"General Raynor?" she breathed in a horrified voice. "General Raynor? And Lady Clavering? Oh, but why, but how? Dear Mr. Cleek, it—it is like some horrible dream! What possible connection could there be between those two people of all others?"
"I don't know. I have a suspicion—it is my business to have that, you know—but I want something stronger. I shall have it soon. My work here in this house is pretty well finished, I fancy. Maybe to-morrow, maybe the next day, but this week certain, I shall be off to Malta. I am going to hunt up a man's army record there."
"Yes. His and—well, possibly, some one's else. When I come back I promise you that I will have the solution to this riddle in my hands. What's that? Oh, yes, Margot is in it."
"Then why—then how can Lady Clavering——"
"Lady Clavering, it appears, knows Margot. So does the General, evidently, for she mentioned her name to him."
"Dear heaven! And you say that she accused him of the murder? Accused him? How could she?"
"She was there—at Gleer Cottage—last night. She went there to meet him. But she was not, however, the first to direct my suspicions against the General. That was done hours before and by a totally different person."
"Whom?"
"His son," said Cleek, and forthwith told her of that memorable interview with Harry Raynor after dinner, and of the typewritten letter he had abstracted from the young wastrel's coat pocket. "Miss Lorne, I waste no sympathy upon that worm," he went on. "From the top of his empty head to the toe of his worthless foot there's not one ounce of manhood in him. But he spoke the truth! His father did type that forged letter and for the purpose he declared."