Mystery Villa Read Online Free PDF Page B

voice of Sergeant Wild broke the tension.
    â€˜Ain’t the old lady in, miss?’ he asked, and the commonplace, ordinary question, and the everyday tone in which it was asked, seemed alike incredible to Bobby; and yet, at the same time, served, as it were, to bring him back into touch with ordinary life.
    Wild, in fact, was feeling a little pleased at Bobby’s silence. He took it as indicating that this smart young Yard chap realised the lead ought to be left to the senior and more experienced man, even if that senior had happened to spend all his service in the uniform branch, and none the worse for that, either. Of course, such an attitude was only right, but some of those C.I.D. chaps were a bit pushing, and thought no one counted but themselves, so it was quite gratifying, Wild fell, to find one who understood the uniform branch mattered, too. Moreover, from where Wild stood, a little to one side and a trifle behind Bobby, he could not see the girl so plainly, nor recognise as plainly as could Bobby those signs and tokens of an awful terror that she displayed so clearly.
    â€˜No... No.’ She answered his question now. ‘There’s no one here but me... no one at all... no one...’
    She shuddered as she spoke, and somehow Bobby was on the instant quite certain that what she said was not true, as instinctively as he knew, also, that only most dire necessity had induced her so to lie. ‘You mean... Miss Barton?’ she asked, her voice controlled by an effort so intense and violent, Bobby wondered so small and slight and frail a body could produce it.
    â€˜Is that the party’s name, miss?’ Wild asked, in his most benevolent, fatherly voice, for all he saw was a pretty young girl naturally a little startled by the abrupt appearance of two strange men. ‘It’s about the football, miss,’ he went on, ‘some of those boys have been and kicked through your window, and a good hiding’s what they want, if you ask me. Though I’m not saying liking a bit of fun isn’t natural enough when you’re young, as you’ll know yourself, miss,’ he added, in polite recognition of his listener’s youth. ‘But, all the same, there’s limits, and I’ll see if I can’t get a plain-clothes man put on here for a while, to stop the annoyance.’
    He paused then, a faintly puzzled look on his broad, good-humoured face suggesting that he was beginning to be vaguely aware of something somehow out of tune somewhere in his amiable chatter, and, indeed, to Bobby it had sounded as grotesquely, almost as indecently incongruous, as jest and song would have seemed by a deathbed, so that he had wished to stop it by some word or gesture of protest. But on the girl this flow of everyday commonplace had evidently a reassuring effect, and though the terror was still in her eyes, the deathly pallor in her cheeks, her voice was better under control as she said:
    â€˜Oh, yes... the football... yes. I’ll get it for you, shall I?’
    Without waiting for an answer, she turned and disappeared into the house, leaving Bobby and Wild standing there.
    â€˜Rum start,’ commented Wild. ‘Fancy a smart girl like that being here! Wonder if she’s a relative or what?’
    Bobby did not answer. He was staring into the dreary interior of the house, noting the dust that lay so thickly everywhere, the cobwebs that hung like a black tapestry on the walls, the hat-and umbrella-stand where busy spiders had spun great webs between hats unworn for half a century, and sticks and umbrellas untouched for as long, and asking himself how, into that drear, bizarre picture of neglect, there had come to fit itself such a picture of bright youth and beauty. He noticed that, on the right, a door was open, and that just within was piled an inconceivable confusion of bills, letters, circulars, papers of all sorts and kinds, none opened, all apparently thrown in there out