“While I made my rounds, I did. But there wasn’t no one else in the works then.”
“How do you know?”
Gurney hesitated. In the last resort he didn’t know. But he had not seen anyone and did not believe anyone had been there.
“But suppose some one had been hidden in the works,” French persisted. “He could have doctored your supper while you were on your rounds?”
“If there ’ad been ’e might,” the man admitted. “But I didn’t see no one.”
“What time do you have your meal?”
Gurney, it appeared, had two meals during the night. Time hung heavy on his hands and the meals made a break. He had his dinner about six, started work at seven, and had his first meal about eleven. His second meal he had about three, and he was relieved at six.
On the night in question he had his first meal at the usual time. Until then he had felt perfectly normal, but he had scarcely finished when he found himself growing overpoweringly sleepy, and the next thing he remembered was being wakened by the fireman at six the next morning.
“It’s clear that your supper was doped,” French said. “Now think, did nothing in any way out of the common happen between six and eleven?”
Gurney began a denial, then stopped.