"They, they?" said Tarling impatiently. "Who are they? Do you mean the woman?"
The new theory was disturbing. He had pierced the second actor in the tragedy—a brown vitriol burn on the back of his hand reminded him of his existence—but who was the third?
"I mean the woman," replied Ling Chu quietly.
"But who in God's name wanted to get into the house after murdering Mrs. Rider?" asked Whiteside irritably. "Your theory is against all reason, Ling Chu. When a person has committed a murder they want to put as much distance between themselves and the scene of the crime as they can in the shortest possible space of time."
Ling Chu did not reply.
"How many people are concerned in this murder?" said Tarling. "A bare-footed man or woman came in and killed Mrs. Rider; a second person made the round of the house, trying to get in through one of the windows——"
"Whether it was one person or two I cannot tell," replied Ling Chu.
Tarling made a further inspection of the little wing. It was, as Ling Chu had said and as he had explained to the Chinaman, cut off from the rest of the house, and had evidently been arranged to give Mr. Milburgh the necessary privacy upon his visits to Hertford. The wing consisted of three rooms; a bedroom, leading from the sitting-room, evidently used by Mrs. Rider, for her clothes were hanging in the wardrobe; the sitting-room in which the murder was committed, and the spare room through which he had passed with Odette to the gallery over the hall.
It was through the door in this room that admission was secured to the house.
"There's nothing to be done but to leave the local police in charge and get back to London," said Tarling when the inspection was concluded.