his
pocket-book and took out the piece. "How you found out I had it, is
more than I know."

"Mere guess-work," said Crewe.

Rolfe shook his head slowly.

"I know better than that," he said. "You're deep. You don't miss much. I
wish now that I had told you about that bit of handkerchief at the first.
But Chippenfield and I wanted to have all the credit of elucidating the
Riversbrook mystery. I hunted high and low to get trace of this
handkerchief, but I couldn't. And now you've beaten me, although you
couldn't have known at first that there was such a thing as a missing
handkerchief in the case. I hope you bear me no malice, Mr. Crewe."

"What for, Rolfe?"

"For not telling you about the handkerchief, after I found this piece in
Sir Horace's hand."

"Not in the least," said Crewe. "Why should you have told me? I don't
tell you everything that I find out. It's all part of the game. That
piece of the handkerchief was a good find, Rolfe, and I congratulate you
on getting it. How did you come to discover it?"

"I was trying to force open the murdered man's hand, and I found it
clenched between the little finger and the next. Of course it was not
visible with his hand closed. Chippenfield, who missed it, didn't
half like my discovery, and all along he underestimated the value of
it as a clue."

"Well, he has had to pay for his folly."

"He has, and serves him right," replied Rolfe viciously. "He's the most
pig-headed, obstinate, vain, narrow-minded man you could come across." It
occurred to Rolfe that it was not exactly good form on his part to
condemn his superior officer so vigorously in the presence of a rival, so
he broke off abruptly and asked Crewe how he came into possession of the
revolver and handkerchief.

Crewe's reply was that he had obtained these articles under a promise of
secrecy from some one who had assured him that Mrs. Holymead had no
connection with the crime. When he was at liberty to tell the story as it
had been told to him, Rolfe would be the first to hear it.

"Mrs. Holymead had no connection with the crime?" exclaimed Rolfe
impatiently. "Perhaps you don't know that the morning after the murder
was discovered she went out to Riversbrook and removed some secret papers
from the murdered man's desk--papers that he had been in the habit of
hiding in a secret drawer?"

"Yes, I know that," said Crewe.

"Well, doesn't that look as if she knew something about the crime?"

"Not necessarily