'You did not wear a sword as part of your Georgian costume, then, Miss Lestrange?'
'There was nothing short enough for me, I imagine. Romilly and Judith provided the costumes, but I certainly was never given a sword.'
'Only a horse-pistol,' said Dame Beatrice.
Kirkby stood the weapon upright on its pommel, thoughtfully sparing Dame Beatrice's carpet, for the point of the sword was very sharp.
'This thing is not a rapier,' he said. I am told that it is a small-sword, although, as you see, the blade is of a pretty fair length. It measures, as a matter of fact, thirty-two and a half inches, and, with the hilt, another six and a quarter inches, so, as you say, it would be too long for you to wear as part of your costume, although the date of it, according to my information, would be about right for Georgian dress. You're sure you've never seen it before?'
'I'm perfectly sure. Anyway, oughtn't it to have a sheath? It looks very dangerous like that.'
'We're still in hopes of finding the sheath, but it doesn't matter if we don't.'
'I don't see why you've brought the sword here,' said Rosamund in an unusually spirited tone.
'As I said, Miss Lestrange, to find out whether you could identify it. We're very anxious to know where it came from.'
'Why-is it-is it...'
'We don't know for certain, not yet, but Mr Romilly picked it up on the cliff-top not a long way from Dancing Ledge.'
'By the way,' said Dame Beatrice, 'who identified the body?'
'Mr Romilly Lestrange. We've questioned him about finding the poor young gentleman and he told us that his nephews Hubert and Willoughby had not turned up at Galliard Hall, so we got him to make a formal identification, which, I may add, he was unwilling to do until we pointed out there was nothing to fear.'
'Nothing to fear?' echoed Rosamund. 'When somebody has been killed, and a sword has been found with Romilly's fingerprints on it, and you're questioning everybody who was at Galliard Hall last week? How can there be nothing to fear?'
'Now, now, miss,' said Kirkby. 'Nothing to fear, and nothing to get excited about, so long as you're an innocent party. Now you seem to be in Mr Tancred's confidence to a certain extent, and you went in the car with him and Dame Beatrice to Shaftesbury. It's not where he lives-at least, it's not his permanent address as given by Mr Romilly Lestrange-so do you know how long he intends to stay there?'
'I don't know anything about it. We left him outside a church...'
'St Peter's,' said Dame Beatrice, 'in Shaftesbury.'
'He didn't mention his plans, miss?'
'Not to me.'
'Right. Thank you, Miss Lestrange. I'll have to find him, of course.'
CHAPTER EIGHT
CORANTO-FELIX NAPOLEON'S FANCY
'Will it please you to see the epilogue, or to hear a Burgomask dance between two of our company?'
(1)
Tancred was tracked down without the slightest difficulty. Accompanied by Dame Beatrice (her companionship sufficiently accounted for on the score that she knew the people concerned), Kirkby went straight to the police station in Shaftesbury.
'Provost?' said the desk-sergeant. 'Why, yes, sir. He's on bail, on his own recognisances. Charged with causing a breach of the peace- to wit, getting drunk, insisting on reciting poetry and assaulting the landlord when requested to leave. His case comes up tomorrow morning.'
'I'm investigating that case of the clergyman found dead on Dancing Ledge. This man Provost may be able to help me.'
'Well, you'll find him in his caravan on Fuddy's Farm Fields, about four miles from here. He's living there, as usual, with a friend.' He gave concise directions. The friend's a female,' he added.
'Is she also a lover of poetry?' Dame Beatrice enquired.
'She'll have to be, ma'am, with that one. He writes it. Let's hope, for his own sake, he doesn't start reciting to the magistrates. Sir Bentham will send him down without the option if he does.'
'Show me on the map where this place is,' said Kirkby. The sergeant pin-pointed Fuddy's Farm Fields on the large-scale wall-map. 'I see. The Blandford road, and branch off at the foot of Melbury Hill. Doesn't look much like farming country.'
'The farm itself is more than three miles away.'
'Oh, yes, I see. Thanks, Sergeant. Well, I think I can find my way.'
'Anything else I can do, sir?'
'Might be-later on.'
(2)
The caravan was sheltered not only from the north by the noble, beacon-topped hill, but from the south-
