They had come back from Jallands through the park and were sitting in the copse above the pond, from which the Inspector and his fishermen had now withdrawn. Bill had listened with open mouth to Antony’s theory, and save for an occasional “By Jove!” had listened in silence. “Smart man, Cayley,” had been his only comment at the end.
“Which other theory?”
“That Mark had killed Robert accidentally and had gone to Cayley for help, and that Cayley, having hidden him in the passage, locked the office door from the outside and hammered on it.”
“Yes, but you were so dashed mysterious about that. I asked you what the point of it was, and you wouldn’t say anything.” He thought for a little, and then went on, “I suppose you meant that Cayley deliberately betrayed Mark, and tried to make him look like a murderer?”
“I wanted to warn you that we should probably find Mark in the passage, alive or dead.”
“And now you don’t think so?”
“Now I think that his dead body is there.”
“Meaning that Cayley went down and killed him afterwards—after you had come, after the police had come?”
“Well, that’s what I shrink from, Bill. It’s so horribly cold-blooded. Cayley may be capable of it, but I hate to think of it.”
“But, dash it all, your other way is cold-blooded enough. According to you, he goes up to the office and deliberately shoots a man with whom he has no quarrel, whom he hasn’t seen for fifteen years!”