commit a
terrible crime for so slight a cause.... Oh, if only my head would
cease throbbing!... Do as you like. Bates, see that every assistance
is given."

Fenley walked a few paces unsteadily. Obviously he was incapable of
lucid thought, and the mere effort at sustained conversation was a
torture. He turned through a yew arch into the Italian garden, and
threw himself wearily into a seat.

"Poor young fellow! He's fair off his nut," whispered Bates.

"What can one expect?" said Farrow. "But we must get busy. Where's
Brodie? Do go an' find him."

Bates jerked a thumb toward the house.

"He's in there," he said. "He helped to carry in the Gov'nor. Hasn't
left him since."

"He must come at once. He can't do any good now, an' we've lost nearly
an hour as it is."

The chauffeur appeared, red-eyed and white-faced. But he understood
the urgency of his mission, and soon had the car in movement. Others
came--the butler, some gardeners, and men engaged in stables and
garage, for the dead banker maintained a large establishment. Farrow
explained his plan. They would beat the woods methodically, and the
searcher who noted anything "unusual"--the word was often on the
policeman's lips--was not to touch or disturb the object or sign in
any way, but its whereabouts should be marked by a broken branch
stuck in the ground. Of course, if a stranger was seen, an alarm
should be raised instantly.

The little party was making for the Quarry Wood, when Jenkins arrived
on a bicycle. The first intimation he had received of the murder was
the chauffeur's message. There was a telephone between house and
lodge, but no one had thought of using it.

"Now, Bates," said Farrow, when the squad of men had spread out in
line, "you an' me will take the likeliest line. You ought to know
every spot in the covert where it's possible to aim a gun at any one
stannin' on top of the steps at The Towers. There can't be many such
places. Is there even one? I don't suppose the barefaced scoundrel
would dare come out into the open drive. Brodie said Mr. Fenley was
shot through the right side while facin' the car, so he bears out both
your notion an' Mr. Trenholme's that the bullet kem from the Quarry
Wood. What's _your_ idea about it? Have you one, or are you just as
much in the dark as the rest of us?"

Bates was sour-faced with perplexity. The killing of his employer was
already crystallizing in his thoughts into an irrevocable thing, for
the but