.. All right. Now go over there and show me how she was lyin' on the floor when you first saw her. I know you'll feel like a fool, but get down and do it… Uh-huh. All right; you can get up. That would mean a good many of those burnt matches must have been scattered close to her. As though they'd been aimed at the fireplace… Now, then: when you came in, did it look as though she'd gone to bed? Was the bed disturbed?"
"I don't think so."
"Excuse me for butting in," said Willard rather restlessly, "but it seems to me that there's been a devil of a fuss about those burnt matches when they may mean nothing at all."
"Think so, hey?" inquired H. M., stiffening. "You got an idea somebody sat here lightin' innumerable cigarettes and then tossin' the match-ends on the floor? One match burned nearly down to a stump, or even two, I might admit as rather a lengthy light for a cigarette; but twelve or fifteen of 'em argued that somebody was strikin' 'em in the dark:'
"But put it this way," urged Willard. "Suppose it was innocent. Suppose that when Bohun discovered the body, coming on it all of a sudden in half light, he bent over and struck a match to make sure..:'
H. M. puffed his cheeks in and out. "Why, aside from the fact that he said he didn't, and there seems to be no earthly reason why he should have denied it, a man don't need a dozen matches to make sure somebody's dead. Besides, I rather imagine it was light enough at that time to see without 'em… wasn't it?' He swung sharply. Bennett felt that there was an underlying purpose in the question aside from what it seemed.
"Yes," he said, "just. I remember noticing how the light from the window fell directly on her."
"But, damn it," snapped Willard, "she wasn't killed in the dark!"
H. M., for some reason, was suddenly imbued with a fantastic jollity. He set his hat on the side of his head; he was almost affable.
"Oh; it's a funny business, son. An exceedingly rummy business. Why does the Visitor strike matches in the dark? Why are the two fires exactly the same? Why does the Visitor get mad and put two drinking-glasses down on the hearth and stamp on 'em? — By the way, you didn't do that, did you?"