round here, under the wall, on our way to the road, when we heard
that car throbbing, and then saw your bit of a light. And that's a good
idea of yours, and we'll bring him into this place and see if there's
aught to give us a clue. Slip down," he went on, turning to the other
man, "and bring the headlights off the car, so that we can see what we're
doing. Do you think this is some of Sir Gilbert's work, Mr. Hugh?" he
whispered when we were alone. "If he was about here, and this Hollins was
in some of his secrets--?"

"Oh, don't ask me!" I exclaimed. "It seems like there was nothing but
murder on every hand of us! And whoever did this can't be far away--only
the night's that black, and there's so many holes and corners hereabouts
that it would be like searching a rabbit-warren--you'll have to get help
from the town."

"Aye, to be sure!" he agreed. "But we'll take a view of things
ourselves, first. There may be effects on him that'll suggest
something."

We carried the body into the room when the policeman came up with the
lamps from the car, and stretched it out on the table at which Hollins
and I had sat not so long before; though that time, indeed, now seemed to
me to belong to some other life! And Chisholm made a hasty examination of
what there was in the man's pockets, and there was little that had any
significance, except that in a purse which he carried in an inner pocket
of his waistcoat there was a considerable sum of money in notes and gold.

The other policeman, who held one of the lamps over the table while
Chisholm was making this search, waited silently until it was over, and
then he nodded his head at the stair.

"There's some boxes, or cases, down in yon car," he remarked. "All
fastened up and labelled--it might be worth while to take a look into
them, sergeant. What's more, there's tools lying in the car that looks
like they'd been used to fasten them up."

"We'll have them up here, then," said Chisholm. "Stop you here, Mr. Hugh,
while we fetch them--and don't let your young lady come down while that's
lying here. You might cover him up," he went on, with a significant nod.
"It's an ill sight for even a man's eyes, that!"

There were some old, moth-eaten hangings about the walls here and there,
and I took one down and laid it over Hollins, wondering while I did this
office for him what strange secret it was that he had carried away into
death, and why that queer and puzzled expression had crossed