He looked up from the paper upon which he was writing when Fred entered. Upon a smaller table in the room some food was spread: a plate of ham and beef, a cold pie, and bread; also a jug of ale.
"You have had nothing to eat?" said Garden. Fred shook his head impatiently. "Of course you haven't; and you think that we can go into an affair like this with empty stomachs. No, old fellow; we must assist ourselves like sensible men. A craving stomach is a bad mental foundation. Come, tuck away; force something down. That's right. Just taste this cold pie—good, isn't it? A pint of ale between us—here's your half, no more and no less. You feel better, don't you? Now we are fit to set to work. You saw her?"
"Yes."
"Did you get her to talk calmly?"
"She was calmer than you are, Dick. She has made up her mind to die."
"Not for many a long year yet. Here's a letter I've written to the papers, signed 'A Lawyer,' showing up the weak points in the case, and appealing for sympathy and a surer kind of justice. Just finished the fourth copy as you came in. My lad is down-stairs; he will take the letters to the newspaper offices, and to-morrow they will be all over the country. Don't lose heart, Fred; there is some infernal mystery at the bottom of this affair, and I mean to get at it. You asked the poor girl about the dresses Mrs. Pamflett was in the habit of wearing?"
"Yes; and she said she never saw the woman in a blue dress."
"Is she still positive about the brooch?"
"She has not the slightest doubt. When her father turned her from his house she left the brooch behind her."
"Then it must have been placed in the grounds by some person—deliberately placed there."