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Updated: June 17, 2025
He was not unacquainted with Merrington's methods of cross-examination. "You could have spoken to Detective Caldew, the other officer engaged in the case," he said. "Young Tom Caldew!" exclaimed the butler, in manifest surprise. "You know him then?" "I know him, but I cannot say I know any good of him," rejoined the butler severely.
Nepcote has plenty of time to take advantage of Merrington's blunder, if there is any occasion for him to do so. No matter what his explanation is, the fact remains that he was in England, and not in France, on the night the murder was committed, and I propose to find out how he spent the time.
There were points about that murder distinct points. You would have enjoyed it." Merrington's professional commiseration of Colwyn's ill-luck in missing an enjoyable murder was intended to convey a distinct rebuke to the other's presumption in discussing a case in which he had not been engaged. But Colwyn's next words startled Merrington out of his attitude of censorious dignity.
Although he was Chief Constable of Sussex, he took no part in the proceedings, but sat at the table like a man in a dream, living in a world of Superintendent Merrington's creation a world of sinister imaginings and vile motives, through which stealthy suspicion prowled craftily with padded feet, seeking a victim among the procession of weeping maids, stolid under-gardeners, stable hands, and anxious upper servants who presented themselves in the library to be questioned.
There was a timid tap, and the door opened slowly, revealing the frail black figure of the housekeeper standing hesitatingly on the threshold. Her frightened eyes were directed to Merrington's truculent ones as though impelled by a magnet. "You you wished to see me?" she stammered. "Yes. Come in." Merrington curtly commanded. "Close that door, Lumbe. Sit down, Mrs.
"I've had the police court proceedings against the girl put back for a week till the question of the ownership of the revolver could be settled. Now that it is decided I shall have Nepcote interviewed and questioned without delay." "Before you try to trace the missing necklace?" The faint inflection of surprise in Colwyn's voice might have escaped a quicker ear than Merrington's.
But she gave no sign of having heard, or, at least, understood the import of Merrington's relation. Her dark eyes wandered around the little office, and slowly returned to the face of the big man who was watching her so closely. Her look, which at first had been one of utter bewilderment, now revealed a trace of incredulity which suggested a returning power for the assimilation of ideas.
Once more Caldew reluctantly admitted to himself that Merrington's deductions were more swift and vigorous than his own, but he was secretly annoyed to think that the other had gained partly by guesswork the solution of a clue which had caused him so much thought and perplexity. "The brooch is no more direct evidence than the revolver and handkerchief," continued Merrington.
As the morning advanced, Merrington's face took on a deeper tint of purple, his fierce little eyes grew more bloodshot, and between the intervals of examining the servants he mopped his perspiring head with a large handkerchief. The significance of one fact he did not realize until afterwards. The last of the inmates of the moat-house to come to the library was the housekeeper, Mrs.
Caldew had cycled to Chidelham to see the Weynes, and Lumbe had been sent to investigate a telephoned report of a suspicious stranger seen at a hamlet called Tibblestone, some miles away. Merrington's face wore a gloomy and dissatisfied expression. He had spent the afternoon in a whirlwind of energy in which he had done many things.
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