urther know, are often the result of
indigestion. Early man didn't understand the art of cookery, and
therefore no doubt his stomach had a great deal to put up with. We
have to thank his bear steaks and wolf chops for a great deal of our
cherished nonsense, no doubt."

Sir Walter, marking the clergyman's flashing eyes, changed the subject,
and Septimus May, who observed his concern, restrained a bitter answer.
But he despaired of the detective from that moment, and proposed
to himself a future assault on such detested modern opinions when
opportunity occurred.

After breakfast Mr. Hardcastle begged for a private interview with the
master of Chadlands, and for two hours sat in his study and took him
through the case from the beginning.

He put various questions concerning the members of the recent house
party, and presently begged that Henry Lennox might join them.

"I should like to hear the account of what passed on the night between
him and Captain May," he said.

Henry joined them, and detailed his experience. While he talked,
Hardcastle appraised him, and perceived that certain nebulous opinions,
which had begun to crystallize in his own mind, could have no real
foundation. The detective believed that he was confronted with a common
murder, and on hearing Henry's history, as part of Sir Walter's story
with the rest, perceived that the old lover of Mary Lennox had last seen
her husband alive, had drunk with him, and been the first to find him
dead. Might not Henry have found an eastern poison in Mesopotamia? But
his conversation with the young man, and the unconscious revelation of
Henry himself, shattered the idea. Lennox was innocent enough.

For a moment, the information of uncle and nephew exhausted, Hardcastle
returned to the matter of the breakfast discussion.

"You will, of course, understand that I am quite satisfied a material
and physical explanation exists for this unfortunate event," he said. "I
need hardly tell you that I am unprepared to entertain any supernatural
theory of the business. I don't believe myself in ghosts, because in my
experience, and it is pretty wide, ghost stories break down badly under
anything like skilled and independent examination. There is a natural
reason for what has happened, as there is a natural reason for
everything that happens. We talk of unnatural things happening, but that
is a contradiction in terms. Nothing can happen that is not natural.
What we call Nature