`Steady,' said Hadley, quietly. `I'm afraid it's you who have to make an explanation. This flat has been taken over by the police, you know. And I'm afraid we can't respect private feelings in a murder case. You are Lester Bitton, aren't you?'
The man's heavy breathing quieted somewhat, and the wrath died out of his eyes.
`I am,' he said in a lower voice. `Who are you?' 'My name is Hadley
'Ah,' said the other, 'I see.' He was groping backwards, and he found the edge of, a heavy leather chair. Slowly he lowered himself until he was sitting on the arm. Then he made, a gesture. `Well, here I am.'
`What are you doing here, Mr Bitton?'
'I suppose you don't know?' Bitton asked, bitterly. He glanced back over his shoulder, at the smashed figure on the hearthstone.
The chief inspector played his advantage. He studied Bitton without threat and almost without interest. Slowly he opened his brief-case, drew out a typewritten sheet — which was only Constable Somers' report, as Rampole saw — and glanced at it.
`We know, of course, that you have employed a firm of private detectives to watch your wife. And — he glanced at the sheet again- `that one of their operatives, a Mrs. Larkin, lives directly across the hall from here.'
`Rather smart, you Scotland Yard men,'' the other observed in an impersonal voice. `Well, that's right. Nothing illegal in that, I suppose. You also know, then, that I don't need to waste my money any longer.'
`We know that Mr Driscoll is dead.'