The Safety Pin | Page 6

his knees and looked slowly and significantly from Belling to Shelmore and from Shelmore to Miss Pretty.
"She thinks he'd got in bed and had got out again pretty quick!" he said, in a sort of dramatic stage aside. "Ah! And what made you think that, Mary?" he went on, turning again to the chambermaid. "You have reasons?"
"Well, sir, when I looked more closely at it, the bed didn't look to me as if it had been slept in all night," answered Mary. "There was just one dint in the top pillow. The sheets were quite straight and uncreased. It was just as if the gentleman had got into bed, bethought himself of something, got up again, and never gone back."
Mellapont slapped his knees again.
"Admirable!" he exclaimed. "Admirable! Mr. Deane went to bed and immediately got up again! Now Mary, you're evidently a girl who keeps her eyes open. When you took Mr. Deane his hot milk where did you set down your tray?"
"On the dressing table, sir, close by where he was sitting in an easy chair, reading."
"Did you notice anything on that dressing table? You did, of course. What, now?"
"Well, sir. I couldn't help noticing--they were there in the middle. A gold watch and chain, a diamond pin, and some rings--diamond rings, I think."
"He wore two diamond rings--valuable," murmured Miss Pretty.
"Just so," said Mellapont. "And now, Mary, were these things on the dressing table when you went in next morning?"
"Oh, no, sir!--there was nothing there! Except brushes and combs and that sort of thing. No valuables, sir."
Mellapont turned and nodded two or three times at Shelmore.
"Nothing could be plainer." he said, in a low confidential voice. "Mr. Deane got up, dressed himself, even to the putting on of his jewellery, and went out--that night! Mary!"
"Sir!"
"I take it that you have charge of the corridor, or passage, or whatever it is, in which the bedroom number seven is situate?"
"Yes, sir. It's the first floor. There are six rooms--numbers three, five, seven on one side; four, six, eight on the other."
"What time did you go off duty that night?"
"Usual time, sir--half-past-eleven."
"Now, then!--did you ever see Mr. Deane leave his room?"
"No, sir--certainly not!"
"Supposing he'd wanted anything after you went off duty--who'd he have got it from?"
"Kight, the night porter, sir. Any bell from the bedrooms is answered after eleven-thirty by Kight."
Mellapont turned to Belling with a wave of his hand.
"Now--Kight!" he commanded. "Kight!" Belling nodded to the chambermaid. "Send him here, Mary," he said. "At once." When the chambermaid had gone, silence fell in the private parlour. It was largely caused by the behaviour of Mellapont, who folded his arms across his broad chest, turned his face towards the ceiling and, fixing his eyes on some real or imaginary spot, seemed to lose himself in profound meditation. He only came to earth again when a stockily-built man in a green apron entered the room and looked enquiringly at Belling.
"The superintendent wants to ask you a question or two, Kight," said the landlord.
Mellapont turned on the night porter--less critically than on the chambermaid. He put his first question with seeming carelessness.
"You're on duty from eleven-thirty to seven, aren't you, Kight?" he asked.
"No, sir! Eleven o'clock at night to eight o'clock in the morning."
"Half-an-hour's difference one way and an hour's the other, eh? All right!--anyway you were on duty on Monday night?"
"As usual, sir."
"Do you know Mr. Deane--the gentleman in number seven?"
"Yes, sir. Saw him say good-night to Mr. Belling when he went upstairs Monday night."
"Did you ever see him come down again that night?"
"I did not, sir."
"Nor early next morning?"
"No, sir."
"Never saw him at all during the night?"
"Never set eyes on the gentleman, sir, after I saw him go upstairs."
"Could he have come down and gone out without your seeing him?"
"It's hard to see how he could, sir. In fact, in an ordinary way, impossible."
"Why, now?--why impossible?"
"Well, sir, the guv'nor there'll understand. You see, this old courtyard outside makes a sort of main passage through the house, from front to back. There's a front entrance to it, as you know, into the High Street; there's a back entrance into Sepulchre Alley. Both entrances are closed at eleven o'clock, when I come on duty: it's my first job to close them. Half-way up the courtyard I've a little room, the door of which is always open. If anybody wants to get in during the night--late travellers, motorists, cyclists, and such-like--they have to ring me up from outside. Same way, if anybody wanted to go out, I'd have to open a door for 'em. Though, to be sure, there is a way out without bothering me--if anybody knows it."
"Ah, there's a way out without bothering you, is there, Kight?" said Mellapont. "And what's that, pray?"
"Well, sir, in our back entrance into Sepulchre Alley there's a