“Good Lord!” I exclaimed. “That settles it. A topping shot of yours, Anthony!”

“Not so bad,” he admitted. “But not exactly a shot—I remembered the face and the associations. Spare my blushes.”

“Ole Baddeley will listen with both ears when you show him this,” I continued. “In a way I’m glad it’s turned out like this ... it was a pretty ghastly thought to imagine that anybody in the house could have been the guilty party. But this settles it.”

“Settles what, Bill?”

“Why—the affair—Prescott of course! Why do you ask?”

Anthony shook his head. “On the contrary, Bill, this settles two little matters but not, distinctly not, the affair of Prescott as you call it. I don’t like to think about that too much. There, Bill, as the immortal Sherlock would say, ‘we are in very deep waters.’”

Dr. Mackenzie joined us. Had we had any success ... yes? ... he was gratified....
111

“May I take this copy of The Prattler with me, Doctor?” said Anthony. “I shall be happy to recompense you for its loss.”

“Certainly not! I couldn’t hear of it,” said the doctor. He would have liked us to have stayed for dinner, but he was very much afraid that his cuisine might not be adequate!

“Many thanks, Doctor,”—Anthony with one of his rare smiles—“we understand perfectly. Besides, we are anxious to get back. Good-afternoon.”

I harked back directly we were outside the house.

“I should be eternally obliged if you would explain things a bit, old man,” I declared, a trifle resentfully. “Surely this clears things up considerably.”

“This clears the robbery problem—Lady Considine’s robbery—and it effectively explains that very vexed question that bothered a number of us—why Marshall opened the window. Beyond that——”

“Tell me,” I begged.

“Well, it’s pretty evident that Marshall took the case containing the pearl necklace from Lady Considine’s bedroom, and it’s also fairly conclusive that she conveyed that same case to her husband—‘Spider’ Webb—via the window of the billiard room. The second set of footprints we shall very soon discover to be that august gentleman’s. And I think they were the footsteps that Dick and Helen Arkwright heard. But I don’t think ...” he paused and reflected.

“You don’t think what?”
112

“I don’t think it was the billiard room door that Jack Considine fancies he heard shutting.” He slashed with his stick at the grass as we walked.

“Was it Prescott’s door?” I broke in eagerly. “Did Prescott hear anything and come down to meet his death?”

My theory excited me.

“No, Bill, I don’t think so. All my intuition and instinct, if you care to call it that, lead me away from that idea.”

“What about Marshall—or Mrs. Spider as she is—and the window? You haven’t explained that yet,” I insisted, “properly!”

“Prescott’s body on the billiard-table was an overwhelming surprise to Marshall when she opened the door this morning. She had dropped the ‘sparklers,’ as Comrade Spider probably calls them, out of the window and closed it again. Then gone quietly back to bed in the servants’ part of the house. Now for her surprise! When she enters the room a few hours later she comes face to face with a greater and more sinister crime. She at once, in her mind, connects the two things! Had ‘Spider’ come back for anything, encountered Prescott and killed him? Had they fought? Was ‘Spider’ hurt? She had last seen him just outside the window. Was he there still, wounded perhaps? She rushes to the window and flings it open. Voilà, Bill!”

I nodded in approval. Yet——

“Where does Prescott come in then?” I queried. “Did he meet Webb outside?”
113

Anthony stopped and looked at me.

“That’s an idea. I never considered that. Outside! That’s certainly a possibility.”

“One more point,” I said, secretly pleased to have set him thinking, “and that may be two ... apparently nothing else has been stolen besides Lady Considine’s necklace ... that is to say nothing in the jewel line.... How comes the Venetian dagger to be in the billiard room?” Anthony looked grave.

“That’s a poser,” he commented. “But it must not be forgotten that we are dealing with two adventures ... ‘The Adventure of Lady Considine’s Necklace’ and ‘The Adventure of the Death in the Billiard Room’ ... there may be no connection whatever between the two ... and yet, as you have suggested, Bill, there may.”

“The Venetian dagger was always kept in the drawing-room,” I maintained. “Therefore, the person that took it, went to the drawing-room to get it.”

“True ... but when? That’s the point. Also, Bill, why was the dagger used when Prescott was already dead—strangled?”

“Perhaps the murderer didn’t know he was dead. Now I’m coming to that second point at which I hinted just now ... something I fail to understand at all. How do you account for the absence of blood stains? As far as I could see, Prescott lay on the billiard-table on his shoulder, there was no blood on the table, though, and his clothing seemed to show very little trace.... I should have imagined, though I don’t pretend to know, that a blow struck with the force that that had been would have caused a rush of blood from the wound.”
114

Anthony nodded. “Good for you—the same feature struck me—but Dr. Elliot had an explanation. He says that a blow struck at the top of the spinal cord as this blow was, produced, in a living body, almost an instantaneous paralysis, and that he would expect, as a medical man, a very small quantity of blood to be shed. This was a dead body when the blow was struck, remember! But why the dagger was ever used ... well, I’m in considerable doubt.”

“And I,” I rejoined. “And I can’t see much hope of our doubts being dispelled.”

Anthony looked at his wrist watch.

“We’ve got time to go home through the village,” he said. “I want to make a call.”

“Are you going to tell Baddeley of this Marshall business at once?” I asked. “He can’t very well arrest her because she’s the wife of a man who was sentenced for jewel robbery five years ago.”

“It would be taking a chance, wouldn’t it?” he grinned.

“It wouldn’t surprise me if she hasn’t cleared by now,” I said, reflectively. “You shook her up a bit this morning.”

“All the better if she has ... but she hasn’t, you’ll find.”

“Why?”
115

“If she’s cleared, Baddeley’s men will have shadowed her ... and she’ll lead them straight to the ‘Spider’” ... he thought for a moment. “Still, I’ve an idea that she’ll let me know where he is when we’ve talked to her for a little while.”

By this time we had reached the village and coming down the hill from the track that leads from the Downs, we entered the main street.

“I am of the opinion, Bill,” said Anthony, “that a few discreet inquiries here may prove of interest and advantage. I suggest that we call and see Mrs. Hogarth at the Post Office. Does she know you, Bill?”

“She remembers me as a guest at the Manor for some years, at any rate,” I responded.

“That’s the stuff to give ’em,”—Anthony waxed merry—“I want her to talk and tell us things—if she knows you it will help tremendously.”

The Post Office was a “general” shop that sold everything from pins to Postal Orders.

“See that?” murmured Anthony, as we entered, heralded by the loud clanging of the shop bell on the door. He pointed to the telephone call-box. “I hoped that the ’phone would be in here.”

Mrs. Hogarth bustled out.

He nudged me in the ribs. “Introduce yourself—tell her who you are.”

“Good-afternoon, Mrs. Hogarth,” I cried with an air. “How’s the rheumatism?”
116

“Why, it’s Mr. Cunningham from the Manor. Good-afternoon, sir. The rheumatics? ... oh, not so bad, sir, considering my age and all that ... this is a terrible thing I hear, sir, what’s happened up at the Manor!”

“Yes, Mrs. Hogarth,” I replied. “It is! This is Mr. Bathurst, a very intimate friend of Sir Charles and her Ladyship——”

Mrs. Hogarth curtsied to the best of her ability—“Pleased to meet you, sir——”

“And they would be glad,” I continued, “if you would give him any information for which he may ask you.”

“Only too pleased, Mr. Cunningham.”

“Thank you,” said Anthony, “I shan’t worry you unduly. This ’phone call-box” ... he motioned towards it ... “is this the nearest one to Considine Manor?”

“Oh yes, sir. By far. The next one is almost to Allingham ... a matter of close on six miles.”

“Now quite in confidence, Mrs. Hogarth, in the very strictest confidence, Sir Charles Considine has asked me to conduct a little inquiry on his behalf. And he suggests that first of all I should come and see you.”

Mrs. Hogarth’s excitement increased. “You may rely on me, sir....”

“I’m sure I can,” ex............