"But he's got to be there!"
"This is all there was," the officer reported. A golf ball fell outof his hand and trickled across the grass.
Again Byles's jaw came out Again his glance travelled round the group.
"I warn you," he said. "If there's been any conspiracy..." He stopped. "If any of you helped him, or you're all pledged to swear he went into that pool when he really didn't..."
"Will you let me answer that?" demanded Cy.
"You have the floor, Mr. Norton."
"Awhile ago," Cy answered, "you paid me a compliment about not losing my head. All right" He paused for a moment. "Mr. Manning did go in. There were then four persons in the pool. Only three of them came out"
He looked at Betterton, at Davis, and at Jean.
"When those three did come out," Cy went on, "I had them under my eye the whole time. They were never out of my sight There has been no conspiracy, and certainly none to swear Mr. Manning never dived in. All this is true, so help me God."
Cy stood there quietly, lean in his black trunks, the long white scar across his ribs. His voice carried such conviction that Byles's reply was quiet
"But that can't be," Byles assured him. "Why not?"
"Because it's impossible!"
"The old sweet song," observed H.M., in a voice like one who begins intoning a hymn. "Burn me, I'm haunted by it! I can't get away from it"
"Wait a minute." Byles spoke softly, and snapped his fingers. "This isn't in my department"—again human nature broke through his expression—"but I'm a little interested. There's an explanation so obvious that I never thought of it!"
Cy started. Officer O'Casey dragged himself up and trotted round the pool to put on his clothes.
"What explanation?" Cy asked.
"There's a secret exit out of the pool. Below the level of the water."
"Mr. Byles, there isn't!" exclaimed Jean. She had gone to her bathing cabin for a robe, and returned wearing it "There's only an inlet and an outlet The inlet has an iron grating and a filter. The outlet has an iron grating. And neither of them is more than eight inches across!"
"Forgive me, Miss Manning, but I wasn't thinking about inlets or outlets."
'Then what were you thinking of?"
"Now why," said Byles, with eyelids half-closed, "did your father have this pool built of stone and not tile?"
Jean shook back her yellow hair, a blaze under the sun.
"But... the pool was built ages and ages ago!" she answered. "I think the main reason was that we all liked underwater games. You throw in a handful of golf balls (the non-floating ones), and see who can bring up the most. Or there's a game called Tom-Tom-Pullaway, where two teams..."
"Is your father a good swimmer?"
"Well, he's all right," Jean said dubiously. "I mean, he can swim. But he hates exercise, except with dumbbells and things."
"Can you let the water out of this pool?"
"Yes! Easily!" said Jean. "Go up to the house"— she pointed—"and find a little old man named Stuffy, in a white coat. He's the houseman. He'll show you how."
"Ferris!" Byles turned round to the second motorcycle policeman, an alert young man who ached for action. "Find this man Stuffy, and have the water let out of the pool."
'Yes, sir!"
"And now," continued Byles, slapping his hat against his side, "I think I can imagine how this exit worked. Yes! You see, Sir Henry..." He stopped. "H.M.!" he said in a louder voice than he had ever used here. "Where the devil's H.M.?"
It did in fact appear, for a second or two, that H.M. had vanished like Manning. But he was only sitting in the padded swing with the canopy, deep in thought, with a malignant scowl fixed on the pruning shears, the blades of which he was absentmindedly snapping back and forth.
The shears, though not new, had sharp and polished blade edges. They were bone dry, though the hinge pin was oiled. In H.M.'s hands they looked like a weapon. Byles had to shout to wake him.
"Hey?" grunted H.M., lifting his eyes and putting down the shears.
"I have here"—Byles tapped his inside pocket— "a subpoena ordering Manning to turn over all his books—his accounting books, I mean—to the District Attorney's Office. Unfortunately..."
Howard Betterton, now smoking a cigar, was instantly beside him.
"I was going to ask you, Mr. Byles," said Betterton, "what authority you have in Westchester County."
Byles smiled. "That can wait for our conference. If s annoying, but not important, if I can't serve the subpoena myself..."
"It's annoyin' to you, is it?" bellowed H.M., with such a blast that both lawyers stepped back. "What do you think it is to the old man?"
"But why should Manning's disappearance ... ?"
"He flum-diddled ME," said H.M., using full capital letters as he drew himself up and tapped himself on the chest. "The blighter challenged me to watch him, and then hocussed me fair and square. Of course, last night before dinner, he told one thumping big lie—lefs call it a piece of misdirection—which same I was waiting for. But this morning! Oh, my eye!
"He sort of tenderly hands me these shears," continued H.M., "and says to keep 'em as a souvenir. And then in he goes. That's his idea of a joke. Now I'm mad. Now I am goin' to get him."
"That's good news," smiled the District Attorney. "I don't really think we'll need your help,
H.M. but have you got the mystery solved already?"
With a faint noise like heavy suction in the pool, which was followed by just as faint a rattle and then a rush, the water level quivered.
"Well... no," growled H.M. "I haven't exactly solved it, y'see. But I've got at least three leads, whackin' great clues that'll unearth lots more clues if I use the spade right."
The water level in the pool was now slowly descending.
"What clues?" Byles asked sharply.
"To begin with," said H.M., ruffling his hands over his big bald head, "I was just thinking of a bust of Robert Browning."
The two lawyers looked at each other without enlightenment
"Really!" said Crystal Manning, and drew her robe close. "Will someone please tell my why Browning keeps butting into this? Couldn't we have Tennyson for a change?"
H.M. looked at her over his spectacles.
"You're a very clever gal, my wench," he said seriously.
Crystal made that sort of curtsey which used to indicate, "Thank you, sir." "When your old man quoted Browning last night"— H.M. pointed at her—"you spotted The Flight of the Duchess' straightaway. I wonder if you spotted anything else?"
"But of course not'" said Crystal, opening wide her dark blue eyes. "What on earth was there?"
"I think we can omit Browning," Byles intervened impatiently. "Forget Browning! What are these other clues"—his tone was not without sarcasm—"you seem to think are so important?"
H.M. Nodded towards the pool. Hat, shoes, gardener's gloves, coat and trousers, scarf, underpants were now swirling round as the water descended.
"I think," H.M. told Byles, "there's something in that pool." "What's that?"
"Easy, now! Lemme finish! When the pool's drained, there'll be a lot of paper bits, little things like that, clogged up to the mouth of the inlet."
"Well?"
"I want you to find me," H.M. considered, "a piece of paper, several times folded, about six inches long and about an inch wide. It may be longer."
"But why the hell do you want that?"
"Because I'm the old-man," said H.M. austerely. "It's awful important, son. Will you have 'em look for it?"
"All right I suppose so. Is there anything else you want?"
H.M.'s roving eye encountered the figure of Officer O'Casey, now fully dressed, as O'Casey marched straight towards them. Officer O'Casey, teeth gritted so that he would not look at H.M, approached Byles.