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With a fair imitation of Professor Brierly's crisp, staccato, clear cut accents, with the perfectly astonishing memory for which James Hale was known, he said: "Oh, yes? Not much question about Wrigley, the man who was found in the water at Bradley Beach, is there? All we know about him is that he was found dead in the water. Do you know that he was drowned? Of course you don't.
McGuire stared a long time at Professor Brierly, at his comrades, at the officers. He said: "Yes, I killed Brown. I killed him in self-defense." He drew out the weapon, slowly. Professor Brierly's voice, in the strained silence that had fallen on the group, sounded like a death knell. "You did not kill Goldberg and Tonti in self-defense.
On the opposite side a motor launch skirted the shore looking unreal against the dark, impenetrable wooded background. In the middle distance a canoe with two figures in it rose and fell lazily in the gentle swell. Professor Brierly's deeply sunken, bright blue eyes looked with paternal affection at the little figure at his side. The lips under the tip-tilted nose formed, faintly, a pout.
He had never remotely connected Charles Turold with the murder until Mr. Brimsdown had imparted Mrs. Brierly's disclosure to him. He had acted promptly enough on that piece of information, but once again he was too late. Austin Turold might have felt reassured if he had known how little his share in the events of that night occupied Barrant's mind during their last interview.
He first wrote Drusilla a long letter and Drusilla answered it by telegraph an answer that brought a reminiscent smile to John Brierly's lips. It read: "I can't talk by letter. Just come." And John came. He was met at the station by the young man from the lawyer's office who had been to see him in Cliveden, and when he arrived at the house he found Drusilla awaiting him.
Brierly's disclosure it seemed a condition precedent to the elucidation of the mystery to substitute Charles Turold for Thalassa as the person whose undisciplined love for Sisily had led him to shoot her father to shield her name. Nor was it incredible to suppose that he had remained in Cornwall to cover her flight in the hope of diverting suspicion from her.
"What can there be in the meeting of a number of prosy old men, Jimmy, that brings a star reporter all the way up here? Or oh, I see you're a friend of Professor Brierly, of course, and Brierly's camp is right up the lake here. McCall's shack, isn't it?" Jimmy nodded.
"We're ekal now," he said with grim intensity, and pointed to the chasm through which ran the stream which made Madge Brierly's refuge an island. "That gully air a hundred feet straight down," he said, "an' its bottom air kivered with rocks. When we're through, your body or mine'll lay there. Air you ready?"
"Just what, if anything, do you suspect?" "Well, Professor," said Justice Higginbotham, "I, for one, should like to have indubitable proof that these men really committed suicide." Professor Brierly's deeply sunken, penetrating blue eyes swept around the circle of faces. He nodded: "Oh, I see. That should be easily determined, certainly with respect to the last two."
"'Scuse me, Professor; I been busy with this and ain't had much sleep. I found something that'll interest you. Mr. Matthews said you'd be along pretty soon, so I waited. Here, Professor " He leaned over and, from behind the chair he had occupied on their arrival, he took a coiled rope. He dropped it with a soft plop at Professor Brierly's feet. "What do you think of this, Professor?"
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