“I was looking at it from the professional point of view,” said M. Formery. He turned to the inspector and added, “You can’t have searched thoroughly. This housekeeper must be somewhere about—if she’s really trustworthy. Have you looked in every room in the house?”
“In every room—under every bed—in every corner and every cupboard,” said the inspector.
“Bother!” said M. Formery. “Are there no scraps of torn clothes, no blood-stains, no traces of murder, nothing of interest?”
“Nothing!” said the inspector.
“But this is very regrettable,” said M. Formery. “Where did she sleep? Was her bed unmade?”
“Her room is at the top of the house,” said the inspector. “The bed had been slept in, but she does not appear to have taken away any of her clothes.”
“Extraordinary! This is beginning to look a very complicated business,” said M. Formery gravely.
“Perhaps Guerchard will be able to throw a little more light on it,” said the Duke.
M. Formery frowned and said, “Yes, yes. Guerchard is a good assistant in a business like this. A little visionary, a little fanciful—wrong-headed, in fact; but, after all, he IS Guerchard. Only, since Lupin is his bugbear, he’s bound to find some means of muddling us up with that wretched animal. You’re going to see Lupin mixed up with all this to a dead certainty, your Grace.”
The Duke looked at the signatures on the wall. “It seems to me that he is pretty well mixed up with it already,” he said quietly.