“Very well,” said my friend. “You will kindly note that from this point onward the formation of the ground prevents our obtaining any other view of Cray’s Folly or its gardens until we reach the path to the valley, or turn on to the high road. From a point on the latter the tower may be seen but that is all. The first part of my experiment is concluded, gentlemen. We will now return.” Giving us no opportunity for comment, he plunged on in the direction of the stream, and at a point which I regarded as unnecessarily difficult, crossed it, to the great discomfiture of the heavy Inspector Aylesbury. A few minutes later we found ourselves once more in the grounds of Cray’s Folly. Harley, evidently with a definite objective in view, led the way up the terraces, through the rhododendrons, and round the base of the tower. He crossed to the sunken garden, and at the top of the steps paused. “Be good enough to regard the sun-dial from this point,” he directed. Even as he spoke, I caught my breath, and I heard Aylesbury utter a sort of gasping sound. Beyond the sun-dial and slightly to the left of it, viewed from where we stood, a faint, elfin light flickered, at a point apparently some four or five feet above the ground! “What’s this?” muttered Wessex. “Follow again, gentlemen,” said Harley quietly. He led the way down to the garden and along the path to the sun-dial. This he passed, pausing immediately in front of the yew tree in which I knew the bullet to be embedded. He did not speak, but, extending his finger, pointed. A piece of candle, some four inches long, was attached by means of a nail to the bark of the tree, so that its flame burned immediately in front of the bullet embedded there! For perhaps ten seconds no one spoke; indeed I think no one moved. Then: “Good God!” murmured Wessex. “You have done some clever things to my knowledge, Mr. Harley, but this crowns them all.” “Clever things!” said Inspector Aylesbury. “I think it’s a lot of damned tomfoolery.” “Do you, Inspector?” asked the Scotland Yard man, quietly. “I don’t. I think it has saved the life of an innocent man.” “What’s that? What’s that?” cried Aylesbury. “This candle was burning here on the yew tree,” explained Harley, “at the time that you looked out of the window of the hut. You could not see it. You could not see it from the crest adjoining the Guest House--the only other spot in the neighbourhood from which this garden is visible. Now, since the course of a bullet is more or less straight, and since the nature of the murdered man’s wound proves that it was not deflected in any way, I submit that the one embedded in the yew tree before you could not possibly have been fired from the Guest House! The second part of my experiment, gentlemen, will be designed to prove from whence it _was_ fired.” CHAPTER XXXIII PAUL HARLEY’S EXPERIMENT CONCLUDED