I glanced at her sharply and saw the intense look in her dark, wide-open
eyes.

"You believe you know who dealt the blow?"

"I have a suspicion--that is all. Only I want you to help me, if you
will."

"Most certainly," I responded. "But if you believe you know the assassin
you probably know something of the victim?"

"Only that he looked like a foreigner."

"Then you have seen him?" I exclaimed, much surprised.

My remark caused her to hold her breath for an instant. Then she
answered, rather lamely, it seemed to me:

"I saw him when the keepers brought the body to the castle."

Now, according to the account I had heard, the police had conveyed the
dead man direct from the wood into Dumfries. Was it possible, therefore,
that she had seen Olinto before he met with his sudden end?

I feared to press her for an explanation at that moment, but,
nevertheless, the admission that she had seen him struck me as a very
peculiar fact.

"You judge him to be a foreigner?" I remarked as casually as I could.

"From his features and complexion I guessed him to be Italian," she
responded quickly, at which I pretended to express surprise. "I saw him
after the keepers had found him."

"Besides," she went on, "the stiletto was evidently an Italian one,
which would almost make it appear that a foreigner was the assassin."

"Is that your own suspicion?"

"No."

"Why?"

She hesitated a moment, then in a low, eager voice she said:

"Because I have already seen that three-edged knife in another person's
possession."

"That's pretty strong evidence," I declared. "The person in question
will have to prove that he was not in Rannoch Wood last evening at
nightfall."

"How do you know it was done at nightfall?" she asked quickly with some
surprise, half-rising from her chair.

"I merely surmised that it was," I responded, inwardly blaming myself
for my ill-timed admission.

"Ah!" she said with a slight sigh, "there is more mystery in this affair
than we have yet discovered, Mr. Gregg. What, I wonder, brought the
unfortunate young man up into our wood?"

"An appointment, without a doubt. But with whom?"

She shook her head, saying:

"My father often goes to that spot to shoot pigeon in the evening. He
told us so at luncheon to-day. How fortunate he was not there last
night, or he might be suspected."

"Yes," I said. "It is a very fortunate circumstance, for it cannot be a
pleasant experience to be under suspicion