“The man with the cough is a fairly lively person,” said Bat.
“The idea of this,” said Ashton-Kirk, “was that as invalids they would escape attention; it would form a reason for their being at the inn; and so far as Marlowe Furnace and the country round about is concerned, they were successful.”
“Count me among the simpletons,” said Bat. “I didn’t fall until they fell on me.”
“You recall that we heard the voice of Alva that night, off stage, so to speak, and lifted very high. I at once felt that this was the voice of authority, and I was curious to see him. The Indian who pushed his chair first attracted my attention when they came in. I knew he was not a North American; this, and the fact that the Campe trouble had its beginning in Mexico, must have started my mind on its course. I had, also, the rolling of the drum and the green stone stored in the back of my memory; and when I saw the peculiar indications of Alva’s skull I felt interested enough to get a less obstructed look.”
“Then your knocking those wrappings from off his head wasn’t an accident after all.”
“A little subterfuge,” smiled Ashton-Kirk. “And a moment after seeing it I had the skull, the rolling sound, the green stone and Mexico all revolving in my mind. Before I slept that night I had them associated. When I got you to leave the road next morning and cut across country toward the castle, it was because I saw the wheel marks of Alva’s chair leave it at the same place; and I was curious to see where he had gone the night before.”
“And this thing which made you send Fuller to Mexico next day—how did you get that?”
“It was a theory, built up around what I had already seen.”
Here the crime specialist looked at his watch.
“Do you know,” said he, surprised, “that it’s three o’clock, and I shouldn’t wonder if the touring party had returned.”