"Well," said the woman, "there was somebody stirring about this house in the middle of Saturday night--between, say, one and two o'clock in the morning--Sunday morning, of course. Both me and Jane here heard 'em--quite plain. And we thought naught of it, then--leastways, what we did think was that it was Mr. Horbury. He often came in very late. But when we found out next morning that he'd never come home--why, then, we did think it was queer that we'd heard noises." "Did you mention that to Mrs. Carswell?" asked Polke. "Of course!--but she said she'd heard nothing, and it must have been rats," replied the elder woman. "But I've been here three years and I've never seen a rat in the place." "Nor me!" agreed the housemaid. "And it wasn't rats. I heard a door shut--twice. Plain as I'm speaking to you, Mr. Polke." Polke reflected a minute and then turned away. "All right, my lasses!" he said. "Well, keep all this to yourselves. Here--I'll tell you what you can do. Send Miss Fosdyke a nice cup of tea into the study--send us all one!--we can't leave what we're doing just yet. And a mouthful of bread and butter with it. Come along, Jones," he continued, leading the constable away. "Here, you step round to old Mr. Batterley's--you know where he lives--near the Castle. Mr. Polke's compliments, and would he be so good as to come to the bank-house and help us a bit?--he'll know what I mean. Bring him back with you." The constable went away, and Polke, after rubbing one of his mutton-chop whiskers for awhile with an air of great abstraction, returned to the study. There Mr. Pellworthy and Betty Fosdyke were talking earnestly in one of the window recesses; Starmidge, at the furthest end of the room, was examining the old oak panelling. "I've sent for Mr. Batterley to give us a hand," said Polke. "I suppose we'd best examine this room in the way he suggested?" Starmidge betrayed no enthusiasm. "If he can do any good," he answered. "But I don't attach much importance to that. However--if there are any secret places around----" "There's a nice cup of tea coming in for you and Mr. Pellworthy in a minute, Miss Fosdyke," said Polke. "We'll all have to put our dinner off a bit, I reckon." He motioned to the detective to follow him out of the room. "Here's a nice go!" he whispered. "The housekeeper's off! Bolted--without a doubt! And--she's got a clear start, too." Starmidge turned sharply on the superintendent. "Got any clue to where she's gone?" he demanded.