“I suppose I’d better get out, though I don’t suppose I shall find anything.” “Wait until I’ve had the remainder of your coffee and I’ll come with you,” said Puttler. “No, Mr. Alford, I never felt less like sleep. We shall have daylight in a couple of hours. Wait.” He turned out the oil lamp which had been requisitioned from the kitchen, blew down the glass chimney, and the room was in darkness. “Now you can pull open those curtains and go out,” he said, “if that is your way.” Dick moved the curtains slightly and looked out. The world lay peaceful, silent, in the pallid light of the moon, and as he opened the door, the sweet scent of the earth and the cold morn greeted him fragrantly. His foot was raised to step across the threshold when Puttler’s big hand closed round his arm. “Wait,” he whispered again. Dick stood motionless. “I see nothing,” he said in the same tone. Still Puttler held him, his head bent, listening. “All right,” he said, released his grip, and stepped out on to the little terrace before the Second Son. He gave a swift glance left and right. “What was it?” asked Dick, in surprise. “Somebody breathing,” was Puttler’s astonishing reply. “You won’t believe that I could hear a man breathing a dozen yards away, but I can. It’s one of my many animal qualities.” He took a little run, cleared the gravel path in a bound, and went noiselessly along the grass to the left. Presently Dick saw him returning at a jog-trot. The detective went past and disappeared round the wing of the block. In a few minutes he returned. “Hearing and scent are my two qualities. Can you smell anything?” Dick sniffed the morning air. “No,” he confessed. “Come along with me.” This time he walked softly across the path, explaining that he was afraid of waking the girls who slept almost immediately above them. They went to the end of the wing, and then the sergeant halted. “Now do you smell anything?” he asked. Dick sniffed again. There was a sweet odour in the air, the scent of some exotic flower that seemed familiar to him. “Does anybody in this house smoke scented cigarettes?” asked the detective, and Dick went suddenly cold. “Harry!” “Your brother, eh?” Puttler’s deep-set eyes surveyed him in the half light. “That doesn’t necessarily mean that he is smoking them. Where were they kept?” “In the library as a rule.” Puttler began searching the grounds with the aid of his lamp. He had not gone far before he saw something and picked it up. It was a half-smoked cigarette with a rose-leaf tip. “Humph!” muttered Puttler, and continued his search--a search which yielded no further evidence. Retracing their steps, they passed the study door, and Puttler, who was walking a little ahead, stumbled over something and put his light to the ground. “You keep rather a lot of ladders about here, Mr. Alford,” he said, in a low voice. “A library ladder outside? What’s the great idea?”