“Hold water!” The phrase brought Cleek’s thoughts harking back to what he had been told regarding the little puddle of water lying on the floor, and of a sudden his eyes narrowed, and the curious one-sided smile travelled up his cheek.
“No, I suppose not,” he said, replying to the doctor’s remark. “Besides, your test tubes would have settled that when it settled the carbon monoxide question. Had cyanide been present, the specimens of blood would have been clotted and blue.”
Of a sudden it seemed to dawn upon the doctor that this didn’t smack quite so much of Board School intelligence as he had fancied, and, facing round, he looked at Cleek with a new-born interest.
“I beg your pardon,” he said, “but I don’t think I caught your name, Mr.—er—er——”
“Cleek, Doctor; Hamilton Cleek, at your service.”
“Good Lord! That is, I—er—er—my dear sir, my dear Mr. Cleek, if there is any intelligence I can possibly supply, pray command me.”
“With pleasure, Doctor, and thank you very much indeed for the kind offer. I have been told that there was a little puddle of water on the floor at the time the murder was discovered, also that you took a sample of it for analysis. As I don’t see any sign of that puddle now, would you mind telling me what that analysis established. I have heard, I may tell you, that you found the water to contain no poisonous substance; but I should be obliged if you can tell me if it was water drawn from a well or such as might have been taken from a river or pond.”
“As a matter of fact, my dear Mr. Cleek, I don’t think it came from any of the three.”
“Hum-m-m! A manufactured mineral water, then?”
“No, not that, either. If it had been raining and there was any hole or leak in this roof, I should have said it was rainwater that had dripped in and formed a little puddle on the floor. If it had been winter, I should have said it was the result of melted snow. As a matter of fact, I incline more to the latter theory than to any other, although it is absurd, of course, to think of snow being obtainable anywhere in England in the month of July.”