ead that Manderson had been
receiving threatening letters, and that the murder was the outcome of
that. But there's no trace of any such thing; and we looked at every
blessed paper. The only unusual things we found were some packets of
bank-notes to a very considerable amount, and a couple of little bags of
unset diamonds. I asked Mr. Bunner to put them in a safer place. It
appears that Manderson had begun buying diamonds lately as a
speculation--it was a new game to him, the secretary said, and it seemed
to amuse him."

"What about these secretaries?" Trent inquired. "I met one called
Marlowe just now outside; a nice-looking chap with singular eyes,
unquestionably English. The other, it seems, is an American. What did
Manderson want with an English secretary?"

"Mr. Marlowe explained to me how that was. The American was his
right-hand business man, one of his office staff, who never left him.
Mr. Marlowe had nothing to do with Manderson's business as a financier,
knew nothing of it. His job was to look after Manderson's horses and
motors and yacht and sporting arrangements and that--make himself
generally useful, as you might say. He had the spending of a lot of
money, I should think. The other was confined entirely to the office
affairs, and I dare say he had his hands full. As for his being English,
it was just a fad of Manderson's to have an English secretary. He'd had
several before Mr. Marlowe."

"He showed his taste," observed Trent. "It might be more than
interesting, don't you think, to be minister to the pleasures of a
modern plutocrat with a large P? Only they say that Manderson's were
exclusively of an innocent kind. Certainly Marlowe gives me the
impression that he would be weak in the part of Petronius. But to return
to the matter in hand." He looked at his notes. "You said just now that
he was last seen alive here, 'so far as the servants were concerned.'
That meant--?"

"He had a conversation with his wife on going to bed. But for that, the
man-servant, Martin by name, last saw him in this room. I had his story
last night, and very glad he was to tell it. An affair like this is meat
and drink to the servants of the house."

Trent considered for some moments, gazing through the open window over
the sun-flooded slopes. "Would it bore you to hear what he has to say
again?" he asked at length. For reply, Mr. Murch rang the bell. A spare,
clean-shaven, middle-aged man, having the servant's manner in its