“Through the garden, sir. I walked down the Promenade from the theatre.”
“And you didn’t notice anything—you saw no traces of footsteps?”
“No, sir. I didn’t notice anything unusual. We shut the side door, the garden door, every evening, also. It was closed yesterday and I found the key—we’ve only got one key to the garden door—in the same place where I was told to hide it when I went out in the evening.”
“What place was that?”
“In one of the pails by the well.”
“You say you were told to hide it there?”
“Yes, sir; the Professor told me. He’d go out in the evening sometimes, too, I suppose, and he wanted to be able to come in that way if necessary.”
“And no one else knew where the key was hidden?”
“No one else, sir. It’s nearly a year now that we’ve been alone in the house. Who else should know of it?”
“When you looked through the keyhole last night, are you sure that the Professor was still alive?”