"How long did it take you to work that one out?" demanded Hemingway offensively.
The Inspector continued, unmoved: "And it means that either the instrument was knocked from the table in a struggle, or that someone lifted it, and dropped it. For why?"
"You can rule out the struggle: there wasn't one. If that had been how that receiver came to be hanging down to the floor, the whole table would have been kicked over, and it wasn't. It looks as if someone deliberately lifted it off the table, and let it hang." He laid down the photograph he had been studying. "Why? Fair-sized chap, Seaton-Carew, wasn't he? Whoever planned to do him in wanted to be sure of getting him in what you might call a convenient position. If you were called away in the middle of a game of Bridge to take a telephonecall, what would you do?"
"I do not play Bridge.".
"Well, shinty, or whatever your unnaturall game is called! You'd pick up the receiver, standing! You might even be facing quite the wrong way for the assassin. But if you found the receiver hanging down beside the table, the way it was, what would be the easiest way for you to pick it up? To sit down in the chair, placed so handy, of course! That would bring your neck well within the reach of a shorter person. And don't tell me that every one of the suspected persons, barring Terrible Timothy, was shorter than Seaton-Carew, because I've seen that for myself! I told you this wasn't going to do us any good. What's the time? Seven o'clock? Let's make a night of it, and have some breakfast! After that, we'll go round to this Jermyn Street address, and startle Mr. Seaton-Carew's man."
Before they set forth on this mission, the Inspector was obliged to present his disgusted chief with the information that the call from Doncaster had come from a public call-box.
"Which isn't at all the sort of thing I want to be told at this hour of the morning," remarked Hemingway, pouring himself out another cup of very strong tea. "Not that I'm surprised. The only thing that would surprise me about this case would be if I was to get a real lead."
"Whisht now, it is early yet!" said the Inspector soothingly.
"It isn't too early for me to recognise a thick fog when I see one!" retorted Hemingway. "To think I told Bob I was glad it wasn't another Pole getting funny with a knife! Now, that was easy!"
"Ay," agreed Grant. "There were so many motives you said there was no seeing the wood for the trees, I mind well. And three of the suspects with records as long as from here to the Border. Ah, well!"