“So am I,” said Reggie. “Good morning, Mr. Coppett.”
Mr. Coppett did not try to keep him. But he was hardly beyond the outer door of the flat when he heard Mr. Coppett say, “Hallo, hallo!” He turned. The door was still shut. Mr. Coppett was using the telephone. He heard “Millfield, double three” something and could not hear anything more. Millfield, as you know, is a quiet middle-class suburb. Mr. Fortune went down stairs pensively.
Pensive he was still when he entered Scotland Yard and sought Lomas’s room. “Well, how goes the quest for the holy stone?” Lomas put up his eyeglass. “My dear Fortune, you’re the knight of the rueful countenance.”
“You’re confused, Lomas. Don’t do it,” Reggie complained. “You’re not subtle at Scotland Yard, but hang it, you might be clear.”
“What can we do for you?”
“One of your largest cigars,” Reggie mumbled and took it. “Yes. What can you do? I wonder.” He looked at Lomas with a baleful eye. “Who lives at Millfield? Speaking more precisely who lives at Millfield double three something?” Lomas suggested that it was a large order. “It is,” Reggie agreed gloomily, “it’s a nasty large order.” And he described his morning’s work. “There you are. The further you go the queerer.”
“Quite, quite,” Lomas nodded. “But what’s your theory, Fortune?”
“The workin’ hypothesis is that there’s dirty work doin’ when a magic stone gets stolen and the man who wants the magic stone vanishes on the same day: which is confirmed when a female connected with a chap who knows all about magic stones is found colloguin’ with the vanished man’s heir: and further supported when that heir being rattled runs to telephone to the chaste shades of Millfield—the last place for a sporting blood like him to keep his pals. I ask you, who lives at Millfield double three something?”
Lomas shifted his papers. “George Coppett stands to gain by Tetherdown’s death, of course,” he said. “And the only man so far as we know. But he’s not badly off, he’s well known, there’s never been anything against him. Why should he suddenly plan to do away with his brother? All your story might be explained in a dozen ways. There’s not an ounce of evidence, Fortune.”
“You like your evidence after the murder. I know that. My God, Lomas, I’m afraid.”