“No, she was very good.”
Reggie went out to take the air, and the air is not bad on the Westhampton heights. He made a good pace under the great beeches of Boldrewood, and came out on the open road across the heath. Just there he had found the dead man. A dull red stain could still be seen. It was farther on that the Archduke was struck. Just beyond the turn to Brendon. He found the place. There was a loosening of the road, as if a heavy car had been brought up sharply or made a violent swerve. He walked to and fro scanning the ground. Another of those foreign matches.
He was just picking it up when a motor-car stopped a few yards away. Two men jumped out and came towards him. One was middle aged and singularly without distinction. The other had a youthful and very jaunty air, and it was only when he came near that Reggie saw the fellow was old enough to be his father. An actor’s face, with that look of calculated expression, and an actor’s way of dressing, a trifle too emphatic. His present part was the gay young fellow.
“Dr. Fortune, I think?” He smiled all over his face.
“I am Dr. Fortune.”
“Reconstructing the crime, eh? Oh, you needn’t be discreet. I’m Lomas—Stanley Lomas—Criminal Investigation Department, don’t you know? Sir Lawson Hunter came round to me last night. Patient’s doing well, I see. That’s providential. Just a moment—just a moment.” He skipped away from Reggie to his companion, and they went over the ground. But Reggie thought them very superficial. Lomas skipped back again. “He didn’t bleed, then. The other man did, though—the man you found.”
“In the middle of the road. And I found him dead in the gutter.”
“It’s quaint what the criminal don’t think of. I’m surprised every time. Did you find anything here?”
Reggie held out his match. “There were two more like that by the other man.”
Lomas turned it over. “Belgian make. You buy them all over the Continent, don’t you know.”