“Suppose Cartwright killed Maxell and Lady Maxell witnessed the murder. Suppose this fellow had to decide whether he would kill the witness or whether he would go away with her? You said the motor-car which came to the house in the middle of the night was the same as that in which Lady Maxell came home. Isn’t it likely that she should have told the murderer, for some reason or other, that the car was coming, because evidently she had arranged for it to come, and that they went away together? Isn’t it likely, too, that she was in the plot, and that, so far from being a victim, she was one of the criminals? We know her antecedents. There was some trouble over her stabbing a young American, Reggie van Rhyn. In fact, most of the evidence seems to incriminate her. There is the key, for example. Who else but she could have taken the duplicate key? Doesn’t it look as though she planned the whole thing, and that her accomplice came in at the last moment to help her get away and possibly to settle Sir John?
“Take the incident of the two locked bedrooms. Obviously somebody who lived in the house and who knew the family routine must have done that. Both Sir John and Lady Maxell were in the habit of fastening their doors at night, and the servants did not go into the bedrooms unless they were rung for. It seems to me fairly clear that Lady Maxell locked the doors so that the suspicions of the servants should not be aroused in the morning.”
“If I had your powers of deduction,” said the admiring Timothy, “I should never miss a winner. Where the blazes is my watch?”
“Try under the pillow,” said Brennan.
“I never put it there,” replied Timothy, but nevertheless turned the pillow over and stood gaping.
For beneath the pillow was a long, stout envelope with a tell-tale blood stain in one corner.
“For heaven’s sake!” breathed Timothy, and took up the package.
It bore no address and was sealed.
“What on earth is this?” he asked.
“I can tell you what those stains are,” said the practical Brennan. “Is there any name on it?”