"Aye, without doubt," replied Garthwaite. "There's a bit of rope round his neck that tight that I couldn't put my little finger between it and him! But you'll see for yourselves—it's not far up the Shawl. You never heard anything, Mr. Cotherstone?"
"No, we heard naught," answered Cotherstone. "If it's as you say, there'd be naught to hear."
He had led them out of his grounds by a side-gate, and they were now in the thick of the firs and pines which grew along the steep, somewhat rugged slope of the Shawl. He put the lantern into Garthwaite's hand.
"Here—you show the way," he said. "I don't know where it is, of course."
"You were going straight to it," remarked Garthwaite. He turned to Brereton, who was walking at his side. "You're a lawyer, aren't you?" he asked. "I heard that Mr. Bent had a lawyer friend stopping with him just now—we hear all the bits of news in a little place like Highmarket. Well—you'll understand, likely—it hadn't been long done!"
"You noticed that?" said Brereton.
"I touched him," replied Garthwaite. "His hand and cheek were—just warm. He couldn't have been dead so very long—as I judged matters. And—here he is!"
He twisted sharply round the corner of one of the great masses of limestone which cropped out amongst the trees, and turned the light of the lantern on the dead man.
"There!" he said in a hushed voice. "There!"
The four men came to a halt, each gazing steadily at the sight they had come to see. It needed no more than a glance to assure each that he was looking on death: there was that in Kitely's attitude which forbade any other possibility.