smile. "Simply because, according to your
somewhat one-eyed and one-sided English law, every one is a suspect
until he is proved innocent. You, your sister, your stepmother, even
your fiancee--who, I suppose, is spending the night here with her cousin
Miss Dowd, under the present circumstances as my orders were issued a
little earlier in the evening--every member of this household comes
under the unwilling stigma of a possible perpetrator of this crime."

"Damn it!-- I say--how dare you----"

"We policemen dare everything, Mr. Duggan, because that is our duty, you
know," he responded smoothly. "And, besides, there's one thing more.
Someone here has an air-pistol, and the owner of that has got to be
found. I've an inkling, supplemented by a few words dropped by your
sister, but we'll let that pass. Only, the owner of the air-gun is not
going to escape this house to-night. That's all, I fancy. Sergeant,
good-night. Or, rather, good morning. You'll call me if necessary, won't
you? I shall be in the very next room. And-- Mr. Duggan, if you don't
happen to have that whisky handy, you needn't bother. I've a flask in my
pocket."

CHAPTER X

THE WOMAN IN THE CASE?

There was no call during the long watches of the night, no untoward
happenings of any sort. Cleek, sleeping with one eye open, rose now and
again and crept silent-footed out into the passage, doing a little bit
of listening in upon his own account. But nothing of any moment
happened. And so when at length the house was astir, and the sound of
servants with their brushes and brooms began to make their usual
early-morning clamour, he shook himself awake, got to his feet, and went
off into the bathroom, where Ross Duggan's safety-razor worked wonders
with his over-night beard, and a wash under the cold-water tap still
more.

Returning, he stopped at the door of that chamber of tragedy where the
one-time master of all this vast inheritance of stone and moorland lay,
Death wiping from his aged face every line and leaving it as smooth as a
child's.

"I want to have a little poke round for myself," he told the constable
on duty outside the door, who instantly let him in, as became a
representative of Scotland Yard. "You might send someone up to the Inn
of the Three Fishers with this note, and see that it gets delivered
immediately into the hands of a chap named Dollops. It's important."

"Very good, sir."

"And in the meantime, I'll see that no one ente