By the twinkle in Griselda’s eye, I was convinced that she regarded this statement as being more literally true than Miss Cram intended it to appear.
Luncheon was announced, and we went in. Lettice did not come in till half-way through the meal, when she drifted into the empty place with a smile for Griselda and a nod for me. I watched her with some attention, for reasons of my own, but she seemed much the same vague creature as usual. Extremely pretty – that in fairness I had to admit. She was still not wearing mourning, but was dressed in a shade of pale green that brought out all the delicacy of her fair colouring.
After we had had coffee, Anne said quietly:
“I want to have a little talk with the vicar. I will take him up to my sitting-room.”
At last I was to learn the reason of our summons. I rose and followed her up the stairs. She paused at the door of the room. As I was about to speak, she stretched out a hand to stop me. She remained listening, looking down towards the hall.
“Good. They are going out into the garden. No – don’t go in there. We can go straight up.”
Much to my surprise she led the way along the corridor to the extremity of the wing. Here a narrow ladder-like staircase rose to the floor above, and she mounted it, I following. We found ourselves in a dusty boarded passage. Anne opened a door and led one into a large dim attic which was evidently used as a lumber room. There were trunks there, old broken furniture, a few stacked pictures, and the many countless odds and ends which a lumber room collects.
My surprise was so evident that she smiled faintly.
“First of all, I must explain. I am sleeping very lightly just now. Last night – or rather this morning about three o’clock, I was convinced that I heard someone moving about the house. I listened for some time, and at last got up and came out to see. Out on the landing I realised that the sounds came, not from down below, but from up above. I came along to the foot of these stairs. Again I thought I heard a sound. I called up, “Is anybody there?” But there was no answer, and I heard nothing more, so I assumed that my nerves had been playing tricks on me, and went back to bed.
“However, early this morning, I came up here – simply out of curiosity. And I found this!”
She stooped down and turned round a picture that was leaning against the wall with the back of the canvas towards us.
I gave a gasp of surprise. The picture was evidently a portrait in oils, but the face had been hacked and cut in such a savage way as to render it unrecognizable. Moreover, the cuts were clearly quite fresh.
“What an extraordinary thing,” I said.
“Isn’t it? Tell me, can you think of any explanation?”
I shook my head.
“There’s a kind of savagery about it,” I said, “that I don’t like. It looks as though it had been done in a fit of maniacal rage.”
“Yes, that’s what I thought.”
“What is the portrait?”
“I haven’t the least idea. I have never seen it before. All these things were in the attic when I married Lucius and came here to live. I have never been through them or bothered about them.”
“Extraordinary,” I commented.
I stooped down and examined the other pictures. They were very much what you would expect to find – some very mediocre landscapes, some oleographs and a few cheaply-framed reproductions.
There was nothing else helpful. A large old-fashioned trunk, of the kind that used to be called an “ark,” had the initials E.P. upon it. I raised the lid. It was empty. Nothing else in the attic was the least suggestive.
“It really is a most amazing occurrence,” I said. “It’s so – senseless.”
“Yes,” said Anne. “That frightens me a little.”
There was nothing more to see. I accompanied her down to her sitting-room where she closed the door.