“Never mind the lopping,” interrupted Ethan with smiling impatience. “But tell me how she did it.”
“Why, sir, she stood her camery up a little ways off, sir; it had three little legs onto it, sir; and she pressed a little rubber ball, and the camery went ‘click,’ sir, like that, sir,—‘click!’ and——”
“Yes, yes, but—now look here, how far off was the camera from—from this place, where you had lopped the branches?”
“About twenty feet, sir, maybe.”
“Well, will you kindly, tell me how Miss Devereux managed to squeeze the little rubber ball and get into the picture at the same time?”
“Sir?”
“What I mean is,” answered Ethan patiently, “how could she have been here—” tapping the photograph he held—“and at the camera the same instant?”
That was evidently a poser. Billings scratched the back of his head dubiously. Finally,
“But she wasn’t there, sir!” he explained.