“He does.  It follows immediately on what I’ve read, and so the thing ends.”  And I sat looking at the little yellow volume.  “Where did you find it, Denny?” I said.

“Oh, on a shelf in the corner of the hall, between the Bible and a Life of Byron.”

I got up and walked back to the hall.  I looked round.  Euphrosyne was not there.  I inspected the hall door; it was still locked on the inside.  I mounted the stairs, and called at the door of her room; when no answer came I pushed it open and took the liberty of glancing round; she was not there.  I called again, for I thought she might have passed along the way over the hall and reached the roof, as she had done before.  This time I called loudly.  Silence followed for a moment.  Then came an answer, in a hurried, rather apologetic tone, “Here I am.”  But then the answer came, not from the direction that I had expected, but from the hall.  And looking over the balustrade, I saw Euphrosyne sitting in the armchair.

“This,” said I, going down-stairs, “taken in conjunction with this,” and I patted One-eyed Alexander’s book, which I held in my hand, “is certainly curious and suggestive.”  “Here I am,” said Euphrosyne, with an air that added, “I’ve not moved.  What are you shouting for?”

“Yes, but you weren’t there a minute ago,” I observed, reaching the hall and walking across to her.

She looked disturbed and embarrassed.

“Where have you been?” I asked.

“Must I give an account of every movement?” said she, trying to cover her confusion with a show of haughty offence.

The coincidence was really a remarkable one; it was as hard to account for Euphrosyne’s disappearance and reappearance as for the vanished head and body of old Stefan.  I had a conviction, based on a sudden intuition, that one explanation must lie at the root of both these curious things, that the secret of which Alexander spoke was a secret still hidden, hidden from my eyes but known to the girl before me, the daughter of the Stefanopouloi.

“I won’t ask you where you’ve been, if you don’t wish to tell me,” said I, carelessly.

She bowed her head in recognition of my indulgence.

“But there is one question I should like to ask you,” I pursued, “if you’ll be so kind as to answer it.”

“Well, what is it?”

“Where was Stefan Stefanopoulos killed, and what became of his body?”

As I put my question I flung One-eyed Alexander’s book open on the table beside her.

She started visibly, crying, “Where did you get that?”

I told her how Denny had found it, and I added: 

“Now, what does ‘beneath the earth’ mean?  You are one of the house, and you must know.”

“Yes, I know, but I must not tell you.  We are all bound by the most sacred oath to tell no one.”

“Who told you?”

“My uncle.  The boys of our house are told when they are fifteen, the girls when they are sixteen.  No one else knows.”