"How can you tell, sir?" asked Pinckney, with added awe and subtracted vehemence.
"The clothes are not singed; the hole might have been made by a drill, it was so clean."
The young man sat in silent wonder. Then Dick put a last question:
"You think it has been—murder?"
"Personally, I am convinced of it. We shall say all we know, and get an adjournment. At the adjourned inquest Colonel Bristo will attend, and tell us his relations with the dead man, who, it appears, had no other friend in the country; but to-day that is not absolutely necessary, and I shall explain his absence myself. Meanwhile, detectives will be sent down, and will find out nothing at all, and the affair will end in a verdict against some person or persons unknown, at best."
Dr. Mowbray's first prediction was forthwith fulfilled: the inquest was adjourned. The doctor at once drove back to Gateby with the two young men. As they drove slowly down the last hill they descried two strangers, in overcoats and hard hats, conversing with Colonel Bristo in the road. Philip Robson was standing by, talking to no one, and looking uncomfortable.
When the shorter of the two strangers turned his face to the gig, Dick ejaculated his surprise—for it was the rough, red, good-humoured face of the Honourable Stephen Biggs.
"What has brought you here?" Dick asked in a low voice when he had greeted the legislator.
By way of reply, Biggs introduced him to the tall, grave, black-bearded, sharp-featured gentleman—Sergeant Compton, late of the Victorian Mounted Police.
There was an embarrassed silence; then Philip Robson stepped forward.