ewe
had spent most of the previous night reading and revising his summaries
and notes of the Riversbrook case, and in minutely reviewing his
investigations of it. Over several pipes in the early morning hours he
pondered long and deeply on the secret of Sir Horace Fewbanks's murder,
without finding a solution which satisfactorily accounted for all the
strange features of the case. But one thing he felt sure of was that
Birchill had not committed the murder. He based that belief partly on
the butler's confession, and partly on his own discoveries. He believed
Hill to be a cunning scoundrel who had overreached the police for some
purpose of his own by accusing Birchill, and who, to make his story more
probable, had even implicated himself in the supposed burglary as a
terrorised accomplice. And Crewe had been unable to test the butler's
story, or find out what game he was playing, because of the assiduity
with which the principal witness for the prosecution had been "nursed"
by the police from the moment he made his confession. Crewe bit hard
into his amber mouthpiece in vexation as he recalled the ostrich-like
tactics of Inspector Chippenfield, who, having accepted Hill's story as
genuine, had officially baulked all his efforts to see the man and
question him about it.

He had come to court with the object of witnessing Birchill's behaviour
in the dock and the efforts of any of his criminal friends to communicate
with him. As a man who had had considerable experience in criminal trials
he knew the irresistible desire of the criminal in the gallery of the
court to encourage the man in the dock to keep up his courage.
Communications of the kind had to be made by signs. It was Crewe's
impression that by watching Birchill in the dock and Birchill's friends
in the gallery he might pick up a valuable hint or two. It was also his
intention to study closely the defence which Counsel for the prisoner
intended to put forward.

It was therefore with a feeling of mingled annoyance and surprise that
Crewe, looking down from his point of vantage at the bevy of
fashionably-dressed ladies in the body of the court, recognised Mrs.
Holymead, Mademoiselle Chiron and Miss Fewbanks seated side by side,
engaged in earnest conversation. Before he could withdraw from their view
behind the pillar in front of him, Miss Fewbanks looked up and saw him.
She bowed to him in friendly recognition, and Crewe saw her whisper to
Mrs. Holymead, who glanc