and
elsewhere. They watch the house; see Manderson off to bed; Martin comes
to shut the window, and leaves it ajar, accidentally on purpose. They
wait till Martin goes to bed at twelve-thirty; then they just walk into
the library, and begin to sample the whisky first thing. Now suppose
Manderson isn't asleep, and suppose they make a noise opening the
window, or however it might be. He hears it; thinks of burglars; gets up
very quietly to see if anything's wrong; creeps down on them, perhaps,
just as they're getting ready for work. They cut and run; he chases them
down to the shed, and collars one; there's a fight; one of them loses
his temper and his head, and makes a swinging job of it. Now, Mr. Trent,
pick that to pieces.'

'Very well,' said Trent; 'just to oblige you, Murch, especially as I
know you don't believe a word of it. First: no traces of any kind
left by your burglar or burglars, and the window found fastened in the
morning, according to Martin. Not much force in that, I allow. Next:
nobody in the house hears anything of this stampede through the library,
nor hears any shout from Manderson either inside the house or outside.
Next: Manderson goes down without a word to anybody, though Bunner
and Martin are both at hand. Next: did you ever hear, in your long
experience, of a householder getting up in the night to pounce on
burglars, who dressed himself fully, with underclothing, shirt; collar
and tie, trousers, waistcoat and coat, socks and hard leather shoes; and
who gave the finishing touches to a somewhat dandified toilet by doing
his hair, and putting on his watch and chain? Personally, I call that
over-dressing the part. The only decorative detail he seems to have
forgotten is his teeth.'

The inspector leaned forward thinking, his large hands clasped before
him. 'No,' he said at last. 'Of course there's no help in that theory.
I rather expect we have some way to go before we find out why a man gets
up before the servants are awake, dresses himself awry, and is murdered
within sight of his house early enough to be 'cold and stiff by ten in
the morning.'

Trent shook his head. 'We can't build anything on that last
consideration. I've gone into the subject with people who know. I
shouldn't wonder,' he added, 'if the traditional notions about loss of
temperature and rigour after death had occasionally brought an innocent
man to the gallows, or near it. Dr. Stock has them all, I feel sure;
most general p