The Circular Staircase | Page 8

mention what had happened to anybody, and
telephoned to town for servants. Then after a breakfast which did more
credit to Thomas' heart than his head, I went on a short tour of
investigation. The sounds had come from the east wing, and not
without some qualms I began there. At first I found nothing. Since then
I have developed my powers of observation, but at that time I was a
novice. The small card- room seemed undisturbed. I looked for
footprints, which is, I believe, the conventional thing to do, although
my experience has been that as clues both footprints and thumb-marks
are more useful in fiction than in fact. But the stairs in that wing
offered something.
At the top of the flight had been placed a tall wicker hamper, packed,
with linen that had come from town. It stood at the edge of the top step,
almost barring passage, and on the step below it was a long fresh
scratch. For three steps the scratch was repeated, gradually diminishing,
as if some object had fallen, striking each one. Then for four steps
nothing. On the fifth step below was a round dent in the hard wood.
That was all, and it seemed little enough, except that I was positive the
marks had not been there the day before.
It bore out my theory of the sound, which had been for all the world
like the bumping of a metallic object down a flight of steps. The four
steps had been skipped. I reasoned that an iron bar, for instance, would
do something of the sort,--strike two or three steps, end down, then turn
over, jumping a few stairs, and landing with a thud.
Iron bars, however, do not fall down-stairs in the middle of the night
alone. Coupled with the figure on the veranda the agency by which it
climbed might be assumed. But--and here was the thing that puzzled
me most--the doors were all fastened that morning, the windows
unmolested, and the particular door from the card-room to the veranda
had a combination lock of which I held the key, and which had not
been tampered with.
I fixed on an attempt at burglary, as the most natural explanation--an
attempt frustrated by the falling of the object, whatever it was, that had
roused me. Two things I could not understand: how the intruder had

escaped with everything locked, and why he had left the small silver,
which, in the absence of a butler, had remained down-stairs over night.
Under pretext of learning more about the place, Thomas Johnson led
me through the house and the cellars, without result. Everything was in
good order and repair; money had been spent lavishly on construction
and plumbing. The house was full of conveniences, and I had no reason
to repent my bargain, save the fact that, in the nature of things, night
must come again. And other nights must follow--and we were a long
way from a police-station.
In the afternoon a hack came up from Casanova, with a fresh relay of
servants. The driver took them with a flourish to the servants' entrance,
and drove around to the front of the house, where I was awaiting him.
"Two dollars," he said in reply to my question. "I don't charge full rates,
because, bringin' 'em up all summer as I do, it pays to make a special
price. When they got off the train, I sez, sez I, `There's another bunch
for Sunnyside, cook, parlor maid and all.' Yes'm--six summers, and a
new lot never less than once a month. They won't stand for the country
and the lonesomeness, I reckon."
But with the presence of the "bunch" of servants my courage revived,
and late in the afternoon came a message from Gertrude that she and
Halsey would arrive that night at about eleven o'clock, coming in the
car from Richfield. Things were looking up; and when Beulah, my cat,
a most intelligent animal, found some early catnip on a bank near the
house and rolled in it in a feline ecstasy, I decided that getting back to
nature was the thing to do.
While I was dressing for dinner, Liddy rapped at the door. She was
hardly herself yet, but privately I think she was worrying about the
broken mirror and its augury, more than anything else. When she came
in she was holding something in her hand, and she laid it on the
dressing-table carefully.
"I found it in the linen hamper," she said. "It must be Mr. Halsey's, but
it seems queer how it got there."

It was the half of a link cuff-button of unique design, and I looked at it
carefully.
"Where was it? In the bottom of the hamper?" I asked.
"On the very top,"