“I'm looking for the traces of an infernal scoundrel, squire, unless I'm much mistaken; but whether I'll find them or not is another question altogether. It's a pure grab in the dark. And, as I suspect I'm up against a pretty smart fellow, I'm not going to give any information away, even to you, for fear he infers something that might help him. He's probably guessed already what I'm after—one can't conceal things on the open beach—but I want to keep him guessing, if possible. Come along.”
The tracks ran, clearly marked, across the sands of the bay in the direction of the old wreck which formed a conspicuous landmark on the shore. The chief constable and his companion followed the trail for a time without finding anything which called for comment.
“They don't appear to have been hurrying,” Sir Clinton said, examining the tracks at one point. “They seem just to have sauntered along, and once or twice they've halted for a moment. I expect they were talking something over.”
“The second man must have been a pretty big fellow to judge by the size of the footmarks,” Wendover ventured cautiously. “Apart from that, there's nothing much to see.”
“No?” Sir Clinton retorted. “Only that his impressions are very shallow—much shallower than Fordingbridge's ones. And his stride's not longer than friend Paul's, either. Also, the impression of the sole's quite smooth—looks like crêpe-rubber soles or something of that sort. If so, there's nothing to be got out of them. That kind of shoe's sold by the thousand.”
Wendover made no reply, for at this moment he caught sight of the inspector plodding along the road above the beach. Sir Clinton whistled shrilly, and Armadale, catching sight of them, left the road and descended to the sands. In a few minutes he reached them, and Sir Clinton gave him a summary of the facts which had come to light since he had telephoned.
“There's just one thing that's turned up since I saw you last, sir,” the inspector reported in his turn. “I've had Flatt's cottage watched, as you ordered; and there's a third man there now. He keeps himself under cover most of the time; but I gave Sapcote a pair of good field-glasses, and he recognised the fellow as soon as he saw him—knew him quite well. His name's Simon Aird. He used to be valet at Foxhills, but he got fired for some cause or other, and hasn't been near Lynden Sands since. Then I asked the fishermen if they'd recognised the man who opened the door to them when they went to borrow the boat, and they recalled that it was Aird. They hadn't thought anything about it, of course, until I questioned them.”
“Now, that's something worth having,” Sir Clinton said appreciatively. “But let's get on with the job in hand. That tide's coming in fast; and, if we don't hurry, it'll be all over these tracks. We never seem to get any time to do our work thoroughly in this place, with all that water slopping up and down twice a day.”
They hurried along the beach, following the trail. It seemed to present nothing of particular interest until, as they drew near the old wreck, Sir Clinton's eye ranged ahead and picked up something fresh.
“See that new set of tracks—a third man—coming out from behind the old wreck's hull and joining the other two?” he asked, pointing as he spoke. “Keep well to the landward side as we come up to them, so as not to muddle them up with our own footprints. I think our best line would be to climb up on top of the wreck and make a general survey from above.”