‘We have not found any place where Miss Cara could have met with a fatal accident. It seems likely that she had been in these passages, but I think we must conclude that she died, or was murdered, elsewhere. I do not think it possible that her body could have been taken to where it was found by way of the steep steps and narrow passages which we have traversed. There would have been a great deal more than a little dust upon her clothing if that had been the case. She may have walked through one of the passages, but I think her body must have been brought back by some easier way.’
Thoughts which Stephen had been holding by main force thrust past his desperate guard. By what way had Candida gone – by what way had she been taken? And if they found her, what was it they would find – herself, or only the body she had worn? He had no answer to these things. He said harshly, ‘Miss Silver is right. If there was such a thing as the Benevento Treasure, it wouldn’t have been hidden where anyone who knew the house might stumble on it. And if Miss Cara came by her death whilst she was looking for it, she must certainly have been taken back into the house by some easier way than the one by which we have come. Only as to where she was murdered – if she really was murdered – there simply isn’t any evidence. And what does it matter? What we have to do is to find this other hiding-place – if it exists.’
He had started out to say, ‘What we have to do is to find Candida,’ but he couldn’t say it. He turned abruptly and went back along the passage leading to the steps. There was something – passed over at the time but coming back as one of those impressions which come, and go, and come again. It was something to do with the passage. The light had been focussed ahead of him as they came through it, the cellar door had been in view. Now it was the passage itself which had his whole attention – rough brick walls, propped by wooden posts and crossed between every two posts by a wooden lateral. Old cottages had half-timbering like that, but what was it doing in an underground passage?
The answer came with the question. One of these squares could be a door.
The light ran up and down, and there was the latch, fitted smoothly against one of the wooden uprights. A turn of the hand and the door swung outwards. He stooped, and came up again. The lifted lamp showed him where he was – in the main cellar of Underhill.
Chapter Forty
It was all to do again. And there was no clue. As the others came through the gap and joined him, Stephen was looking about him with something very like despair in his heart. This was the main cellar of the house, with an easy flight of steps going up to a passage behind the kitchen, and a second flight which led to the courtyard at the side of the house. Along the far wall there was a row of doors. When Miss Olivia had brought him down here she had dismissed them briefly.
‘The wine-cellar. Coals. Wood. The others are empty.’
He had not been permitted to examine any of them. When he had said bluntly that he could not make a satisfactory report without a much more detailed examination he had been put in what Miss Olivia considered to be his place. Any of the cellars might conceal an opening, and ‘The wine-cellar is locked.’ He found he was saying these words aloud.
It was Miss Silver who answered him.
‘Is it your opinion that the entrance to this hiding-place would be in a locked cellar? It is not mine.’
‘Why?’
She said in her usual composed manner,
‘It would attract too much attention. The locked room would be the very first to be investigated. The aim would rather be to put the Treasure in a place which would attract no attention at all.’
Stephen said bitterly. “This place is about thirty by twenty – there is plenty of choice.’
She came nearer to him and put a hand on his arm.
‘Have you thought about the steps – the ones coming down from the house? Or the others?’
He stared at her.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I talked to Anna. She is in great distress about Candida. She has grown fond of her. I asked her whether she could bear to think for the rest of her life that she might have saved her and had refrained. She cried bitterly, and said what could she do? She was very much afraid. She said, “They would kill me!” I told her that she would be protected, and that she must tell what she knew. She declared with vehemence that she knew nothing – only that there were secret places, and that she had seen the dust on Miss Cara’s shoes, and that she was very much afraid. When I pressed her she said it was because of what old Mr. Benevent had told her.’
They were all listening, but as far as she and Stephen Eversley were concerned they might have been alone. He reached out and took her by the arm.
‘What did he tell her?’
Miss Silver repeated what Anna had said.
‘He was very old, and he used to talk about the Treasure. He said it was quite safe in a secret place – “A man may walk over it and not know it is there. He may go up, and he may go down, and he will not know. And if he knew, and if he went, it would never do him any good.” There is a rhyme about it, you know, among the family papers:
‘ “Touch not nor try,
Sell not not buy,
Give not nor take,
For dear life’s sake.” ’
His hand closed on her. He said in a hard voice,
‘An old man in his dotage babbling. What a clue!’
‘Old men remember the past.’
‘Say it again.’
She repeated the words.
‘ “A man may walk over it and he will not know. He may go up and he may go down, and he will not know.” ’
He let go of her abruptly and went over to the steps which led to the house, but before reaching them he swerved and crossed diagonally to the flight which gave upon the courtyard. It was set in a corner, but a little away from the wall. There was a space there wide enough for a man to enter. A little straw lay about, as if carelessly dropped. It was old trodden straw. He came into the narrow place with the electric lamp in his hand. He may go up, and he may go down, and he will not know. This unregarded corner might be passed a thousand times. The steps were of stone – old steps, hollowed by the passing of many feet. The wall on the other side was also of stone – big square blocks of it, quarried from the hill beyond and set in place three hundred, four hundred years ago. If there were a secret entrance to Ugo di Benevento’s hiding-place it might very well be here. A tunnel dug from this point would pass under the courtyard. There might be such a tunnel. The steps would screen it. His mind was quite clear, quite logical. A hundred men might search for a hundred days and never find the entrance. The light passed backwards and forwards, up and down. It showed stone and straw, and a little round black thing that lay at his foot. He stooped and picked it up, and it was a shoe-button. Just an ordinary black shoe-button.
He held it in the palm of his hand and the light fell on it. Miss Silver’s voice seemed to come from a long way off. ‘What is it?’
He turned so that she could see the button on his palm. ‘Candida has shoes with a strap and a button like this.’ The words horrified him. If Candida had come this way, how had she come? And why had the button come off her shoe? Frightful images rose before his thought. If she had been dragged along this rough floor, the button might have caught and been wrenched -
Miss Silver said quickly and insistently, ‘It means that this is the place. It means that we are on the right track.’
Mr. Tampling was at some disadvantage. Both the Chief Constable and Inspector Rock were taller than he was, especially the Inspector. He really could not see what was happening. It occurred to him that if he went a little way up the steps he would be able to see very well. He saw Miss Silver step aside, and he saw the Inspector take the lamp whilst Stephen Eversley examined the wall. There was no hand-rail to the steps, so to be sure of keeping his balance Mr. Tampling kneeled down upon the fifth step, which gave him a very good view. He heard the Chief Constable say, ‘Well, it all looks as solid as the Cathedral to me.’