“That means then that the murderer left the Maze at some time not much earlier than four o’clock, since Miss Forrest heard him in the Maze after Neville’s body was found by Torrance at 3.52 p.m.”
“Most probable on the face of it.”
“Then if you find someone in such a position that they could not have been in the Maze at 4 p.m., they’re cleared.”
“True.”
Wendover produced from a cupboard an Ordnance Survey map of the district.
“Let’s take each person in turn and see if we can establish their positions during the afternoon.”
“I can help you there,” Sir Clinton volunteered. “I got most of it in the police reports. They were busy on that very point.”
Wendover nodded and began without more ado.
“Sylvia Hawkhurst. She was out paying a call, wasn’t she?”
“Yes,” Sir Clinton explained. “She and friend Ernest went off in the car from the house at about eighteen minutes past three. At a quarter to four—just about the moment when the murders occurred—she was in a shop buying shoe-laces. That precludes any chance of her having used the car to get back to the Maze at the critical time. After that she paid a call on some friends and stayed with them until she came back home after six o’clock.”