“Well, don’t be so grudging about it. Of course I’m right! As a matter of fact, those scratches on the blotting paper gave me the idea as soon as I saw them. I’d been puzzling after a way of getting round that confession. But when I found that second sheet in the waste-paper basket of course the thing was as plain as a pikestaff. That was a bad blunder of his, by the way; not to look through the rest of the basket’s contents.” “Yes,” Alec agreed seriously. “And supposing the inspector had found it. It might have given him something to think about, mightn’t it?” “It might and it mightn’t. Of course from the inspector’s point of view there’s been nothing to afford the least question as to the plain fact of suicide; except the absence of motive, of course, and that’s really nothing, after all. He hasn’t had his suspicions aroused more or less by accident, as it were, like we have.” “We’ve had the luck, all right,” Alec remarked, possibly in his rôle of brake. “Undoubtedly, but we haven’t let it lie about untouched,” Roger said complacently. “In fact, I think we’ve done very well indeed up to now,” he added candidly. “I don’t see how we could have done more, do you?” “No, I’m dashed if I do,” said Alec with decision. “But there’s one thing needed to round it off nicely.” “Oh? What’s that?” “To find the murderer,” Roger replied calmly. Chapter X Mrs. Plant is Apprehensive “Great Scott!” Alec exclaimed, considerably startled. “Find the murderer?” Roger seemed pleased with the impression he had made. “Naturally. What else? It’s the logical sequel to what we’ve already done, isn’t it?” “Yes, I suppose so,” Alec hesitated, “if you put it like that. But—— Well, we seem to be getting on so jolly fast. I mean, it’s rather difficult to realise that a murder’s been committed at all. It all seems so impossible, you know.” “That’s simply because it’s something foreign to your usual experience of life,” Roger said thoughtfully. “I admit that it is a bit of a shock at first to face the fact that Stanworth was murdered instead of committing suicide. But that’s not because there’s anything inherently improbable about murder itself. Murder’s a common enough event if it comes to that. But it doesn’t generally take place among the circle of one’s immediate friends; that’s the trouble. Anyhow, there’s no getting over it in this case. If ever a man was murdered, Stanworth was. And very cleverly murdered, too. I tell you, Alec, it’s no ordinary criminal we’re after. It’s an extraordinarily cool, brainy, and calculating sort of person indeed.” “Calculating?” Alec repeated. “Then do you think it was premeditated?” “Impossible to say, as yet. But I should certainly imagine so. It looks as if it had been very carefully thought out beforehand, doesn’t it?” “There doesn’t seem to have been much left to chance,” Alec agreed.