that being so, you've got to begin over again, Brendon, and find why
he did it. Once grant that this was a deliberately planned murder
and a mighty sight cleverer than it looked at first sight, then
you've got to ferret back into the past and find what motives
Redmayne had for doing it."

But Brendon was not convinced.

"I can't agree with you," he answered. "I've already pursued that
theory, but it is altogether too fantastic. We know, from impartial
testimony, that the men were the best of friends up to the moment
they left Princetown together on Redmayne's motor bicycle the night
of the trouble."

"What impartial testimony? You can't call Mrs. Pendean's evidence
impartial."

"Why not? I feel very certain that it is; but I'm speaking now of
what I heard at Paignton from Miss Flora Reed, who was engaged to
Robert Redmayne. She said that her betrothed wrote indicating his
complete change of opinion; and he also told her that he had asked
his niece and her husband to Paignton for the regattas. What is
more, both Miss Reed and her parents made it clear that the soldier
was of an excitable and uncertain nature. In fact Mr. Reed didn't
much approve of the match. He described a man who might very easily
slip over the border line between reason and unreason. No, Halfyard,
you'll not find any theory to hold water but the theory of a
mental breakdown. The letter he wrote to his brother quite confirms
it. The very writing shows a lack of restraint and self-control."

"The writing was really his?"

"I've compared it with another letter in Bendigo Redmayne's
possession. It's a peculiar fist. I should say there couldn't be a
shadow of doubt."

"What shall you do next?"

"Get back to Plymouth again and make close inquiries among the onion
boats. They go and come and I can trace the craft that left Plymouth
during the days that immediately followed the posting of Redmayne's
letter. These will probably be back again with another load in a
week or two. One ought to be able to check them."

"A wild-goose chase, Brendon."

"Looks to me as though the whole inquiry had been pretty much so
from the first. We've missed the key somewhere. How the man that
left Paignton in knickerbockers, and a big check suit and a red
waistcoat on the morning after the murder got away with it and never
challenged a single eye on rail or road--well, it's such a flat
contradiction to reason and experience that I can't easily believe
the face valu