ome servant at a bedroom window, if you got out by a
window on one of the other sides. But there were three unoccupied rooms
on that side; two spare bedrooms and Mrs sitting-room. I should have
thought it would have been safer, after you had done what was necessary
to your plan in Manderson's room, to leave it quietly and escape through
one of those three rooms.... The fact that you went through her window,
you know,' he added coldly, 'would have suggested, if it became known,
various suspicions in regard to the lady herself. I think you understand
me.'

Marlowe turned upon him with a glowing face. 'And I think you will
understand me, Mr Trent,' he said in a voice that shook a little, 'when
I say that if such a possibility had occurred to me then, I would have
taken any risk rather than make my escape by that way.... Oh well!' he
went on more coolly, 'I suppose that to any one who didn't know her,
the idea of her being privy to her husband's murder might not seem so
indescribably fatuous. Forgive the expression.' He looked attentively at
the burning end of his cigarette, studiously unconscious of the red flag
that flew in Trent's eyes for an instant at his words and the tone of
them.

That emotion, however, was conquered at once. 'Your remark is perfectly
just,' Trent said with answering coolness. 'I can quite believe, too,
that at the time you didn't think of the possibility I mentioned. But
surely, apart from that, it would have been safer to do as I said; go by
the window of an unoccupied room.'

'Do you think so?' said Marlowe. 'All I can say is, I hadn't the nerve
to do it. I tell you, when I entered Manderson's room I shut the door of
it on more than half my terrors. I had the problem confined before me in
a closed space, with only one danger in it, and that a known danger: the
danger of Mrs Manderson. The thing was almost done; I had only to wait
until she was certainly asleep after her few moments of waking up,
for which, as I told you, I was prepared as a possibility. Barring
accidents, the way was clear. But now suppose that I, carrying
Manderson's clothes and shoes, had opened that door again and gone in my
shirt-sleeves and socks to enter one of the empty rooms. The moonlight
was flooding the corridor through the end window. Even if my face was
concealed, nobody could mistake my standing figure for Manderson's.
Martin might be going about the house in his silent way. Bunner might
come out of his bedroom.