"Because my sister, Mrs. Moxton, told me that you were her best friend."
"I hope I am her friend. But I confess that I am astonished to hear that you are her brother. Are you not a foreigner?"
"Yes, to speak truly there is no blood relationship. Mrs. Gordon, the mother of my sister, married my father, Adolph Zirknitz, who was a widower. The marriage of our parents is the bond between us."
"I see. And you have two sisters?"
"Oui! Mrs. Moxton, who is Laura, and Miss Janet Gordon. Who told you?"
"Polly--Miss Horley."
"Ah," muttered Zirknitz, with a look of displeasure, "she talks so much, oh, so very much."
Here was a discovery. The mythical lover of Mrs. Moxton, the murderer of her husband, if the blood signs could be believed, turned out to be her brother by marriage. A queer sort of relationship truly, which Ellis had not met with before, still, one sufficiently close to put any question of love out of the case. If so, what was Zirknitz's motive for committing the crime? Ellis felt that he was floundering in deep water.
"Why do you tell me all this?" he asked suspiciously.
"Because Laura says that you are her friend, and will help her through with this matter."