This gave French his lead. When he left the office he had obtained all the details of the party that he wanted. On the day before the crime Mr. Fogden had had a telephone call from Mrs. Berlyn saying that Berlyn was to be out on the following evening and that she would be alone, and asking if he and one or two of the others would come and keep her company. Eight people had turned up, including himself, Cowls and Leacock from the works, a Dr. Lancaster and his wife, and two Miss Pyms and a Miss Nesbitt from the town. All these people were very intimate and the party was quite informal. Some of them had played billiards, and the others bridge. This information seemed to French to eliminate Fogden, Cowls, and Leacock, as well, of course, as Mrs. Berlyn herself. He spent the remainder of the day in racking his brains for other possible accomplices and in thinking out ways to learn their movements on the night in question. Next morning he took up the matter of the whereabouts of all suspects when the incriminating letters were posted in London. Fortunately, the enquiry presented but little difficulty. A further application to Mr. Fogden revealed the fact there was an attendance book at the works which all the officers signed, from Mr. Fogden himself down. This book showed that everyone concerned was in Ashburton on the dates of posting. Even Stanley Pyke, who was absent five days out of six on his rounds, had been there. Further, Mr. Fogden’s diary showed that he had had interviews with Colonel Domlio on the critical days. From Lizzie Johnston, French learned that Mrs. Berlyn had also been at home during the period. French was more puzzled than ever. It looked as if someone must have been mixed up in the affair of whose existence he was still in ignorance. Just as he was about to step into bed that night an idea struck him which gave him sharply to think. As he considered it he began to wonder if his whole view of the crime were not mistaken. He suddenly saw that the facts could bear a quite different interpretation from that which he had placed upon them, an interpretation, moreover, which would go far towards solving the problem of the accomplice. Once again he swung from depression to optimism as, chuckling gently to himself, he decided that next morning he would embark on a line of enquiry which up to the present he had been stupid enough entirely to overlook. Chapter Thirteen The Accomplice? French’s new idea had been subconsciously in his mind from the very first, but probably owing to his theory of the guilt of one of the two men supposed to be lost, he had never given it the consideration he now saw that it deserved. Suppose that on the night of the tragedy the lines of footprints had not been faked. Suppose that after leaving the car the two men had walked across the moor _and reached Domlio’s_. Suppose that Domlio was the moving spirit in the affair and Berlyn merely the accomplice.