"Perhaps she was on her bicycle, sir," suggested the Sergeant, having thought about it for a moment. "Come to think of it, she would have been, most likely."
"She bicycles, does she?" Harding's frown deepened. "That's a point we'll go into. For if Mrs. Chudleigh was cycling home , I no longer like the look of young Billington-Smith's alibi. She fixed ten-to-one as the time of her seeing him, because she knows that it takes about half an hour to walk from the Grange to the Vicarage. What she forgets — if she was cycling that day — is that it wouldn't take anything like that time to cover the distance on a bicycle."
The Sergeant nodded slowly. "That's so, sir. More likely she'd have seen him a good ten minutes earlier, or more. That's what happens when you get ladies giving evidence about time. It's a queer thing, but I've very often noticed that women never have any notion of time. You've only got to wait for your wife to go upstairs to get her hat on to see that. Well, you aren't a married man, sir — least ways I've got an idea you're not — but if ever you do happen to get married you'll see what I mean. And if your good lady don't keep you hanging about a quarter of an hour, and then stand you out she was only upstairs a couple of minutes — well, she'll be different from mine, sir, that's all." With which misogynistic pronouncement the Sergeant folded his arms across his chest, and brooded silently till the car drew up at the Grange front door. Then, as he climbed out, he gave the result of his meditations. "But if that was so, sir, and supposing Mr. Billington-Smith to have come back here unbeknownst and murdered the General, he'd have got here round about five to one, by my reckoning, and run slap into Mrs. Twining coming to fetch the General for his cocktail."
"Yes," said Harding. "He would."
"Well, but that goes and upsets it, doesn't it, sir?"
Harding did not answer, and before the Sergeant could repeat his remark Finch had opened the front door.
Harding stepped into the hall. "Finch, when Mrs. Ghudleigh called here on Monday morning, was she walking, or on her bicycle?"
"Mrs. Chudleigh, sir? She was on her bicycle," replied the butler.
"Are you sure of that?"
"Oh yes, sir. Mrs. Chudleigh had propped her machine up against the porch, and I thought at the time that it was very much in the way of anyone coming in. I cannot say that I care for bicycles myself, sir. What I should call troublesome things, if you take my meaning."