“You’ve let this get on your nerves,” he said quietly. “I suggest that we shelve the subject altogether till you’ve had some breakfast. We’ll go over to the station hotel and see what they can do for us, and afterwards you shall put the whole case before me and I’ll give you what advice I can. There’s plenty of time before my train goes and you’ll take a different view of things after you’ve eaten something.” She gave him a swift look of gratitude and followed him without speaking. At the hotel he ordered food and, when it came, quietly but firmly insisted that she should do it justice, making an excellent breakfast the while himself and keeping the conversation rigidly to impersonal topics. It was not till the meal was over and he had handed her a cigarette and lighted one himself that he allowed her to unburden her mind. “First of all, what did you wish to consult me about?” His tone was curt and business-like and, fortified by the food which she had badly needed, she was able to collect her thoughts and put them more clearly into words. She gave him a brief account of what had happened. The main facts he had already learned from the evening papers, in which Mrs. Draycott’s latest photograph, over the caption of “The Murdered Woman,” had confronted him. He questioned her sharply on one or two points, otherwise he let her tell the story in her own way. When she had finished he sat back in his chair, smoking thoughtfully, for a minute. Then he leaned forward, his keen eyes on hers. “Where was Leslie while all this was happening at the farm?” he asked sharply. Cynthia met his gaze without flinching. “With me,” she answered simply. “Then why doesn’t he say so?” “That’s what I wanted to see you about. It doesn’t clear him. You see, he wasn’t with me at the time they seem to think the murder actually took place. And now he doesn’t want me to say anything because he’s afraid it will drag me into it for nothing. I think he’s wrong and he ought to tell them. Mother being so hateful about our engagement makes it all so much more difficult.” “When was he with you?” “From five till nearly half-past. Then he did exactly what he said, took a long walk and did not get back to the farm till about eight. It was all my fault, really.” She broke off, as though she found it difficult to continue. “You’d better tell me exactly what happened,” came in Sir Edward’s quiet voice.