Missing or Murdered Read Online Free PDF

and soda and went to bed.”
    â€œYou didn’t see him next morning?”
    â€œNo. I was busy in the cellar. Mary waited on him and saw he had all he wanted for breakfast.”
    â€œGood. I’ll interrogate her later. I’d like to see his room. I believe you said he’d left his luggage?”
    â€œYes, his bag is there just as he left it. No one has touched it.”
    â€œAnyone occupying that particular room now?”
    â€œNo. No one has occupied it since he left. Mary Standish found this signet-ring on the wash-hand-stand the same morning. She told me about it and we left it there until next day. When Lord Bygrave didn’t come back I took charge of it.”
    â€œI’ll take possession of it for the present,” said the inspector, examining the ring closely. “I believe that’s the crest of the Bygraves.”
    George Lawless picked up a key from a table, and together the two men went upstairs to a room on the first floor. In a corner of the apartment stood a capacious leather kit-bag.
    â€œThere’s his luggage—just as he left it. I tried it, to see if it was locked, but found that it was open. Nothing inside has been touched.”
    The inspector lifted the kit-bag and brought it into the centre of the room. Unfastening the straps he opened it and carefully turned out the contents on the floor. Shirts, collars, socks, underclothes, a safety razor and strop, tooth-brush, hair-brushes, soap, etc., a suit of light-coloured Harris tweeds, a pair of walking shoes, a pair of morocco slippers, pyjamas, a bunch of keys attached to a key chain and a pound tin of tobacco which had been broken formed the main contents. Inspector Heather had just arranged these articles on the floor when the door of the bedroom opposite opened and there emerged into the corridor Mr. Algernon Vereker, wiping his hands with a towel.
    â€œYou lose no time, inspector,” he remarked. “I didn’t expect you down here to-day.”
    Inspector Heather smiled. “Can’t allow you too long a start, Mr. Vereker,” he remarked jocularly.
    â€œOh, I haven’t left the mark yet. But I may as well jump off now. I see you are having a look through Bygrave’s kit. I’ll take an inventory too—as his executor I suppose I ought to, in case of eventualities.”
    Vereker, having dried his hands, threw his towel through the open door of his bedroom and came and watched the inspector making a detailed list of Lord Bygrave’s personal belongings.
    â€œHave you emptied the canvas pocket?” he asked.
    â€œIs there one?” asked the inspector in turn.
    â€œOh, yes; rather neatly concealed. I’ve often borrowed that bag.”
    The inspector promptly examined the interior more carefully and, thrusting in his hand, produced a slim, well-worn notebook.
    â€œBy Jove, a diary—I hope it’s modernly indiscreet!” exclaimed Vereker. “But it’s a foolish hope, I’m afraid—Bygrave was a gentleman.”
    The notebook, however, merely contained a mass of lead-pencil jottings, the rough unpolished notes of an ardent and patient naturalist, of bird life, etc. They were all dated and referred to observations taken in the Western Islands of Scotland during a holiday the previous year. The officer tossed it over to Vereker with a disappointed shrug of his shoulders.
    â€œAn ordinary diary might have been of great use,” he said quickly.
    â€œNow, let’s start making brilliant deductions, inspector,” said Vereker.
    â€œFire away, Mr. Vereker,” replied Heather, his eyes moving from one article to another on the floor as he jotted the items down in his notebook.
    â€œThen I must withdraw the ‘brilliant’; I was leaning on you for all the sparkle, inspector. But to business! I deduce Lord Bygrave was in a hurry on the morning of his departure.”
    â€œGood, Mr. Vereker. You came to that conclusion