r. And yet that would involve
treachery towards the mistress to whom this woman seems devoted. Well,
well, the point is a minor one, and when you have Randall you will
probably find no difficulty in securing his accomplice. The lady's story
certainly seems to be corroborated, if it needed corroboration, by every
detail which we see before us.' He walked to the French window and threw
it open. 'There are no signs here, but the ground is iron hard, and one
would not expect them. I see that these candles in the mantelpiece have
been lighted.'

'Yes, it was by their light, and that of the lady's bedroom candle, that
the burglars saw their way about.'

'And what did they take?'

'Well, they did not take much--only half a dozen articles of plate off
the sideboard. Lady Brackenstall thinks that they were themselves so
disturbed by the death of Sir Eustace that they did not ransack the
house, as they would otherwise have done.'

'No doubt that is true, and yet they drank some wine, I understand.'

To steady their nerves.'

'Exactly. These three glasses upon the sideboard have been untouched, I
suppose?'

'Yes, and the bottle stands as they left it.'

'Let us look at it. Halloa, halloa! What is this?'

The three glasses were grouped together, all of them tinged with wine,
and one of them containing some dregs of beeswing. The bottle stood near
them, two-thirds full, and beside it lay a long, deeply stained cork.
Its appearance and the dust upon the bottle showed that it was no common
vintage which the murderers had enjoyed.

A change had come over Holmes's manner. He had lost his listless
expression, and again I saw an alert light of interest in his keen,
deepset eyes. He raised the cork and examined it minutely.

'How did they draw it?' he asked.

Hopkins pointed to a half-opened drawer. In it lay some table linen and
a large corkscrew.

'Did Lady Brackenstall say that screw was used?'

'No, you remember that she was senseless at the moment when the bottle
was opened.'

'Quite so. As a matter of fact, that screw was _not_ used. This bottle
was opened by a pocket screw, probably contained in a knife, and not
more than an inch and a half long. If you will examine the top of the
cork, you will observe that the screw was driven in three times before
the cork was extracted. It has never been transfixed. This long screw
would have transfixed it and drawn it up with a single pull. When you
catch this fellow, you wi