He paused in his narrative for a moment and glanced from face to face in the group. “You'll see, from this, foul play was the last thing that entered my mind. I got up to his cottage and found him, just as young Colby had said, lying face down on the garden path. From the look of him he'd obviously died of congestion. It seemed all plain sailing. In fact, I was just going to leave him and hunt up some assistance when my eye caught something. His arms were stretched out at full length above his head, as if he'd gone down all of a piece, you know; and his right sleeve had got rucked up a little, so that it showed a bit of his arm. And my eye happened to catch a mark on the skin just above the wrist. It was pretty faint; but there had evidently been some compression there. It puzzled me—still puzzles me. However, that's your affair. It struck me that I might as well have a look at the other arm, so I pushed up the coat-sleeve a little—that's the only thing I did to alter things in any way around the body—and I found a second mark there, rather like the first one.” He paused, as if to give the inspector the chance of putting a question; but, as none came, he went on with his story. “The impression I got—of course, I may be wrong—was that marks of that sort might be important. Certainly, after seeing them, I didn't care to assert that poor old Hay's death was due entirely to natural causes. He'd died of congestion, all right. I'm dead sure that a P. M. will confirm that. But congestion doesn't make marks on a man's wrists. It seemed to me worth ringing you up. If it's a mare's nest, then it's a mare's nest, and I'll be sorry to have troubled you. But I believe in having things done ship-shape; and I'd rather trouble you than get into hot water myself, if there's anything fishy about the affair.” Inspector Armadale seemed rather dubious about how he should take the matter. To Wendover it almost looked as though he was regretting the haste with which he had brought Sir Clinton into the business. If the whole thing turned out to be a mare's nest, quite evidently Armadale expected to feel the flick of his superior's sarcasm. And obviously a couple of marks on a dead man's wrists did not necessarily spell foul play, since the man had clearly died of cerebral congestion, according to the doctor's own account. At last the Inspector decided to ask a question or two. “You don't know of anyone with a grudge against Hay?” Rafford made no attempt to restrain a smile. “Hay?” he said. “No one could possibly have a grudge against Peter. He was one of the decentest old chaps you could find anywhere—always ready to do a good turn to anyone.” “And yet you assert that he was murdered?” demanded the inspector. “No, I don't,” the doctor retorted sharply. “All I say is that I don't feel justified in signing a death certificate. That ends my part. After that, it's your move.”