"Capable of murder, is he?"
"He's fanatical about his invention and—he needs money."
"You don't think him guilty?" announced Mr. Wicks, with rare penetration.
"There seems to be little or nothing against him as yet," said Garrison. "There was nothing found on the body, so far as I have been able to learn, to indicate murder."
"If murder at all, how could it have been done," demanded Mr. Wicks.
"Only by poison."
"H'm! You saw the dead man's effects, of course. What did they comprise?"
Garrison detailed the dead man's possessions, as found at the coroner's office. He neglected nothing, mentioning the cigars as candidly as he did the few insignificant papers.
"In what possible manner could the man have been poisoned?" demanded Wicks, rising, with his watch in his hand. "Was there anything to eat at his apartments—or to drink?"
"Not that I can trace. The only clew that seems important, so far, is that Scott spent fifteen minutes in Hardy's room, alone, on the night of his death."