“He turned up at the farm soon after ten o’clock, after the police had been trying to get him for nearly an hour. The assumption was that he had come in late from a case and, as far as I know, he has never been asked to give an account of his movements. All I do know is that he left the Whitbury garage at five-thirty in a hired car and, apparently, did not get home till about nine-thirty, when he found the police call waiting for him.” Staveley’s eyes narrowed as he stared at Fayre. “You don’t seriously mean that you suspect Gregg of Mrs. Draycott’s murder?” he ejaculated. “On my word, I don’t know what to think. If the fellow was bluffing this afternoon he did it uncommonly well. If he wasn’t, why didn’t he clear himself? He could have done it easily.” “What line did he take?” “Told me to go to the devil—in other words, the police—and flatly refused to give any account of himself whatever. The worst of it is, he’s in a very strong position. Practically the only thing I’ve got to go on at present is the fact that he undoubtedly knew Mrs. Draycott at one time and has gone out of his way to lie to the police about it. You must admit it looks fishy.” “The devil he did! Do the police know?” Fayre looked rather sheepish. “Unless they’ve been pursuing the same lines of investigation as myself, they don’t. I kept quiet about it in the hope that it might lead to something.” “Being naturally afraid that the Force, in its naïve way, would blunder. Oh, Hatter, Hatter, this comes of reading detective stories!” “I know; you needn’t rub it in. I’ve made an infernal hash of the whole thing.” “How much did you tell the fellow?” “Quite enough to put him on his guard, unfortunately.” “What’s your theory about the whole thing?” “Somebody picked up Mrs. Draycott in a car and drove her to Leslie’s farm. Everything points to that. We’ve got good reason to believe that we’ve got part of the number of the car. It ran into a farm-cart and the carter took what he could see of it. If the man in the car was Gregg he must have done one of two things. Either he deliberately faked the number of the car he hired from the Whitbury garage, or he changed cars somewhere before he picked up Mrs. Draycott. There is, of course, the possibility that he picked her up in the hired car and somehow managed to reach the farm and get away again without being seen. In the light of what we know, this is extremely unlikely.” “If he’s got an alibi, why on earth doesn’t the fellow produce it?” “Either because he’s so sure of his position that he can afford not to or for the more simple reason that he hasn’t got one. Meanwhile, I’m left kicking my heels. I’ve got a list here of the garages in this neighbourhood within a radius of fifteen miles or so. If he did change cars, it will be bound to have been at one of them.”