Inspector Moresby was evidently having a busy day. He did not put in an appearance at lunch, and when Roger and Anthony strolled down to the sea-level to smoke their post-prandial pipes there was still no sign of him. Anthony surmised vaguely that his investigations must be covering a larger field than their own.
Anthony had plenty of time for his surmises, for ever since their return to the inn Roger had lapsed into a highly unaccustomed state of taciturnity. To his cousin’s efforts to make conversation or discuss their discoveries of the morning he replied with only a brief word or grunt. Anthony, who was not always so tactless as he appeared, realised that his mind was busy with some knotty problem connected with the case, and was content to leave him to his meditations. They scrambled out to their usual rock and composed themselves to smoke in silence.
It was nearly three-quarters of an hour before Roger volunteered any clue as to what was puzzling him. “I’m sure,” he said abruptly, “that this information of the landlady’s ought to give us a pointer to the truth, if we could only interpret it correctly.”
“You mean, about Mrs. Vane’s visit and their quarrel?” Anthony enquired.
“No, no,” Roger said with unusual testiness. “That doesn’t give us anything fresh. It’s natural enough for her to have visited him, and we’d gathered already that they were on bad terms. No, about those pipes.”
“Oh! But I don’t see how they come in.”
“Well, after all,” observed Roger sarcastically, “a pipe does play rather a leading part in the affair, doesn’t it?”
“What on earth are you talking about?” asked Anthony blankly.
Roger stared at him for a moment and then laughed. “Oh, sorry! I was forgetting that you don’t know anything about that. And you mustn’t ask me either, because I’m under the most fearful oaths of secrecy. Anyhow, a pipe does play a leading part—but don’t tell Moresby I told you.”
“Mum’s the word,” agreed Anthony cheerfully. “All right, carry on, then. You’ll get to the bottom of it, Roger, if you work your grey matter hard enough.”