been in
possession of a secret: it seemed certain that both had been murdered by
some person who desired to silence them. There was no possible doubt as
to Kitely's murder: from what Brereton had heard that afternoon there
seemed to be just as little doubt that Stoner had also been murdered. He
had heard what the local medical men had to say--one and all agreed that
though the clerk had received injuries in his fall which would produce
almost instantaneous death he had received a mortal blow before he fell.
Who struck that blow? Everything seemed to point to the fact that the
man who struck it was the man who strangled Kitely--a man of great
muscular power.

Glancing around the room as he sat in a big easy chair, his hands behind
his head, Brereton's eyes fell suddenly on Kitely's legacy to Windle
Bent. The queer-looking old volume which, because of its black calf
binding and brass clasp, might easily have been taken for a prayer-book,
lay just where Bent had set it down on his desk when Christopher Pett
formally handed it over--so far as Brereton knew Bent up to now had
never even opened it. And it was with no particular motive that Brereton
now reached out and picked it up, and unsnapping the clasp began idly to
turn over the leaves on which the old detective had pasted cuttings from
newspapers and made entries in his crabbed handwriting. Brereton
believed that he was idly handling what Pett had jocosely described the
book to be--a mere scrap-book. It never entered his head that he held in
his hands almost the whole solution of the mystery which was puzzling
him.

No man knows how inspiration comes to him, and Brereton never knew how
it was that suddenly, in the flash of an eye, in the swiftness of
thought, he knew that he had found what he wanted. Suggestion might have
had something to do with it. Kitely had written the word _Scrap-book_ on
the first blank page. Afterwards, at the tops of pages, he had filled in
dates in big figures--for reference--1875--1879--1887--and so on. And
Brereton suddenly saw, and understood, and realized. The cryptic entry
in Kitely's pocket-book became plain as the plainest print. _M. & C. v.
S. B. cir. 81_:--Brereton could amplify that now. Kitely, like all men
who dabble in antiquarian pursuits, knew a bit of Latin, and naturally
made an occasional airing of his knowledge. The full entry, of course,
meant M. &. C. _vide_ (=see) Scrap-Book _circa_ (=about) 1881.

With a sharp exclama