“I shouldn’t be surprised to hear that he killed himself,” remarked Sorley in an abrupt way.
“Oh, that’s impossible,” said Alan quickly; “the medical evidence proved conclusively that he was murdered, stabbed to the heart.”
“Well, my boy, a man can stab himself to the heart, can’t he?”
“Yes,” replied the young man dryly, “but he could scarcely hide the instrument with which he killed himself after his death, and that, as we know, is missing.”
“What sort of instrument was it, Alan?” asked Mrs. Fuller.
“A stiletto, it is thought, mother.”
“That sounds as though an Italian had a hand in the crime,” remarked the vicar; “they generally use the stiletto!”
“I can’t say who killed him, or of what nationality the assassin was, father, since nothing can be learned likely to cast light on the subject. But I am sure of one thing from what Latimer has told me, which is that Grison did not stab himself. He had no reason to.”
“Mad people never do have any reason,” remarked Mr. Sorley pointedly.
“But Grison was not mad.”