, and, though your explanations are
possible ones, I do not agree with you. We are looking at this case from
entirely different points of view. You believe that Ronald committed the
murder, and you are allowing that belief to colour everything connected
with the case. I am looking at this murder as a mystery which has not
yet been solved, and, without excluding the possibility that Ronald is
the murderer, I am not going, because of the circumstantial evidence
against him, to accept his guilt as a foregone conclusion until I have
carefully examined and tested all the facts for and against that theory.

"The one outstanding probability is that Mr. Glenthorpe was murdered for
his money. Now, excluding for the time being the circumstantial evidence
against Ronald--though without losing sight of it--the next point that
arises is was he murdered by somebody in the inn or by somebody from
outside--say, for example, one of the villagers employed on his
excavation works. The waiter's story of the missing knife suggests the
former theory, but I do not regard that evidence as incontrovertible.
The knife might have been stolen from the kitchen by a man who had been
drinking at the bar; indeed, until we have recovered the weapon it is
not even established that this was the knife with which the murder was
committed. It might have been some other knife. We must not take the
waiter's story for granted until we have recovered the knife, and not
necessarily then. But that story, as it stands, inclines to support the
theory that the murder was committed by somebody in the inn. On the
other hand, the theory of an outside murderer lends itself to a very
plausible reconstruction of the crime. Suppose, for example, the murder
had been committed by one of Mr. Glenthorpe's workmen, actuated by the
dual motives of revenge and robbery, or by either motive. Apparently the
whole village knew of Mr. Glenthorpe's intention to draw this money
which was in his possession when he was murdered--he seems to have been
a man who talked very freely of his private affairs--and the amount,
L300, would be a fortune to an agricultural labourer or a fisherman.
Such a man would know all about the bedroom windows on that side of the
inn opening on to the hillside, and would naturally choose that means of
entry to commit the crime. And, if he were a labourer in Mr.
Glenthorpe's employ, the thought of concealing the body by casting it
into the pit would probably occur