“But you remember that his pocket-book had been rifled,” he said, as he halted to discuss the question of returning. “May not that plan have been taken from his pocket-book after he was dead?”
“But in that case how did it come on the staircase?”
“It was dropped there by the man who stole it from the pocket-book.”
“He will be too frightened to go back for it,” she declared confidently. “He would be afraid of being caught.”
“But he may have been in the house while we were there,” he replied. “We did not solve the mystery of the crash we heard when we were in the room upstairs.”
“You said at the time it was possibly caused by the wind upsetting something.”
He was amused at the inconsequence of the line of reasoning she adopted in order to prevent him going back for the plan.
“At the time we did not know there was a dead body upstairs,” he said.
“Do you think the murderer was in the house while we were there?” she asked.
“It is impossible to say definitely. My own impression now is that some one was in the house—that the crash we heard was not caused by the wind.”