"I'm sure I shall," I returned.
"There's one other thing, sir. I am afraid I shall have to run through your clothes before I leave you. We are compelled to search everyone under arrest by regulations.
"Right you are," I said. "I've really no intention of cutting my throat, but if it's the rule—"
I held up my hands, and with deft fingers he went swiftly through my pockets, taking out the contents.
"These will be entered and returned to you," he said. "Good-night."
"Good-night," I replied; and turning the key in the lock, the good fellow tramped away down the passage, leaving me to myself.
I am afraid I was much too tired to indulge in any of the proper emotions for a wrongly accused prisoner. Indeed, beyond reckoning out in a vague sort of way that the murder must have taken place on the night of Sangatte's party, I did not bother my head any further about the matter. Stripping off my clothes as quickly as possible, I scrambled into bed and flicked off the switch which controlled an invisible electric light. Five minutes later I was as sound asleep as I have ever been in my life.
If the French gentleman who said that life was only worth living for its new experiences was right in his statement, I had no reason to complain when I woke up next morning. It was certainly a novel sensation to open one's eyes in a police station under a charge of murder, and to find an affable-looking Inspector standing beside one's bed with a bag in his hand.
It was my captor of the previous day, and the bag which he was holding was the one which I had brought up with me from Woodford.
"Good morning," I said, smiling at him sleepily.