"Damn it," he said. "Who noticed that?"
"That good-looking young lawyer, Glover."
"Did the police notice?"
"I suppose they did when Glover called their attention to the fact," said the girl.
Mr. Briggerland took off his glasses and wiped them.
"It was done in such a hurry—I had to get back through the garden gate to join the police. When I got there, I found they'd been attracted by the shot and had entered the house. Still, nobody would know I was in the garden, and anyway my association with the capture of an escaped convict would not get into the newspapers."
"But a case of suicide would," said the girl. "Though I don't suppose the police will give away the person who informed them that James Meredith would be at Dulwich Grange."
Mr. Briggerland sat back in his chair, his thick lips pursed, and he was not a beautiful sight.
"One can't remember everything," he grumbled.
He rose from his chair, went to the door, and locked it. Then he crossed to a bureau, pulled open a drawer and took out a small revolver. He threw out the cylinder, glanced along the barrel and the chambers to make sure it was not loaded, then clicked it back in position, and standing before a glass, he endeavoured, the pistol in his right hand, to bring the muzzle to bear on his left temple. He found this impossible, and signified his annoyance with a grunt. Then he tried the pistol with his thumb on the trigger and his hand clasping the back of the butt. Here he was more successful.