'Of course,' she assented slowly. 'You were the friend of that strange little creature with the marvellous invention, weren't you?'
'I was scarcely his friend,' Lavendale corrected, 'but I did my best to help him.'
She made a pencil mark in the margin of the manuscript and laid it face downwards upon the table. Then she leaned back in her chair and looked at him.
'Tell me what happened?' she begged. 'I was obliged to leave London the next day and I have only just returned. Was it suicide or murder?'
'The man was murdered, without a doubt,' Lavendale replied.
'Is that so, really?' she asked gravely. 'Tell me, had he given over his formula to the War Office?'
Lavendale sighed.
'Unfortunately no! He was to have handed it over at eleven o'clock the next morning.'
'Was it found amongst his effects?'
'Not a written line of any sort.'