VI

Vera, left to await results, got up and dressed.

She glanced over once or twice at the door. It was a good solid door. It was both bolted and locked and had an oak chair wedged under the handle.

It could not be broken open by force. Certainly not by Dr Armstrong. He was not a physically powerful man.

If she were Armstrong intent on murder, it was cunning that she would employ, not force.

She amused herself by reflecting on the means he might employ.

He might, as Philip had suggested, announce that one of the other two men was dead. Or he might possibly pretend to be mortally wounded himself, might drag himself groaning to her door.

There were other possibilities. He might inform her that the house was on fire. More, he might actually set the house on fire… Yes, that would be a possibility. Lure the other two men out of the house, then, having previously laid a trail of petrol, he might set light to it. And she, like an idiot, would remain barricaded in her room until it was too late.

She crossed over to the window. Not too bad. At a pinch one could escape that way. It would mean a drop—but there was a handy flower-bed.

She sat down and picking up her diary began to write in it in a clear flowing hand.

One must pass the time.

Suddenly she stiffened to attention. She had heard a sound. It was, she thought, a sound like breaking glass. And it came from somewhere downstairs.

She listened hard, but the sound was not repeated.

She heard, or thought she heard, stealthy sounds of footsteps, the creak of stairs, the rustle of garments—but there was nothing definite and she concluded, as Blore had done earlier, that such sounds had their origin in her own imagination.

But presently she heard sounds of a more concrete nature. People moving about downstairs—the murmur of voices. Then the very decided sound of someone mounting the stairs—doors opening and shutting—feet going up to the attics overhead. More noises from there.

Finally the steps came along the passage. Lombard’s voice said:

‘Vera. You all right?’

‘Yes. What happened?’

Blore’s voice said:

‘Will you let us in?’

Vera went to the door. She removed the chair, unlocked the door and slid back the bolt. She opened the door. The two men were breathing hard, their feet and the bottom of their trousers were soaking wet.

She said again:

‘What’s happened?’

Lombard said:

‘Armstrong’s disappeared…’

VII

Vera cried:

‘What?’

Lombard said:

‘Vanished clean off the island.’

Blore concurred:

‘Vanished—that’s the word! Like some damned conjuring trick.’

Vera said impatiently:

‘Nonsense! He’s hiding somewhere!’

Blore said:

‘No, he isn’t! I tell you, there’s nowhere to hide on this island. It’s as bare as your hand! There’s moonlight outside. As clear as day it is. And he’s not to be found.’

Vera said:

‘He doubled back to the house.’

Blore said:

‘We thought of that. We’ve searched the house, too. You must have heard us. He’s not here, I tell you. He’s gone—

clean vanished, vamoosed…’

Vera said incredulously:

‘I don’t believe it.’

Lombard said:

‘It’s true, my dear.’

He paused and then said:

‘There’s one other little fact. A pane in the dining-room window has been smashed—and there are only three little soldier boys on the table.’

Chapter 15

I

Three people sat eating breakfast in the kitchen.

Outside, the sun shone. It was a lovely day. The storm was a thing of the past.

And with the change in the weather, a change had come in the mood of the prisoners on the island.

They felt now like people just awakening from a nightmare. There was danger, yes, but it was danger in daylight. That paralysing atmosphere of fear that had wrapped them round like a blanket yesterday while the wind howled outside was gone.

Lombard said:

‘We’ll try heliographing today with a mirror from the highest point of the island. Some bright lad wandering on the cliff will recognise SOS when he sees it, I hope. In the evening we could try a bonfire—only there isn’t much wood—and anyway they might just think it was song and dance and merriment.’

Vera said:

‘Surely someone can read Morse. And then they’ll come to take us off. Long before this evening.’

Lombard said:

‘The weather’s cleared all right, but the sea hasn’t gone down yet. Terrific swell on! They won’t be able to get a boat near the island before tomorrow.’

Vera cried:

‘Another night in this place!’

Lombard shrugged his shoulders.

‘May as well face it! Twenty-four hours will do it, I think. If we can last out that, we’ll be all right.’

Blore cleared his throat. He said:

‘We’d better come to a clear understanding. What’s happened to Armstrong?

Lombard said:

‘Well, we’ve got one piece of evidence. Only three little soldier boys left on the dinner-table. It looks as though

Armstrong had got his quietus.’

Vera said:

‘Then why haven’t you found his dead body?’

Blore said:

‘Exactly.’

Lombard shook his head. He said:

‘It’s damned odd—no getting over it.’

Blore said doubtfully:

‘It might have been thrown into the sea.’

Lombard said sharply:

‘By whom? You? Me? You saw him go out of the front door. You come along and find me in my room. We go out and search together. When the devil had I time to kill him and carry his body round the island?’

Blore said:

‘I don’t know. But I do know one thing.’

Lombard said:

‘What’s that?’

Blore said:

‘The revolver. It was your revolver. It’s in your possession now. There’s nothing to show that it hasn’t been in your possession all along.’

‘Come now, Blore, we were all searched.’

‘Yes, you’d hidden it away before that happened. Afterwards you just took it back again.’

‘My good blockhead, I swear to you that it was put back in my drawer. Greatest surprise I ever had in my life when I found it there.’

Blore said:

‘You ask us to believe a thing like that! Why the devil should Armstrong, or anyone else for that matter, put it back?’

Lombard raised his shoulders hopelessly.

‘I haven’t the least idea. It’s just crazy. The last thing one would expect. There seems no point in it.’

Blore agreed.

‘No, there isn’t. You might have thought of a better story.’

‘Rather proof that I’m telling the truth, isn’t it?’

‘I don’t look at it that way.’

Philip said:

‘You wouldn’t.’

Blore said:

‘Look here, Mr Lombard, if you’re an honest man, as you pretend—’

Philip murmured:

‘When did I lay claims to being an honest man? No, indeed, I never said that.’

Blore went on stolidly:

‘If you’re speaking the truth—there’s only one thing to be done. As long as you have that revolver, Miss Claythorne and I are at your mercy. The only fair thing is to put that revolver with the other things that are locked up—and you and I will hold the two keys still.’

Philip Lombard lit a cigarette.

As he puffed smoke, he said:

‘Don’t be an ass.’

‘You won’t agree to that?’

‘No, I won’t. That revolver’s mine. I need it to defend myself— and I’m going to keep it.’

Blore said:

‘In that case we’re bound to come to one conclusion.’

‘That I’m U. N. Owen? Think what you damned well please. But I’ll ask you, if that’s so, why I didn’t pot you with the revolver last night? I could have, about twenty times over.’

Blore shook his head.

He said:

‘I don’t know—and that’s a fact. You must have had some reason.’

Vera had taken no part in the discussion. She stirred now and said:

‘I think you’re both behaving like a pair of idiots.’

Lombard looked at her.

‘What’s this?’

Vera said:

‘You’ve forgotten the nursery rhyme. Don’t you see there’s a clue there?’

She recited in a meaning voice:

‘Four little soldier boys going out to sea;

A red herring swallowed one and then there were Three.’

She went on:

‘A red herring—that’s the vital clue. Armstrong’s not dead… He took away the china soldier to make you think he was. You may say what you like—Armstrong’s on the island still. His disappearance is just a red herring across the track…’

Lombard sat down again.

He said:

‘You know, you may be right.’

Blore said:

‘Yes, but if so, where is he? We’ve searched the place.

Outside and inside.’

Vera said scornfully:

‘We all searched for the revolver, didn’t we, and couldn’t find it? But it was somewhere all the time!’

Lombard murmured:

‘There’s a slight difference in size, my dear, between a man and a revolver.’

Vera said:

‘I don’t care—I’m sure I’m right.’

Blore murmured:

‘Rather giving himself away, wasn’t it? Actually mentioning a red herring in the verse. He could have written it up a bit different.’

Vera cried:

‘But don’t you see, he’s mad? It’s all mad! The whole thing of going by the rhyme is mad! Dressing up the judge, killing Rogers when he was chopping sticks—drugging Mrs Rogers so that she overslept herself—arranging for a bumble bee when Miss Brent died! It’s like some horrible child playing a game. It’s all got to fit in.’

Blore said:

‘Yes, you’re right.’ He thought a minute. ‘At any rate there’s no zoo on the island. He’ll have a bit of trouble getting over that.’

Vera cried:

‘Don’t you see? We’re the Zoo… Last night, we were hardly human any more. We’re the Zoo…’