The detective did not find these details particularly pertinent, and edged nearer to vital matters: "Pretty unpleasant position for those two men, Dixon and Isaac. I was in Berkeley before I came here and there was a lot of talk." The valet looked at him with sharp surprise: "But no suspicion rests on _them_, I’ll be bound. I lived in that house since last October and I’ll swear that there’s not an honester pair in the whole country." Mr. Larkin, as a stranger to the parties, had no need to display a corresponding warmth, merely remarking that Berkeley was convinced of their innocence. The young man appeased, felt in his coat for a pipe and drew a tobacco pouch from his pocket. As he filled the bowl, his profile was presented to the detective’s vigilant eye, which dwelt thoughtfully on the neat outline, almost handsome except that the chin receded slightly. A good looking fellow, Mr. Larkin thought, and smart—somehow as the conversation had progressed he was beginning to think him smarter than he had at the start. "How about that Miss Maitland," he said, "the young lady secretary?" Willitts had the pipe in his mouth and was pressing the tobacco down with his thumb. He spoke through closed teeth: "What about her?" "Well, what sort is she? You needn’t tell me she’s good looking, for I saw her once in the post office and she’s a peach." The valet leaned forward and felt in his coat pocket for matches. The movement presented his face in full to Mr. Larkin’s glance, and the detective noticed that its bright alertness had diminished, that a slight film of stolidity had formed over it like ice over a running stream. The man had removed his pipe and held it in one hand while he scrabbled round in his coat with the other. "She’s a very fine young lady; nothing but good’s ever been said of her in _my_ hearing. And very competent in her work—they say—and she would be, or Mrs. Janney wouldn’t keep her." He found the matches and, sitting upright, lit one and applied it to the pipe bowl. The detective, with his eyes ready to swerve to the landscape, hazarded a shot at the bull’s-eye. "They were saying—or more hinting I guess you’d call it—that Mr. Price was—er—getting to look her way too often." Willitts was very still. The watching eyes noticed that the flame of the match burned steady over the pipe bowl; for a moment the valet’s breath was held. Then, without moving, his voice peculiarly quiet, he said: "Now I’d like to know who told you _that_?" The other gave a lazy laugh: "Oh, I can’t tell—every kind of rumor was flying about. They were ready to say anything." "Yes, that’s it. Say anything to get listened to and not care whose character they were taking away." "Then there’s nothing in it?"