The Case of the Ward Lane Tabernacle | Page 7

didn't see nothing."
"And how do you know thieves have been in the house?"
"Everythink's tumbled about worse than ever, sir, and all different from
what it was yesterday; and there's a box o' papers in the attic broke
open, and all sorts o' things."
"Have you spoken to the police?"
"No, sir; I'm that frightened I don't know what to do. And missis was
going to see a gentleman about it yesterday, and----"
"Very well, I am that gentleman--Mr. Martin Hewitt. I have come down
now to meet her by appointment. Did she say she was going anywhere
else as well as to my office and to her sister's?"
"No, sir. And she--she's got the snuff-box with her and all." This latter
circumstance seemed largely to augment the girl's terrors for her
mistress's safety.
"Very well," Hewitt said, "I think I'd better just look over the house
now, and then consider what has become of Mrs. Mallett--if she isn't
heard of in the meantime."

The girl found a great relief in Hewitt's presence in the house, the deaf
old house-keeper, who seldom spoke and never heard, being, as she
said, "worse than nobody."
"Have you been in all the rooms?" Hewitt asked.
"No, sir; I was afraid. When I came in I went straight upstairs to my
room, and as I was coming away I see the things upset in the other attic.
I went into Mrs. Perks' room, next to mine (she's the deaf old woman),
and she was there all right, but couldn't hear anything. Then I came
down and only just peeped into two of the rooms and saw the state they
were in, and then I came out into the garden, and presently this young
woman came with the message from Mrs. Rudd."
"Very well, we'll look at the rooms now," Hewitt said, and they
proceeded to do so. All were in a state of intense confusion. Drawers,
taken from chests and bureaux, littered about the floor, with their
contents scattered about them. Carpets and rugs had been turned up and
flung into corners, even pictures on the walls had been disturbed, and
while some hung awry others rested on the floor and on chairs. The
things, however, appeared to have been fairly carefully handled, for
nothing was damaged except one or two framed engravings, the brown
paper on the backs of which had been cut round with a knife and the
wooden slats shifted so as to leave the backs of the engravings bare.
This, the girl told Hewitt, had not been done on the night of the first
burglary; the other articles also had not on that occasion been so much
disturbed as they now were.
Mrs. Mallett's bedroom was the first floor front. Here the confusion
was, if possible, greater than in the other rooms. The bed had been
completely unmade and the clothes thrown separately on the floor, and
everything else was displaced. It was here indeed that the most
noticeable features of the disturbance were observed, for on the side of
the looking-glass hung a very long old-fashioned gold chain untouched,
and on the dressing-table lay a purse with the money still in it. And on
the looking-glass, stuck into the crack of the frame, was a half sheet of
notepaper with this inscription scrawled in pencil:--

To Mr. Martin Hewitt.
Mrs. Mallett is alright and in frends hands. She will return soon
alright, if you keep quiet. But if you folloe her or take any steps the
conseqinses will be very serious.
This paper was not only curious in itself, and curious as being
addressed to Hewitt, but it was plainly in the same handwriting as were
the most of the anonymous letters which Mrs. Mallett had produced the
day before in Hewitt's office. Hewitt studied it attentively for a few
moments and then thrust it in his pocket and proceeded to inspect the
rest of the rooms. All were the same--simply well-furnished rooms
turned upside down. The top floor consisted of three comfortable attics,
one used as a lumber-room and the others used respectively as
bedrooms for the servant and the deaf old woman. None of these rooms
appeared to have been entered, the girl said, on the first night, but now
the lumber-room was almost as confused as the rooms downstairs. Two
or three boxes were opened and their contents turned out. One of these
was what is called a steel trunk--a small one--which had held old
papers, the others were filled chiefly with old clothes.
The servant's room next this was quite undisturbed and untouched; and
then Hewitt was admitted to the room of Mrs. Mallett's deaf old
pensioner. The old woman sat propped up in her bed and looked with
half-blind eyes at