“We don't, sir, that's a fact. Not but what Mr. Hoyle is as little changed as anybody I know. Just the same pleasant-looking gentleman he is as he was the first time I saw him. A nice cheerful gentleman is Mr. Hoyle—always ready with his joke.”
The inspector nodded.
“Oh, ay. Just the same, I see. Well, well, we will be off. As likely as not we shall come in here on our way back. Anyhow, I shall not forget your Stilton in a hurry, landlord. I haven't had a cut from a cheese like that since I was a boy in Leicestershire. By the way, what was that I heard of a burglary down this way last week?”
The landlord scratched his head.
“It is funny you should ask that, sir. I haven't heard of anything lately. I was talking to a couple of gents this morning about a robbery there was about this time a year ago—a couple of robberies I might say. Squire Morpeth over at the Park, and Sir John Lington at Lillinghurst were both broken into and hundreds of pounds' worth of goods—silver and what not—taken. Nobody was ever brought to account for it either, though there were big rewards offered.”
“Dear, dear! One doesn't expect to hear of such things in a quiet little place like Burford,” the inspector observed contradictorily. “Well, so long, landlord. See you again later.”
It did not take long, following the landlord's instruction, to run the car up to Rose Cottage, but just as they were nearing it John Steadman looked at his companion.
“I think you're running off on a side track, you know, inspector.”
“I'm sure I am!” the other returned cheerfully. “But, when the straight track takes you nowhere, one is inclined to make a little excursion down a side path, right or wrong.”
Rose Cottage looked quite an ideal dwelling for an artist. It was a black and white timbered cottage standing back from the road, its garden for the most part surrounded by a high hedge. Over the walls creepers were running riot. Later on there would be a wealth of colour, but to-day only the pyrus japonica was putting forth adventurous rosy blossoms. A wicket gate gave access to the gravelled path running up to the rustic porch between borders gay with crocuses—purple and white and gold.