Page:Agatha Christie - The Secret Adversary (1922).djvu/252

236 long ago, and the war's over, what does it matter now?"

"I guess history repeats itself, Jane. First there was a great hue and cry over those papers, then it all died down, and now the whole caboodle's started all over again—for rather different reasons. Then you can hand them over to us right away?"

"But I can't."

"What?"

"I haven't got them."

"You—haven't—got them?" Julius punctuated the words with little pauses.

"No—I hid them."

"You hid them?"

"Yes. I got uneasy. People seemed to be watching me. It scared me—badly." She put her hand to her head. "It's almost the last thing I remember before waking up in the hospital. "

"Go on," said Sir James, in his quiet penetrating tones. "What do you remember?"

She turned to him obediently.

"It was at Holyhead. I came that way—I don't remember why. "

"That doesn't matter. Go on."

"In the confusion on the quay I slipped away. Nobody saw me. I took a car. Told the man to drive me out of the town. I watched when we got on the open road. No other car was following us. I saw a path at the side of the road. I told the man to wait."

She paused, then went on. "The path led to the cliff, and down to the sea between big yellow gorse bushes—