“ ‘If Jack did it,’ she said, ‘he doesn’t know he’s done it. He doesn’t know he’s killed—father.’ She faltered a bit over the last word, and I didn’t interrupt. ‘What I mean is this,’ she went on after a moment. ‘I know Jack—better than anyone else. I know those rages of his—when he sees red. But they’re over in a minute. He’s capable of anything for a second or two, but if he’d done it, Hugh, if he’d hit father—and killed him—his remorse would have been dreadful. He wouldn’t have run away: I’m certain of that. That’s why I say that if Jack did it he doesn’t know—he killed him.’
“I said nothing: there was no good telling her that it wasn’t one blow, nor yet two or three, that had been used. There was no good telling her that it was no accidental thing done unwittingly in the heat of the moment—that it was an absolute impossibility for the man who had done it to be in ignorance of the fact. And yet, though I realised all that, her simple conviction put new hope into me. Illogical, I admit, but I went downstairs feeling more confident.
“I found that the local police had arrived—a sergeant and an ordinary constable—and had already begun their investigations. The principal evidence, of course, came from the stranger, and he repeated to them what he had already told me. His name apparently was Lenham—Victor Lenham—and the police knew he had been stopping at the local inn.
“ ‘You saw the body through the window, sir,’ said the sergeant, ‘and then went round to the drawing-room?’
“ ‘That is so, sergeant.’
“ ‘You didn’t go into the room?’
“ ‘Not until later—with these gentlemen. You see,’ he added, ‘I’ve seen death too often not to recognise it. And as, in a way, you will understand, it was no concern of mine, I thought it advisable to have some member of the house itself with me before entering the room.’
“ ‘Quite, sir, quite.’ The sergeant nodded portentously. ‘Is there anything else you can tell us?’
“ ‘Well,’ said Lenham, ‘there is a point, which I have already mentioned to this gentleman.’ He glanced at me, and then, turning back to the sergeant, he told him about the man he had passed on the road. And it was when he came to the description that suddenly the constable gave a whistle of excitement. The sergeant frowned on him angrily, but the worthy P.C., whose only experience of crime up-to-date had been assisting inebriated villagers home, had quite lost his head.
“ ‘Mr. Fairfax, sergeant,’ he exploded. ‘ ’E was down here to-night. Caught the last train, ’e did. Jenkins at the station told me—sure thing.’