“Well?” demanded the latter at once, hurrying forward. “Any luck?”
“Not so much luck, Anthony, as brilliance,” Roger replied with pardonable pride. “Yes, I think I’ve solved this little problem, as Holmes would have said if he’d been here instead of me.”
“Who’s the murderer, then?”
“Can you possess your soul in patience a little longer? I don’t want to spoil a good story, but it’s such a long and complicated one that I don’t want to have to tell it twice over. If you can wait till Moresby arrives I can kill two birds with one stone.”
“But he may be ages,” Anthony grumbled.
“Well, give me till half-way through supper,” said Roger, “and if he isn’t back by then I’ll promise to give you an outline of it in advance.” And with that Anthony had to be content.
“By Jove,” Roger resumed, as they walked back to the inn. “By Jove, I do hope Moresby hasn’t been working along this line himself. He’s such a reticent devil, I never know what’s in his mind; he’ll spill a fact or two occasionally, but never a theory—that is, not without some ulterior motive. Yes, if this idea hasn’t occurred to him already, I fancy I’ve got a little shock in store for Inspector Moresby.”
“Is the solution quite—quite unexpected, then?”
“Entirely, so far as I know—or at any rate, by me. Then I suddenly caught a glimpse of things from a fresh angle, and all the facts proceeded to arrange themselves in the neatest way possible.”
“You’ll be able to convince the inspector, I suppose? He’s a bit of a sceptical devil.”