He went carefully over the rocks between the place where the body had lain and the water; but there was little for him here. Once or twice he paused, studying the rocks with a careful scrutiny, but he did not tell us what he found.
About ten the drag-hooks came, and I helped Nealman bring his duckboat from the marshy end of the lagoon. Then the sheriff, the coroner and myself began the slow, tiresome work of dragging.
Of course we began along the shore, close to the scene of the crime. We worked from the natural wall and back to a point a hundred yards beyond the starting-place. Then we turned back, just the width of the drag hooks beyond. We reached the Bridge again without result.
As the moments passed the coroner’s annoyance increased. Noon came and passed—already we had dragged carefully a spot a full hundred square yards in extent. The tide flowed again, beat against the Bridge and fretted the water, making our work increasingly difficult. And at last the sheriff rested, cursing softly, on his oars.
“Well, Weldon?” he asked.
The coroner’s eyes looked rather bright as he turned to answer him. I got the impression that for all his outer complacency he was secretly excited. “Nothing, Slatterly,” he said. “What do you think yourself?”
“I think we’re face to face with the worst deal, the biggest mystery that’s come our way in years. In the first place, there isn’t any use of looking and dragging any more.”
“But man, the body’s got to be here somewhere.”
“Got, nothing! We’ve got to begin again, and not take anything for granted. This is still water, except for these waves the tide makes, breaking over the rocks—and you know a body doesn’t move much in still water, especially the first night. For that matter the place was still as a slough, they say, while the tide was going out—most of the night. We’ve looked for a hundred yards about the spot. It’s not there. And the murderer couldn’t swim with it clear across the lagoon.”