“We’ve had the luck, all right,” Alec remarked, possibly in his role of brake.
“Undoubtedly, but we haven’t let it lie about untouched,” Roger said complacently. “In fact, I think we’ve done very well indeed up to now,” he added candidly. “I don’t see how we could have done more, do you?”
“No, I’m dashed if I do,” said Alec with decision.
“But there’s one thing needed to round it off nicely.”
“Oh? What’s that?”
“To find the murderer,” Roger replied calmly.
X
Mrs. Plant Is Apprehensive
“Great Scott!” Alec exclaimed, considerably startled. “Find the murderer?”
Roger seemed pleased with the impression he had made. “Naturally. What else? It’s the logical sequel to what we’ve already done, isn’t it?”
“Yes, I suppose so,” Alec hesitated, “if you put it like that. But—Well, we seem to be getting on so jolly fast. I mean, it’s rather difficult to realise that a murder’s been committed at all. It all seems so impossible, you know.”
“That’s simply because it’s something foreign to your usual experience of life,” Roger said thoughtfully. “I admit that it is a bit of a shock at first to face the fact that Stanworth was murdered instead of committing suicide. But that’s not because there’s anything inherently improbable about murder itself. Murder’s a common enough event if it comes to that. But it doesn’t generally take place among the circle of one’s immediate friends; that’s the trouble. Anyhow, there’s no getting over it in this case. If ever a man was murdered, Stanworth was. And very cleverly murdered, too. I tell you, Alec, it’s no ordinary criminal we’re after. It’s an extraordinarily cool, brainy, and calculating sort of person indeed.”
“Calculating?” Alec repeated. “Then do you think it was premeditated?”
“Impossible to say, as yet. But I should certainly imagine so. It looks as if it had been very carefully thought out beforehand, doesn’t it?”
“There doesn’t seem to have been much left to chance,” Alec agreed.
“And look at the deliberation of the fellow. Fancy stopping to collect those bits of vase and cover up the traces of that second shot like that! He must have some nerve. Yes, it certainly looks more and more as if it was a prearranged thing. I don’t say for last night in particular; that may only have been a favourable opportunity which the chap was quick to seize. But I do think that he’d made up his mind to kill Stanworth some time or other.”
“You think it was somebody Stanworth knew, then?”
“Oh, there’s not much doubt about that. And somebody he was vastly afraid of, too, I should imagine. Why else should he keep a revolver so handy, if he wasn’t expecting something of the kind? Yes, that’s the line we ought to go on—see if we can discover whether there was anybody among his acquaintances of whom Stanworth was thoroughly frightened. If we can only find that out, and the name of the person as well, the odds are ten to one that we shall have solved the mystery of the murderer’s identity.”
“That sounds reasonable enough,” said Alec with interest. “Got any theory of how it was done?”
Roger beamed. “I believe I can tell you exactly how it was done,” he said, not without pride. “Listen!”
He recounted at some length the results of his after-lunch meditations and explained the reasons upon which his conclusions had been based. It took the two of them several circuits of the rose garden before the recital was completed, and then Roger turned expectantly to his companion.
“You see?” he concluded eagerly. “That accounts for everything except the facts of the confession and the murderer’s escape from the library. Now I’ve cleared up the confession, and we’ve only got one difficulty to get over. What do you think of it?”
“Humph!” observed Alec cautiously. He paused, and it was evident that he was thinking deeply.
“Well?” asked Roger impatiently.
“There’s one thing I don’t quite see,” Alec said slowly. “According to you the shot that killed Stanworth was fired from the other man’s revolver. Then how is it that the bullet they took out of his head fitted the empty shell in his own revolver?”
Roger’s face fell. “Hullo!” he exclaimed. “That never occurred to me.”
“I thought it couldn’t have,” said Alec complacently. “That rather knocks your theory on the head, doesn’t it?”
“It’s one to you, Watson, certainly,” Roger smiled a little ruefully.
“Ah!” observed Alec deeply. He was evidently not going to spoil the impression he had just made by any rash remarks. Alec was one of those fortunate people who know just when to stop.
“Still, after all,” Roger said slowly, “that’s only a matter of detail, isn’t it? My version of how it happened may be quite wrong. But that doesn’t affect the main issue, which is that it was done.”
“In other words, the fact of murder is definitely established, you think, although you don’t know how it was carried out?” Alec asked thoughtfully.
“Precisely.”
“Humph! And do you still think the motive was robbery?”
“I do. And—By Jove!” Roger stopped suddenly in his stride and turned exultantly to his companion. “That may account for Mrs. Plant, too!”
“What about Mrs. Plant?”
“Well, didn’t you notice her at lunch? She was as cheerful and unconcerned as anything. Rather a change from the very perturbed person we surprised at the safe this morning, wasn’t it? And on the face of it you’d have expected her to be still more worried, with the prospect of the opening of the safe this afternoon and the proving of her little story to us to be false. But was she? Not a bit of it. She looked as if she hadn’t a trouble in the world. You must have noticed it.”
“Yes, I did, now you come to mention it. I thought she must be acting.”
“Mrs. Plant wasn’t acting at lunch any more than she was telling the truth to us this morning,” said Roger with
