enough to be angry with the
detective for opening his eyes to the fact. "I don't see how you're
going to prove it, and, even if you did, it doesn't matter a dump one
way or the other."

"We'll let that point go," rejoined Colwyn curtly. "Your attitude in
shutting your eyes to facts hardly encourages me to proceed, but I'll
try. Would you mind showing me those bits of candle-grease you picked up
in the bedroom?"

Superintendent Galloway produced a metal match-box from his pocket,
emptied some pieces of candle-grease, a burnt wooden match and a broken
matchhead from it, and sat back eyeing the detective with a supercilious
smile. Colwyn, after examining them closely, brought from his own pocket
an envelope, and shook several more pieces of candle-grease on the
table.

"Look at these pieces of candle-grease side by side," he said. "Yours
were picked up alongside the bed; I found mine underneath the gas
burner."

Superintendent Galloway glanced at the pieces of candle-grease with the
same supercilious smile. "I see them," he said. "They are pieces of
candle-grease. What of them?"

"Do you not see that they are different kinds of candle-grease? The
pieces you picked up alongside the bed are tallow; mine, picked up from
underneath the gas-globe, are wax."

The Superintendent had not noticed the difference in the candle-grease,
but he thought it beneath his dignity to examine them again. "The
murderer may have had two candles," he said oracularly. "Anyway, what
does it matter? They're both candle-grease."

Colwyn swept his fragments back into his pocket with a quick impatient
gesture. "Both candle-grease, as you say," he returned sharply. "We do
not seem to be making much progress in our investigations, so let us
discontinue them. Good-night."

CHAPTER X

Colwyn went to bed, but not to sleep. Hour after hour he lay awake,
staring into the darkness, endeavouring to put together the facts he had
discovered during the afternoon's investigations at the inn. But they
resembled those irritating odd-shaped pieces of a puzzle which refuse to
fit into the remainder no matter which way they are turned. Try as he
would, he could not fit his clues into harmony with the police theory of
the murder.

On the other hand, he could not, nor did he attempt, to shut his eyes to
the strong case against Ronald, for he fully realised that there was
much to be explained in the young man's actions before any alternative
theory to