The Lost Valley

I must say that Moira played up well to my lead. She was naturally upset at what she had gone through, and the sergeant, I fancy, made allowance for this, and attributed any trifling discrep

thing more than a benefactor to me; but I did not make the radical mistake of treating Bryce's death too lightly. I rather flatter myself that I mixed my sorrow and my common sense in just the right proportions. It was different

e enquired into my past life, asked me how long I had been with Bryce, and

end of my father's, and naturally th

ind of that everything was up with us, and our hastily-built castle of cards would come tumbling to the ground. While I was thinking of this it struck me al

anything to do with the burglary

?" the serge

heard of it," the man said. "Why wasn't it r

you." And here I looked warningly at Moira. She gave no sign that she had notice

down," the man ran on, "but all t

e time that you people hadn't followed the matter up. I meant to ask Mr. Bryce about it, but the matter wen

," the sergeant suggested, "it might help us a b

that he would be difficult to recognise. I was swayed by cautiousness more than anything else at the moment, but I fancy that deep down in my mind was a primiti

ant when I'd finished. "It looks as if he

yce there wasn't any

ast," the man said in a half-w

m for a good many years, and my father knew him before that. But of course I've been in the Islan

"We'll see what Miss

enemies that you kno

"My uncle was the kindest of men," she said. "I can c

telling the exact truth. But we strove, rather successfully as it now appears, to twist the truth to suit ourselves without actually telling a downright lie, and we did it in a way that seemed

r. Bryce's niece, i

," I said, an

points on his fingers, "you are an old frie

so," I

hing

test doubt at the back of my mind. He spoke as if he

smiling. It was just the sort of smile that one would e

that I made no attempt to h

ied quickly, her face pali

oment. "He's guessed that we're engaged, Moira," I said. And the

," I rattled on, "but-well, I suppose we're all you

r and his own ready stumbling into the trap I had not set for him, he now looked upon me as nothing more than a love-sick youth with no eyes for anyone or anything save the girl who occupied his heart. If the man could only have seen what was in my min

ice. "We police have certain duties to carry out, but we're human after all, and a

ith gratitude that was

let had entered the wall of the chest a little too close to the heart to be pleasant. The doctor did

hanging limply in the chair, the lifeless clay scarcely yet cold, it came to me with something of the clearness of prophecy that this was not the end but the beginning of the play. It was something closely akin to second sight, and for the moment the spaciousness of the vision that I saw but dimly thrilled me with its possibilities. I knew, though how I knew I cannot say even at this distant date, that the calm, silent policemen with their helmets in their hands, the earnest, energetic divisional surgeon, and his confrère the sergeant, even the dead man himself, were but the

tor and the two policemen between them were lifting Bryce out of the chair he would never more occupy,

present," I whispered to the sergeant. The man nodded

if you could go to

an't, Jim. It's no good trying t

nderstand,"

loss. He's gone out of my life, and I'll never meet anyone who'll quite take his place. I can't put what I mean into so many words, but I think you can understand. You're quick a

evening four-or was it five?-years ago, and in the light of

t our being engaged. But I had to be as natural as I could, and

ith unutterable things in the d

id slowly, "that yo

f mine, but some sub-conscious sense in me i

e hall, and knew that the servants had just c

"You'd better tell them, and

went down the h

n fine, was that Bryce was dead and buried, and the police admitted that they held no clue to the identity of the murderer. Motive there was none as far as they could see, and the whole affair looked like one of these senseless crim

y enough in truth. The bulk of this went to Moira, with the curious proviso that she could not invest it in any way without first submitting the proposal to me and receiving my sanction. The wi

but then there was no reason why she should have been anything else. Any strain that there had been, and was still for that matter,

was said and done there could be no denying that things were far from satisfactory. Neither of us made any further reference to my bare-faced lying on that ill-starred night, but the more I though

ment of my plans and that brought us, willy-nilly, to the Valley-for so I still persist in calling it, as if there were not a

nnounced that I was going the next eve

w I could never seem to summon up enough courage. It's about Uncle and ..

n," I

documents in his room that would help us to take up the work where he left

ey are still ther