“Not for a moment. You can explain to the Bishop that your Sunday trousers are in pawn; if he’s really genial he’ll appreciate that. Besides, that tweed suit makes you look like a good-natured sort of ass; and that’s what you want, isn’t it? After all, if you do stay to lunch, it will only be a bachelor party.”
“Very well, then, we’ll go. Just when I was beginning to like Chilthorpe! Look here, Leyland, you aren’t expecting me to serve a summons on the Bishop or clap the darbies on him, or anything? Because if so you’d better go yourself.”
“Oh no, I don’t suspect the Bishop—not particularly, that is. I just want to know what he can tell us about Mottram’s movements immediately before his death, and what sort of man he was generally. He may even know something about the will; but there’s no need to drag that topic in, because my telegram ought to produce full information about that. Thanks awfully. And we’ll pool the day’s information, eh?”
“Done. I say, though, I think I’d better just wire to the Bishop, to make sure that he’s at home, and ready to receive a stray spy. Then we can start at elevenish.”
As Bredon returned from sending the telegram, he was waylaid, to his surprise, by Mr. Pulteney, who was fooling about with rods and reels and things in the front hall. “I wonder if I might make a suggestion to you, Mr. Bredon,” he said. “I despise myself for the weakness, but you know how it is. Every man thinks in his heart that he would have made a good detective. I ought to know better at my age, but the foul fiend keeps urging me to point something out to you.”
Bredon smiled at the elaborate address. “I should like to hear it awfully,” he said. “After all, detection is only a mixture of common sense and special knowledge, so why shouldn’t we all put something into the pot?”
“It is special knowledge that is in question here; otherwise I would not have ventured to approach you. You see that rod? It is, as you doubtless know, Mottram’s; it is the one which he intended to take out with him on that fatal morning. You see those flies on it?”
They looked to Bredon very much like any other flies, and he said so.
“Exactly. That is where special knowledge comes in. I don’t know this river very well; but I do know that it would be ridiculous to try to fish this river with those particular flies, especially at this time of the year and after the weather we’ve been having. And I do know that a man like Mottram, who had been fishing this river year after year, couldn’t possibly have imagined that it was any use taking those flies down to the Long Pool. I only mention it because it makes me rather wonder whether Mottram really came down here to fish. Well, I must be starting for the river. Still nursing the unconquerable hope. Good-morning.” And, with one of his sudden gestures, the old gentleman was gone.
A telegram came in admirably good time, assuring Bredon that the Bishop would be delighted to see him. It was little after eleven when the car took the road again; this time their way brought them closer to the Busk and gave them a better view of its curious formation. A narrow gorge opened beneath them, and they looked down into deep pools overhung by smooth rocks that the water had eaten away at their base. There was no actual waterfall, but the stream always hurried downward, chuckling to itself under and around the boulders which interrupted its course. “I think Pulteney overestimates the danger of having his river dragged,” observed Bredon. “You couldn’t drag that part of it; and, with all those shelves of rock, a corpse might lie for days undiscovered, and no one the wiser. I’m glad that it’s a death by gas, not by drowning.”