am prepared for almost anything; but surely you cannot find anything
suspicious in the mere atmosphere of the place?"

"No; nothing but what you yourself must have observed. There is a
distinct odour of violets in the room; so that unless that unhappy man
yonder was of the kind that scents itself, we may set it down that a
woman has been in here."

"A woman? But no woman could do a thing like that," pointing to the
position of the dead man. "Nor," after sniffing the air repeatedly, "do
I notice anything of the odour which you speak."

"Nor me nuther, sir," put in the constable.

"Still, the odour is here," returned Cleek. "And--no! it does not
emanate from the dead man. There is scent on him to be sure, but it is
not the scent of violets. Odours last at best but a little time after
the person bearing them has left the room, and as it must now be upward
of an hour since the discovery of the crime----"

Cleek sucked in his upper lip and took his chin between his thumb and
forefinger and pinched it hard. What was that that Narkom had told him
regarding Lennard's startling experience after he had been left on guard
at the old railway arch? Hum-m-m! Certainly there was _one_ woman abroad
in this neighbourhood to-night, and a woman decidedly _not_ of the lower
classes at that, as witness the fact that she had worn an ermine cloak.
Certainly, that would point to the wearer being a woman to whom money
was no object--and to Lady Katharine Fordham, with all the great St.
Ulmer wealth behind her, it assuredly was not. Clearly, then, whoever
was or was not the actual perpetrator of this night's crime, a woman of
the higher walk of life--a rich and fashionable woman, in fact--was in
some way connected with it.

The question was, did Lady Katharine Fordham possess an ermine cloak?
And if she did, would she be likely to have brought it up from Suffolk
at this time of the year? The curious smile slid down his cheek and
vanished. He turned to Mr. Narkom, who had been watching him anxiously
all the time.

"Well, my friend, let us poke about a bit more till your assistants get
back from the shelter on the Common," he said and dropped down on his
knees, examining every inch of the flooring with the aid of a pocket
torch and a magnifying glass. For some moments nothing came of this, but
of a sudden Narkom saw him come to an abrupt halt.

Twitching back his head, he sniffed at the air, two or three times,
after the manner of a hound