But learning of Danny’s home situation had changed all that. Danny had good reason to run away. Phillip had not.

The specter of a man preying on small boys loomed larger in his mind.

They continued searching and questioning neighbors in the area for the rest of the day. There were a few vague sightings, though people were uncertain as to which boy they might have seen. A boy was a boy, apparently and they all looked the same.

Tired and dejected, they returned to Lakeside Cottage as evening was falling.

They were met at the front door by the housekeeper, in great distress. With tears running down her face she babbled on about carpets. “Oh, your grace, something terrible, I’m so sorry. It was the carpets you see, we only take them up once a week to beat and today’s the day, only when we took up the mat at the front entrance there it was, underneath. Someone must have shoved it under the door, but instead it went under the mat and nobody knew, nobody knew. It might have been there for days, and goodness knows what those villains thought when they didn’t get any reply—and, oh, what if they hurt him, poor little lad? And all because of the carpet.”

Hart unraveled the torrent of words. “What went under the mat, Mrs. Harris?”

“The letter—the ransom note, of course! It was addressed to Mr. Jephcott, so of course he opened it.”

“What? Where is this ransom note?”

Jephcott, having heard the commotion in the hall, came hurrying down the stairs brandishing an envelope. “Here it is, your grace, I have it.” He handed it to Hart who scanned the note inside.

Bring £5,000 to the bridge by the old mill and leave it under the broken stone just before dusk. Or the boy dies.

There was no date, no way of telling when the note had been written. And nobody knew how long it had been under the mat.

Hart glanced at the sky. “It’s almost dusk now, but—”

“Come on.” George was already running for the stables.

They rode to the old bridge, taking Stanley, the groom, as a guide. They found the broken stone, but of course there was no other sign of anything or anyone. They searched the old mill, but going by the thickness of the dust and cobwebs that covered the place, nobody had been there for years.

“Any other likely buildings nearby?” Hart asked the groom. Stanley suggested a couple of run-down and abandoned buildings, and even though full dark had fallen, there was enough moonlight to enable them to find those buildings, and ascertain that they too were uninhabited.

They returned to Lakeside Cottage even more dejected than before. Had the delay in discovering the ransom note caused the death of young Phillip?