mean? Do you mean to say it's actually
_true_?"

Bisset shook his head sombrely.

"Ower true," said he. "But as to how it happened, come in to the
library, sir. It was in his ain library he was killed! The Fiscal and
Superintendent is there now and we've been going into the circumstantial
evidence. Most extraordinary mystery, sir--most extraordinary!"

In the library they found Simon Rattar and Superintendent Sutherland.
The Superintendent was a big burly red-moustached man; his face a
certificate of honesty, but hardly of the intellectual type. Ned looked
round him apprehensively for something else, but Bisset said:

"We've taken him upstairs, sir."

For a moment as he looked round that spacious comfortable room with its
long bookcases and easy chairs, and on the tables and mantel-piece a
hundred little mementoes of its late owner, the laird of Stanesland was
unable to speak a word, and the others respected his silence. Then he
pulled himself together sharply and asked:

"How did it happen? Tell me all about it!"

Perhaps there might have been for a moment in Simon's eye a hint that
this demand was irregular, but the superintendent evidently took no
exception to the intrusion. Besides being a considerable local magnate
and a kinsman of the dead baronet, Stanesland had a forcible personality
that stood no gainsaying.

"Well, sir," said the superintendent, "Mr. Rattar could perhaps explain
best----"

"Explain yourself, Sutherland," said Simon briefly.

The superintendent pointed to a spot on the carpet a few paces from the
door.

"We found Sir Reginald lying there," he said. "His skull had been fairly
cracked, just over the right eye, sir. The blow would have been enough
to kill him I'd think myself, but there were marks in his neck too,
seeming to show that the murderer had strangled him afterwards to make
sure. However, we'll be having the medical evidence soon. But there's no
doubt that was the way of it, and Mr. Rattar agrees with me."

The lawyer merely nodded.

"What was it done with?"

The superintendent pursed his lips and shook his head.

"That's one of the mysterious things in the case, sir. There's no sign
of any weapon in the room. The fire irons are far too light. But it was
an unco' heavy blow. There was little bleeding, but the skull was fair
cracked."

"Was anything stolen?"

"That's another mystery, sir. Nothing was stolen anywhere in the house
and there was no papers in a mess li