“It looks like a .22 calibre. One could carry a Colt pistol of that size in one’s pocket and no one would notice it.”
His eye traced out the line joining the bullet-mark and the lamp.
“The shot was evidently fired by some one in that bay over there,” he inferred. “Just go to where you were standing when the light went out, Mold. Can you see into this bay here?”
Mold looked around and discovered that a show-case interposed between him and the point from which the pistol had been fired.
“They evidently thought of everything,” Sir Clinton said, when he heard Mold’s report. “If a man had brandished his pistol in front of Mold, there was always a chance that Mold might have remembered his costume. Firing from that hiding-place, he was quite safe, and could take time over his aim if he wanted to.”
He climbed down the steps and verified the matter by going to the position from which the shot had been fired. It was evident that the shooter was out of sight of the keeper at the actual moment of the discharge.
“Now what happened after that, Mold?” Sir Clinton demanded, coming back to the central case again.
Mold scratched his ear as though reflecting, then hurriedly took his hand down again.
“This pistol went off, sir; and the lamp-glass tinkled all over the place. I got a start—who wouldn’t?—with the light going out, and all. Before I could move an inch, some one got a grip of my wrists and swung me round. He twisted my arms behind my back and I couldn’t do anything but kick—and not much kickin’ even, or I’d have gone down on my face.”
“Did you manage to get home on him at all?”