man to quarrel
with his subordinate for excess of caution in the initial stage of the
investigations, when it was his duty to doubt everybody and confide in
nobody. Moreover, Merrington could not forget that he himself had
completely underestimated the importance of that clue when Caldew had
drawn his attention to it.

A search of Hazel's bedroom at Stading brought to light additional
testimony of the love which was likely to destroy her. Merrington and
Caldew, ruthlessly turning over the feminine appointments of this dainty
little nest, had unearthed from the bottom of the girl's box a square
parcel tied with ribbon. The packet contained letters and postcards from
Phil, principally picture postcards from different Continental places he
had visited after leaving Cambridge. There were three letters: two
schoolboy epistles, asking the girl to look after the pets he had left
at home, and one short note from the University announcing the dispatch
of a volume of poems as a birthday gift. There was also a Christmas
card, dated some years before, inscribed, "To dear Phil, with love, from
Hazel." The girl had kept it, perhaps, because she was too shy to bestow
it on the intended recipient, but its chief value in Merrington's eyes
was the similarity between the written capital F and the same letter in
the scratched inscription on the greenstone brooch.

With these discoveries Merrington was satisfied. In Hazel Rath's secret
love for Phil Heredith the Crown was supplied with the motive for the
murder of Phil Heredith's wife. In Merrington's opinion, the supposition
of motive was strengthened by the fact that the murder was committed
during Hazel's first visit to the moat-house since the arrival of the
young bride, because until Phil's marriage it had been the girl's custom
to visit the moat-house once a week. Miss Heredith informed Merrington
that she had questioned the girl on the afternoon of the murder about
the sudden cessation of her visits, and Hazel had replied rather
evasively. Merrington formed the opinion that she had stayed away
because she could not bear to see the woman whom Phil had made his wife.
Then, realizing that her prolonged absence was likely to be remarked
upon, she went across on the day of the murder to see her mother.
Merrington did not think that the murder was premeditated. His belief
was that when the girl found herself back in the surroundings where she
had spent such a happy girlhood in associatio