nine in order to change his clothes and go back to Salisbury, but he was almost immediately taken ill. Barker declares that his master sent him out on an errand instantly on his return, and that when he came in he found him dying."

"Did he not explain what the errand was?"

"No; he refused to say."

In that refusal Fetherston saw that the valet, whatever might be his fault, was loyal to his dead master and to Enid Orlebar. He had not told how Bellairs had sent to Hill Street that scribbled note, and how the distressed girl had torn along to Half Moon Street to arrive too late to speak for the last time with the man she loved. Was Barker an enemy, or was he a friend?

"That refusal arouses distinct suspicion, eh?"

"Barker has very cleverly concealed some important fact," replied the keen-faced man who controlled that section of Scotland Yard. "Bellairs, feeling deadly ill, and knowing that he had fallen a victim to some enemy, sent Barker out for somebody in whom to confide. The man claimed that the errand that his master sent him upon was one of confidence."

"And to whom do you think he was sent?"

"To a woman," was Trendall's slow and serious reply. "To the woman who murdered him!"

"But if she had poisoned him, surely he would not send for her?"

exclaimed Fetherston.

"At the moment he was not aware of the woman's jealousy, or of the subtle means used to cause his untimely end. He was unsuspicious of that cruel, deadly hatred lying so deep in the woman's breast. Lady Blanche, on hearing of the death of her lover, was terribly grieved, and is still abroad. She, of course, made all sorts of wild allegations, but in none of them did we find any basis of fact. Yet, curiously enough, her views were exactly the same as my own--that one of poor Harry's lady friends had been responsible for his fatal seizure."

"Then, after all the inquiries you inst.i.tuted, you were really unable to point to the actual a.s.sa.s.sin?" asked Fetherston rather more calmly.

"Not exactly unable--unwilling, rather."

"How do you mean unwilling? You were Bellairs' friend!"

"Yes, I was. He was one of the best and most n.o.ble fellows who ever wore the King's uniform, and he died by the treacherous hand of a jealous woman--a clever woman who had paid Barker to maintain silence."

"But, if the dying man wished to make a statement, he surely would not have sent for the very person by whose hand he had fallen," Fetherston protested. "Surely that is not a logical conclusion!"

"Bellairs was not certain that his sudden seizure was not due to something he had eaten at the club--remember he was not certain that her hand had administered the fatal drug," replied Trendall. A hard, serious expression rested upon his face. "He had, no doubt, seen her between the moment when he left the Bachelors' and his arrival, a little over an hour afterwards, at Half Moon Street--where, or how, we know not. Perhaps he drove to her house, and there, at her invitation, drank something. Yet, however it happened, the result was the same; she killed him, even though she was the first friend to whom he sent in his distress--killed him because she had somehow learnt of his secret engagement to Lady Blanche Herbert."

"Yours is certainly a remarkable theory," admitted Walter Fetherston.

"May I ask the name of the woman to whom you refer?"

"Yes; she was the woman who loved him so pa.s.sionately," replied Trendall--"Enid Orlebar."

"Then you really suspect _her_?" asked Fetherston breathlessly.

"Only as far as certain facts are concerned; and that since Harry's death she has been unceasingly interested in the career of the man Barker."

"Are you quite certain of this?" gasped Fetherston.

"Quite; it is proved beyond the shadow of a doubt."

"Then Enid Orlebar killed him?"

"That if she actually did not kill him with her own hand, she at least knew well who did," was the other's cold, hard reply. "She killed him for two reasons; first, because by poor Harry's death she prevented the exposure of some great secret!"

Walter Fetherston made no reply.

Those inquiries, inst.i.tuted by Scotland Yard, had resulted in exactly the same theory as his own independent efforts--that Harry Bellairs had been secretly done to death by the woman, who, upon her own admission to him, had been summoned to the young officer's side.

CHAPTER XXIV

WHAT THE DEAD MAN LEFT

IT was news to Fetherston that Bellairs had dined at his club on that fateful night.

He had believed that Enid had dined with him. He had proved beyond all doubt that she had been to his rooms that afternoon during Barker's absence. That feather from the boa, and the perfume, were sufficient evidence of her visit.

Yet why had Barker remained in the neighbourhood of Piccadilly Circus if sent by his master with a message to Richmond? He could not doubt a single word that Trendall had told him, for the latter's information was beyond question. Well he knew with what care and cunning such an inquiry would have been made, and how every point would have been proved before being reported to that ever active man who was head of that Department of the Home Office that never sleeps.

"What secret do you suggest might have been divulged?" he asked at last after a long pause.

The big room--the Room of Secrets--was silent, for the double windows prevented the noise of the traffic and the "honk" of the taxi horns from penetrating there. Only the low ticking of the clock broke the quiet.

"I scarcely have any suggestion to offer in that direction," was Trendall's slow reply. "That feature of the affair still remains a mystery."

"But cannot this man Barker be induced to make some statement?" he queried.

"He will scarcely betray the woman to whom he owes his present prosperity, for he is prosperous and has a snug little balance at his bank. Besides, even though we took the matter in hand, what could we do?

There is no evidence against him or against the woman. The farcical proceedings in the coroner's court had tied their hands."

"An open verdict was returned?"

"Yes, at our suggestion. But Professors Dale and Boyd failed to find any traces of poison or of foul play."

"And yet there _was_ foul play--that is absolutely certain!" declared the novelist.