“That will be all,” said Markham; and the woman went out.
“She didn’t help us much,” complained Heath.
“What!” exclaimed Vance. “I think she did remarkably well. She cleared up several moot points.”
“And just what portions of her information do you consider particularly illuminating?” asked Markham, with ill-concealed annoyance.
“We now know, do we not,” rejoined Vance serenely, “that no one was lying perdu in here when the bonne departed yesterevening.”
“Instead of that fact being helpful,” retorted Markham, “I’d say it added materially to the complications of the situation.”
“It would appear that way, wouldn’t it, now? But, then—who knows?—it may prove to be your brightest and most comfortin’ clue. . . . Furthermore, we learned that some one evidently locked himself in that clothes-press, as witness the shifting of the key, and that, moreover, this occultation did not occur until the abigail had gone, or, let us say, after seven o’clock.”
“Sure,” said Heath with sour facetiousness; “when the side door was bolted and an operator was sitting in the front hall, who swears nobody came in that way.”
“It is a bit mystifyin’,” Vance conceded sadly.
“Mystifying? It’s impossible!” grumbled Markham.