“Yes, but so it would have been if she had met her fate several minutes earlier than was supposed. Clarke and Hexford differ about the length of time which intervened between the moment when the former looked into the room from the outside and that of their final entrance. But whether it was five minutes or ten, the period was long enough to render their testimony uncertain as to the exact length of time she had lain there dead. Had I been there—But it’s useless to go into that. Let us take up something more tangible.”
“Very good. Here it is. Of the six bottles of spirits which were surreptitiously taken from the club-house’s wine-vault, four were found standing unopened on the kitchen table. Where are the other two?”
“That’s it! That’s the question I have put myself ever since I interrogated the steward and found him ready to swear to the correctness of his report and the disappearance of these two bottles. Ranelagh did not empty them, or the bottles themselves would have been found somewhere about the place. Now, who did?”
“No one within the club-house precincts. They were opened and emptied elsewhere. There’s our clew and if the man you’ve got up from New York is worth his salt, he has his task ready to hand.”
“A hard task for a stranger—and such a stranger! Not very prepossessing, to say the least. But he has a good eye, and will get along with the boys all right. Nothing assertive about him; not enough go, perhaps. Would you like to see him?”
“In a moment. I want to clear my mind in reference to these bottles. Only some one addicted to drink would drag those six bottles out of that cold, unlighted cellar.”
“Yes, and a connoisseur at that. The two missing bottles held the choicest brand in the whole stock. They were kept far back too—hidden, as it were, behind the other bottles. Yet they were hauled to the front and carried off, as you say, and by some one who knows a good thing in spirits.”
“What was in the four bottles found on the kitchen table?”
“Sherry, whiskey, and rum. Two bottles of rum and one each of sherry and whiskey.”
“The thief meant to carry them all off, but had not time.”