lved.

It will be remembered that in my first dispatch I described the
situation as I found it on reaching this place early on Tuesday morning.
I told how the body was found, and in what state; dwelt upon the
complete mystery surrounding the crime, and mentioned one or two
local theories about it; gave some account of the dead man's domestic
surroundings; and furnished a somewhat detailed description of his
movements on the evening before his death. I gave, too, a little fact
which may or may not have seemed irrelevant: that a quantity of whisky
much larger than Manderson habitually drank at night had disappeared
from his private decanter since the last time he was seen alive. On
the following day, the day of the inquest, I wired little more than an
abstract of the proceedings in the coroner's court, of which a verbatim
report was made at my request by other representatives of the Record.
That day is not yet over as I write these lines; and I have now
completed an investigation which has led me directly to the man who must
be called upon to clear himself of the guilt of the death of Manderson.

Apart from the central mystery of Manderson's having arisen long before
his usual hour to go out and meet his death, there were two minor points
of oddity about this affair which, I suppose, must have occurred to
thousands of those who have read the accounts in the newspapers: points
apparent from the very beginning. The first of these was that, whereas
the body was found at a spot not thirty yards from the house, all the
people of the house declared that they had heard no cry or other noise
in the night. Manderson had not been gagged; the marks on his wrists
pointed to a struggle with his assailant; and there had been at least
one pistol-shot. (I say at least one, because it is the fact that in
murders with firearms, especially if there has been a struggle, the
criminal commonly misses his victim at least once.) This odd fact seemed
all the more odd to me when I learned that Martin the butler was a bad
sleeper, very keen of hearing, and that his bedroom, with the window
open, faced almost directly toward the shed by which the body was found.

The second odd little fact that was apparent from the outset was
Manderson's leaving his dental plate by the bedside. It appeared that he
had risen and dressed himself fully, down to his necktie and watch and
chain, and had gone out of doors without remembering to put in this
plate, which