“My point of view, indeed! Do you want me to draw up another chair and light a pipe? Should we be enlightened by tobacco smoke?”
“I cannot trust your tobacco. Try a cigar.”
The detective angrily thumped a Chesterfield lounge to see if it betrayed aught suspicious.
At that instant Bruce’s glance rested on the fireplace. The grate contained the ashes of a fire,—a fire not long lighted. This, combined with the undrawn blinds, argued a departure early in the morning.
“He went to Monte Carlo by the day Channel service,” mused Bruce. “He may have departed a few hours after Lady Dyke’s death, as Mrs. Hillmer was not certain as to the exact date.”
Somehow the few cinders attracted him. They had, perchance, witnessed a tragedy.
Suddenly he stopped smoking. He was so startled by something he had seen that the policeman must have noticed his agitation were not the detective at that instant intently screwing his eyes to peer behind the back of the elaborate cabinet.
On the hearth was a handsome Venetian fender. Into each end was loosely socketed a beautifully moulded piece of ironwork to hold the fire-irons. That on the left was whole, but from that on the right a small spike had been broken off.
By comparison with its fellow the missing portion was identical with the bit of iron found imbedded in the skull of the murdered woman. Of this damning fact Bruce had no manner of doubt, though the incriminatory article itself was then locked in a drawer in his own residence.
He did not move. He sat as one transfixed.