“Go to bed,” said Reggie. “What’s the time? Time runs on, doesn’t it? Yes, go to bed.” “Oh, but, Mr. Fortune, you are disappointing,” Alice Beach cried. “I am. I notice it every day. It’s my only vice.” “I do think you might be interested!” “A poor crime, but her own,” Captain Cosdon chuckled. “It’s no good, Mrs. Beach. It don’t appeal to the master mind.” “You know, Fortune, it’s devilish awkward,” the Colonel protested. “I’m sorry. But what can we do? You might call up your village policeman. He’s four miles off, and I dare say he needs exercise. You might telephone to Thorton and say you have been burgled, and will they please watch some road or other for some one or other with a bag of silver and a set of cameos and a ruby brooch. It doesn’t sound helpful, does it?” “It sounds damned silly.” “But I thought you’d find clues, Mr. Fortune,” Alice Beach cried, “all sorts of clues, finger-prints and foot-prints and----” “And tell us the crime was done by a retired sergeant-cook with pink hair and a cast in the eye,” Cosdon grinned. “You see, I’ve no imagination,” said Reggie, sadly. “Confound you, Cosdon, it isn’t a joke,” Colonel Beach cried. “No, I don’t think it’s a joke,” Reggie agreed. “One of your perfect crimes, Mr. Fortune?” “Well, I was sayin’--you have to allow for chance. There was a lot of luck about.” “What are you thinking of?” “The time, Mrs. Beach. Yes, the flight of time. We’d better go to bed.” But he did not go to bed. He stirred the fire in his bedroom and composed himself by it. The affair annoyed him. He did not want to be bothered by work and his mind insisted on working. Something like this. “Philosophically time is an illusion. ‘Time travels in divers paces with divers persons.’ Highly divers, yes. Time is the trouble, Colonel. Why was there such a long time between the first scream and the second scream? Sally tumbled down. Sally was fumbling in the dark: but it don’t take many minutes to get from her room to the stairs. She took as long as it took the chauffeur to run to the powerhouse. He started some while after the first scream, he had found what was wrong and put the light on again within a minute of the second. Too much time for Sally--and too little. How did Sally’s burglars get off so quick? Faulks ran up at the second scream. The rest of us were there next minute. They were there to hit Faulks. When we came, we saw no one, heard no one and found no one.” He shook his head at the firelight. “And yet Sally’s rather a dear. I wonder. No, it didn’t go according to plan. But I don’t like it, my child. It don’t look pretty.” He sat up. Somebody was moving in the corridor. He went to his table for an electric torch, slid silently across the room, flung open the door and flashed on the light. He caught a glimpse of legs vanishing round a corner, legs which were crawling, a man’s legs. A door was closed stealthily.