I wonder if she keeps up the business, and if
Clancy and Hale, together with Mrs. Herne, this supposititious
mother, have to do with the matter. That unfinished house
would make an admirable factory, and the presence of the
ghosts would be accounted for if a gang of coiners was
discovered there. But there is a fifteen-feet wall round the
house, and the park is a regular jungle. Cuthbert examined
the place by day and night and could see nothing suspicious.
I wonder if Miss Loach, living near the place, learned that a
gang was there. If so, it is quite conceivable that she might
have been murdered by one of them. But how the deuce did
anyone enter the house? The door certainly opened at
half-past ten o'clock, either to let someone in or someone
out. But the bell did not sound for half an hour later. Can
there be any outlet to that house, and is it connected with
the unfinished mansion of Lord Caranby, used as a factory?"
This was all theory, but Jennings could deduce no other
explanation from the evidence he had collected. He determined
to search the unfinished house, since Caranby had given him
permission, and also to make an inspection of Rose Cottage,
though how he was to enter on a plausible excuse he did not
know. But Fate gave him a chance which he was far from
expecting. On arriving at the "Shrine of the Muses" he was
informed that Miss Saxon had gone to Rexton. This was natural
enough, since she owned the cottage, but Jennings was inclined
to suspect Juliet from her refusal to marry Cuthbert or to
explain her reason, and saw something suspicious in all she
did.
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