Gordon shook his head.
“I might have seen it,” he replied, “but I don’t take much account of such things, Mr. Matthews, being a married man...”
“Tut, tut,” fussed Matthews, “I think you have seen it. Come, think of the office for a minute!”
“Of the office?” repeated Gordon. Then he exclaimed suddenly:
“Miss Mackwayte!”
“Exactly,” answered Matthews, “it’s her hat, I recall it perfectly. She wore it very often to the office. Look at the blood on it!”
He put the hat down on the table and ran into the bar where Nur-el-Din sat immobile on her chair, wrapped in a big overcoat of some soft blanket cloth in dark green, her chin sunk on her breast.
Matthews called up the Mill House and asked for Francis Okewood. When he mentioned the finding of Barbara Mackwayte’s hat, the dancer raised her head and cast a frightened glance at Matthews. But she said nothing and when Matthews turned from the telephone to go back to the tap-room she had resumed her former listless attitude.
Matthews and Gordon made a thorough search of the kitchen and back premises without finding anything of note. They had just finished when the sound of a car outside attracted their attention. On the road beyond the little bridge outside the inn Francis and Desmond Okewood were standing, helping a woman to alight. Francis was still wearing his scarecrow-like apparel, while Desmond, with his beard and pale face and bandaged head, looked singularly unlike the trim Brigade Major who had come home on leave only a week or so before.
Matthews went out to meet them and, addressing the woman—a brisk-looking person--as Mrs. Butterworth, informed her that it was shocking weather. Then he led the way into the inn.