Page:The Indian Drum (1917 original).pdf/71

Rh case, if he has left anywhere any evidence of what it is that changed and oppressed him for all these years, or if there is any evidence of what has happened to him now, it will be found in his house."

Sherrill turned back to Alan. "It is for you—not me, Alan," he said simply, "to make that search. I have thought seriously about it, this last half hour, and have decided that is as he would want it—perhaps as he did want it—to be. He could have told me what his trouble was any time in these twenty years, if he had been willing I should know; but he never did."

Sherrill was silent for a moment.

"There are some things your father did just before he disappeared that I have not told you yet," he went on. "The reason I have not told them is that I have not yet fully decided in my own mind what action they call for from me. I can assure you, however, that it would not help you now in any way to know them."

He thought again; then glanced to the key on the dresser and seemed to recollect.

"That key," he said, "is one I made your father give me some time ago; he was at home alone so much that I was afraid something might happen to him there. He gave it me because he knew I would not misuse it. I used it, for the first time, three days ago, when, after becoming certain something had gone wrong with him, I went to the house to search for him; my daughter used it this morning when she went there to wait for you. Your father, of course, had a key to the front door like this one; his servant has a key to the servants' entrance. I do not know of any other keys."

"The servant is in charge there now?" Alan asked.

"Just now there is no one in the house. The