a man come in 'at, from his description
i' t' papers, 'ud be this here fellow that were murdered. I didn't
talk none to him, but, after a bit, I heard him talking to t'
landlord. And, after a deal o' talk about fishing hereabouts, I heard
him asking t' landlord, as seemed to be a gr't fisherman and knew all
t' countryside, if he knew any places, churchyards, where there were
Netherfields buried? He talked so much about 'em, 'at 't name got
right fixed on my mind. T' next day I had business outside Alnwick, at
one or two farms, and that night I made further north, to put up at
Embleton. Now then, as I were walking that way, after dark I chanced
in wi' a man near Lesbury, and walked wi' him a piece, and I asked
him, finding he were a native, if he knew owt o' t' Netherfield
graves. And that 'ud be t' man 'at tell'd you 'at he'd met such a
person. All right!--I'm t' person.'

"Then you merely asked the question out of curiosity?" suggested the
inspector.

"Aye--just 'cause I'd heard t' strange man inquire," assented Beeman.
"I just wondered if it were some family o' what they call
consequence."

"You never saw the man again whom you speak of as having seen at
Alnwick?" the inspector asked. "And had no direct conversation with
him yourself?"

"Never saw t' fellow again, nor had a word with him," replied Beeman.
"He had his glass or two o' rum, and went away. But I reckon he was t'
man who was murdered."

"And where have you been, yourself, since the time you tell us about?"
asked the inspector.

"Right away across country," answered Beeman readily. "I went across
to Chillingham and Wooler, then forrard to some farms i' t' Cheviots,
and back by Alnham and Whittingham to Alnwick. And then I heard all
about this affair, and so I thought good to come and tell you what bit
I knew."

"I'm much obliged to you, Mr. Beeman," said the inspector. "You've
cleared up something, at any rate. Are you going to stay longer in the
neighbourhood?"

"I shall be here--leastways, at Alnwick yonder, at t' Temp'rance--for
two or three days yet, while I've collected some sheep together 'at
I've bowt for our maister, on one farm and another," replied Beeman.
"Then I shall be away. But if you ever want me, at t' 'Sizes, or wot
o' that sort, my directions is James Beeman, foreman to Mr. Thomas
Dimbleby, Cross-houses Manor, York."

When this candid and direct person had gone, the inspector looked at
Miss Raven and me with glances that in