“I’m not so sure. Anything may turn out to be important in a case like this. In the meantime, I am more than grateful to you, Miss Allen, for your frankness. Cynthia will no doubt see you very soon and thank you herself. In view of the fact that she may have to appear at the inquest this afternoon I considered it better that she should not be known to have been in touch with you. She saw my point; otherwise she would have come in answer to your note this morning.” Miss Allen nodded. “I’m very glad she has got you to turn to, Sir Edward. If there is anything more I can tell you at any time I will let you know.” Kean paused in the act of shaking hands. “One thing more,” he said. “You have no reason to suspect that your sister went out with the intention of meeting anybody on Monday night?” “I hadn’t at the time, but I have wondered since. I was writing letters in the little room I call my study when she went out. I shut myself up there directly after tea, to get through some troublesome correspondence, and left her comfortably settled in front of the fire in here. When I came back about half-past six she was gone and the maid told me she had seen her go out. I was surprised, because she hated walking and it was not the sort of weather to tempt her out of the house, but I did not get anxious until after the arrival of Cynthia. We waited dinner for her until past eight, and after dinner I sent the groom down to Keys to ask if she had been seen there. When he returned and said he could get no trace of her I began to get really anxious. Until then I had simply thought she had lost her way, and was in hopes that she might have telephoned to the inn at Keys, leaving a message for me saying she was hung up somewhere. I have no telephone here, you see, and she knew that the people at The Boar sometimes take messages for me. I sent my man straight back to Keys, telling him to see Gunnet, the constable there. But Gunnet was out and his wife did not know when he would be back. Of course, I know now that he was at the farm. Cynthia was just trying to persuade me to let her take her car and scour the lanes when the police arrived with the news of what had happened.” “You have no idea what could have taken her to Leslie’s farm?” “None whatever. I should certainly never have dreamed of looking for her there. By ten o’clock I had made up my mind that she had either lost her way or had an accident. There was a gale blowing that night and a good many trees were down, and I was afraid she might have been hit and be lying helpless somewhere. Thinking it over, I feel certain of one thing.” Kean looked up quickly. “Yes?” “She never meant to go to the farm. It is two miles the other side of Keys and forty minutes’ walk from here. She was wearing an old pair of evening shoes and she hadn’t troubled to change them. No sane woman would walk even a mile on a country road in thin slippers.” Chapter VI