“No. I was looking over the tire to see whether I could locate the damage; I was particularly anxious to get it in shape if I could, because we were planning to motor over next day to a nursery in Lakedale to get some things for the garden—some little lilacs and flowering almonds and some privet for a hedge that we——” He broke off abruptly, and after a moment said gently, “I beg your pardon; that’s got absolutely nothing to do with it, of course. What I was trying to explain was that I was endeavouring to locate the tire trouble. In a minute or so I did.”
“You ascertained its nature?”
“Yes; there was a cut in it—a small, sharp cut about half an inch long.”
“Is that a usual tire injury?”
“I am not a tire expert, but it seemed to me highly unusual. I didn’t give it much thought, however, except to wonder what in the world I’d gone over to cause a thing like that. I was in a hurry to get it fixed, as I said, and I remembered that I’d seen Orsini standing by the gate as we went by to the garage. I went out to ask him to get me a hand, but he’d started down the road toward Rosemont. I could see him quite a bit off, hurrying along, and I remembered that we’d given him the evening off. So I went back to the garage, took my coat off and got to work myself. I’d just got the shoe off when I heard——”
“Just a minute, Mr. Bellamy. Did you see Mrs. Bellamy again when you went to the gate?”
“Oh, no; she’d been gone several minutes; and in any case there is a jog in the road two or three hundred feet north of our house that would have concealed her completely.”
“She was headed in the general direction of Orchards?”
“In the direction of Orchards—yes.”
“It was along this route that the Perrytown bus passed?”