“I don’t know! The sergeant just said to take her to the parish boundary and leave her there. He was getting a bit cross, and as soon as this lady spoke up to him, he thought he’d better take a firm line. You know how he is. Such a shame—she was a nice lady, too, and she’d only just arrived. But she said she’d been in tighter places than this: that she’d been exploring in Borneo and the king of the headhunters had condemned her to death, and that she’d shot him and escaped! You should have seen the constable’s face!”

“Ma, listen….” And I told her the whole thing.

She sat down and her mouth opened wide with amazement. Finally she held up her hand. “I won’t hear another word,” she said. “And I’m not having you going down the cellar and stirring up that brother of yours, either. He’d like nothing better than an excuse to go tearing over the mountains on a wild-goose chase. He’s in trouble with the law, don’t you understand? And that’s real trouble, not some nonsense about ghosts and spirits and demon huntsmen. You get off up the mountain and bring those poor little girls back to the castle. You’ve frightened them out of their wits with these tales of yours—now go and get them back! Go on!”

She didn’t believe me….And now she was angry. Oh, it wasn’t all anger; I knew that well enough. There was worry in it, too, both for Peter and for the two girls—and for me, because she could see me getting into trouble and losing my position at the castle. There was nothing to be done.

“All right, I’ll go,” I said, knowing I’d do nothing of the sort. I stood up. “But you won’t tell anyone, will you?”

“You’re a silly girl,” was all the reply I got to that; so I turned to go.

I went through the kitchen door into the parlor—and heard a voice that stopped me dead.

The kitchen door was right next to the foot of the stairs, and someone—two men were coming down the staircase as I came through the door. I looked up. I’d never seen them before; they were obviously new guests, come for the shooting contest. They looked into the parlor, saw what Sergeant Snitsch was doing, and paused. Neither of them saw me, because the door into the kitchen was set back a little way, in the shadows; and one of the men said to the other: “Look, Max—that fat fool’s inspecting papers….”

It was the man from the cave!

Chapter Five

I didn’t move.

“Have you got any papers, Doctor Cadaverezzi?” said the other man quietly, the one called Max.