Muller followed her through several rooms into a large bed-chamber where he found an elderly man, very evidently ill, lying in bed.
“Who are you?” asked the sick man, raising his head from the pillow. The woman had gone out and closed the door behind her.
“My name is Muller, police detective. Here are my credentials.”
Fellner glanced hastily at the paper. “Why does the police send to me?”
Fellner sat upright in bed now. He leaned over towards his visitor as he said, pointing to a letter on the table beside his bed, “Asta’s overseer writes me from her estate that she left home on the 18th of November to visit me. She should have reached here on the evening of the 18th, and she has not arrived yet. I did not receive this letter until to-day.”
“I knew only that she would arrive sometime before the third of December. That date is her twenty-fourth birthday and she was to celebrate it here.”
“Did she not usually announce her coming to you?”
“No, she liked to surprise me. Three days ago I sent her a telegram asking her to bring certain necessary papers with her. This brought the answer from the overseer of her estate, an answer which has caused me great anxiety. Your coming makes it worse, for I fear--” The sick man broke off and turned his eyes on Muller; eyes so full of fear and grief that the detective’s heart grew soft. He felt Fellner’s icy hand on his as the sick man murmured: “Tell me the truth! Is Asta dead?”
The detective shrugged his shoulders. “We do not know yet. She was alive and able to send a message at half past eight this evening.”
“To the nearest police station.” Muller told the story as it had come to him.
The old man listened with an expression of such utter dazed terror that the detective dropped all suspicion of him at once.
“What a terrible riddle,” stammered the sick man as the other finished the story.
“Would you answer me several questions?” asked Muller. The old gentleman answered quickly, “Any one, every one.”
“She has a fortune of over three hundred thousand guldens, and considerable land.”
“No,” replied Fellner harshly. But a thought must have flashed through his brain for he started suddenly and murmured, “Yes, she has one relative, a step-brother.”
The detective gave an exclamation of surprise.