"I shouldn't think she could mend a broken motor, Tod."
"Oh, I don't expect anything very serious was the matter. Probably her driving--she drives furiously, as a woman always does--had put the gear out of order. However, Arnold passed them and camped some distance outside Leegarth, so that the villagers, who knew his face, would not recognize him. Then, some time after eleven, he saw the motor coming along, also skirting the village. The two women were in it, and he thought that they had lost their way. And then again he fancied that Mrs. Crosbie was going to the Devon Maid to see Rebb. At all events the motor passed out of sight in the darkness. I may tell you that its lamps were not lighted, so Mrs. Crosbie ran the risk of police interference. Rather foolish, I think, seeing she did not want to be seen."
"Well! well," said Gerald, after a pause, "and what does all this mean?"
"Arnold," went on Tod cautiously, "did not attach much importance to this motor car business, but when he told me I fancied that Mrs. Crosbie had to do with the murder."
"I don't see how----"
"I do. She didn't want to be recognized: she had no lamps, so that she could slip along easily, and--as we learned at Belldown--she did not return through the village. If she did not come down to murder Bellaria, why was she in this neighborhood, and why did she lie to you about Bognor?"
"It's a mare's nest you have found, Tod. Mrs. Crosbie has no motive to murder Bellaria, and she certainly hasn't the nerve."
"I'll ask her myself," said Tod, rising. "Come on over to Leegarth."