The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [3835]
"Madam, do you recognize this?"
I took from my pocket the crushed mass of colored sugar and fruit I had picked up from the musty cushions of the old sofa in the walled-up room of the bungalow.
She took it and looked up, staring.
"It is one of them," she cried. "Where did you get it? You look as if--as if--"
"I had come upon a clue to Gwendolen? Madam, I believe I have. This candy has been held in a hot little hand. Miss Graham or one of the girls must have given it to her as she ran through the dining-room or across the side veranda on her way to the bungalow. She did not eat it offhand; she evidently fell asleep before eating it, but she clutched it very tight, only dropping it, I judge, when her muscles were quite relaxed by sleep; and then not far; the folds of her dress caught it, for--"
"What are you telling me?" The interruption was sudden, imperative. "I saw Gwendolen asleep; she held a string in her hand but no candy, and if she did--"
"Did you examine both hands, madam? Think! Great issues hang on a right settlement of this fact. Can you declare that she did not have this candy in one of her little hands?"
"No, I can not declare that."
"Then I shall always believe she did, and this same sweetmeat, this morsel from the table set for your guests on the afternoon of the sixteenth of this month, I found last night in the disused portion of the bungalow walled up by Mr. Ocumpaugh's father, but made accessible since by an opening let into the floor from the cellar. This latter I was enabled to reach by means of a trap-door concealed under the rug in the open part of this same building."
"I--I am all confused. Say that again," she pleaded, starting once more to her feet, but this time without meeting my eyes. "In the disused part of the bungalow? How came you there? No one ever goes there--it is a forbidden place."
"The child has been there--and lately."
"Oh!" her fingers began to tremble and twist themselves together. "You have something more than this to tell me. Gwendolen has been found and--" her looks became uncertain and wandered, as I thought, toward the river.
"She has not been found, but the woman who carried her into that place will soon be discovered."
"How? Why?"
I had risen by this time and could answer her on a level and face to face.
"Because the trail of her steps leads straight along the cellar floor. We have but to measure these footprints."
"And what?--what?"
"We find the abductor."
A silence, during which one long breath issued from her lips.
"Was it a man's or woman's steps?" she finally asked.
"A woman's, daintily shod; a woman of about the size of--"
"Who? Why do you play with my anguish?"
"Because I hate to mention the name of a friend."
"Ah! What do you know of my friends?"
"Not much. I happened to meet one of them, and as she is a very fine woman with exquisitely shod feet, I naturally think of her."
"What do you mean?" Her hand was on my arm, her face close to mine. "Speak! speak! the name!"
"Mrs. Carew."
I had purposely refrained up to this moment from bringing this lady, even by a hint, into the conversation. I did it now under an inner protest. But I had not dared to leave it out. The footprints I alluded to were startlingly like those left by her in other parts of the cellar floor; besides, I felt it my duty to see how Mrs. Ocumpaugh bore this name, notwithstanding my almost completely restored confidence in its owner.
She did not bear it well. She flushed and turned quickly from my side, walking away to the window, where she again took up her stand.
"You would have shown better taste by not following your first impulse," she remarked. "Mrs. Carew's footsteps in that old cellar! You presume, sir, and make me lose confidence in your judgment."
"Not at all. Mrs. Carew's feet have been all over that cellar floor. She accompanied me through it last night, at the time I found this crushed bonbon."
I could see that Mrs. Ocumpaugh