“ ‘Of course, we had the drags at once and set to work to recover the remains, but no trace of the body could we find. On the other hand, we brought to the surface an object of a most unexpected kind. It was a linen bag which contained within it a mass of old rusted and discoloured metal and several dull-coloured pieces of pebble or glass. This strange find was all that we could get from the mere, and, although we made every possible search and inquiry yesterday, we know nothing of the fate either of Rachel Howells or of Richard Brunton. The county police are at their wit’s end, and I have come up to you as a last resource.’
“You can imagine, Watson, with what eagerness I listened to this extraordinary sequence of events, and endeavoured to piece them together, and to devise some common thread upon which they might all hang. The butler was gone. The maid was gone. The maid had loved the butler, but had afterwards had cause to hate him. She was of Welsh blood, fiery and passionate. She had been terribly excited immediately after his disappearance. She had flung into the lake a bag containing some curious contents. These were all factors which had to be taken into consideration, and yet none of them got quite to the heart of the matter. What was the starting-point of this chain of events? There lay the end of this tangled line.
“ ‘I must see that paper, Musgrave,’ said I, ‘which this butler of yours thought it worth his while to consult, even at the risk of the loss of his place.’
“ ‘It is rather an absurd business, this ritual of ours,’ he answered. ‘But it has at least the saving grace of antiquity to excuse it. I have a copy of the questions and answers here if you care to run your eye over them.’
“He handed me the very paper which I have here, Watson, and this is the strange catechism to which each Musgrave had to submit when he came to man’s estate. I will read you the questions and answers as they stand.
“ ‘Whose was it?’
“ ‘His who is gone.’
“ ‘Who shall have it?’
“ ‘He who will come.’
“ ‘Where was the sun?’
“ ‘Over the oak.’
“ ‘Where was the shadow?’
“ ‘Under the elm.’
“ ‘How was it stepped?’
“ ‘North by ten and by ten, east by five and by five, south by two and by two, west by one and by one, and so under.’
“ ‘What shall we give for it?’
“ ‘All that is ours.’
“ ‘Why should we give it?’
“ ‘For the sake of the trust.’
“ ‘The original has no date, but is in the spelling of the middle of the seventeenth century,’ remarked Musgrave. ‘I am afraid, however, that it can be of little help to you in solving this mystery.’
“ ‘At least,’ said I, ‘it gives us another mystery, and one which is even more interesting than the first. It may be that the solution of the one may prove to be the solution of the other. You will excuse me, Musgrave, if I say that your butler appears to me to have been a very clever man, and to have had a clearer insight than ten generations of his masters.’
“ ‘I hardly follow you,’ said Musgrave. ‘The paper seems to me to be of no practical importance.’
“ ‘But to me it seems immensely practical, and I fancy that Brunton took the same view. He had probably seen it before that night on which you caught him.’
“ ‘It is very possible. We took no pains to hide it.’
