In the dim place there were signs of a desperate struggle.  The rugs and cushions of Miss Falconer’s automobile were scattered far and wide.  The gray car had vanished; and in the center of the floor was Georges, the chauffeur, lying on his back with arms extended, staring up at the ceiling with wide, unseeing blue eyes.

CHAPTER XVI

“I MUST GO ON”

Kneeling by the young man’s side, I felt for his pulse; but the moment that my fingers touched his cold wrist I knew the truth.  There flashed into my mind queerly, as things do at grim moments, an often-heard expression about rigor mortis setting in.  With this poor fellow it had not started, but he was dead for all that.  The most skilful surgeon in Europe could not have helped him now.

I never doubted that it was murder.  The confusion of the garage was proof of it; and the instrument, once I looked about me, was not far to seek.  Divided between rage, horror, and pity, I saw a sort of sharp stiletto suitable for use as a penknife or letter opener, which, after doing its work, had been cast upon the floor.

I remained on my knees beside the lad, smitten with a keen remorse.  I knew no good of him; I had even suspected him; but he had an honest face.  Why had I not kept watch all night?  The instructions I had given, the plan I had thought so clever, might be responsible for the killing; it must have been some echo of the struggle that had roused me when I had wakened and glanced out and gone placidly back to sleep.

Had Van Blarcom caught our whispered colloquy, or surmised it?  Helped by his precious colleagues, he must have taken Georges unprepared, throttled him to prevent his shouting, and ended his frantic struggles with one swift, ruthless blow.  But why?  What sort of soldiers could these be who wore the uniform of a brave, chivalrous country and yet did murder?  What sort of mission were they bound upon that for no visible gain or motive they risked desperate work like this?

And the girl upstairs?  The thought was like a knife thrust; it brought me to my feet, my heart pounding, my forehead cold and wet.  I told myself that she must be safe, that wholesale killing could not be the aim of these wretches, that the gray automobile was not what our one-cent sheets in their tales of gunmen like to call a “murder car.”  But what did I know about it?  I was in a funk, a funk of the bluest variety.  In that one age-long moment I learned what sheer fright meant.

Without knowing how I got there, I found myself in the gallery.  The doors that lined it were rickety and worm-eaten; I stared weakly at them.  A mere twist of practised fingers, and they could be forced open by any one who cared to try.  I thought I heard a faint breathing inside the girl’s room, but I was not sure; I was too rattled.  Very guardedly I knocked and got no answer.  Then, in utter panic, I knocked louder, at risk of disturbing the whole house.