"Could pick him out of a thousand, sir."
"And you, Dick, were intimately acquainted with him. We'll go in and see the body. By the way, Filey, was the street door chained and bolted when Simmons unlocked it?"
"I never asked him. Here he is, sir; he can answer for himself."
Constable Simmons joined the group, and Inspector Robson repeated the question.
"Neither locked nor bolted, sir," he replied.
Inspector Robson drew Dick aside, and said, "That's a suspicious circumstance, Dick. The murderer got in by the back entrance, and got out by the front. I argue it this way. He gets in, he kills the man, he finds the key of the street door in the bedroom, he goes down, unchains, unbolts, and unlocks the door. He then returns to the bedroom and fastens the key on the cord, goes down again and lets himself out. It seems to prove that the murder was committed by a novice."
Dick made no remark. He recollected that Mrs. Death had not said anything in the police station of Reginald's visit to his father in the afternoon, and of his having a second key to the street door. That information had been given exclusively to Dick by Mrs. Death in Draper's Mews; it would come out presently, of course, but he would not utter a word to throw the shadow of a suspicion on Reginald. "A nice treacherous part I'm playing," he thought, "but I must go on with it. God knows how things will turn out."
There were some twenty or thirty persons in the Square; a few were airing theories concerning the murder, and recalling other crimes as mysterious and thrilling; one man was boasting that he had seen every house in London in which a murder had been committed during the last forty years; the majority were silent, and appeared to derive a creepy enjoyment by simply staring at the walls and windows. A journalist was jotting down everything he heard that could be incorporated into an article. Two newspaper artists were sketching, and one of these came forward and asked Inspector Robson if he would kindly point out the window of the room in which the body was lying. He replied that he did not know. The other artist, observing that the Inspector had a key in his hand, inquired if it belonged to the house.
"Key of the street door," said the inspector, whereupon the artist immediately took a sketch of it, and wrote beneath, "Key of the Street Door by which the Murderer Made his Escape."
"We go in for realism," he said, as with a few skilful touches he limned the faces of Inspector Robson, Constable Applebee, and Dick on his sketching pad. "Nothing tickles the public so much as sketches from real life in pen and pencil. We live in a melodramatic age, and must go with the times. I belong to 'The Illustrated Afternoon.' Now I call these speaking likenesses. I take it you belong to the force, and are here upon official business. May I inquire your name, or shall I call it the Portrait of a Gentleman who Carried the Street Door Key?"