“Please,” assented Carrados.

“When our father died about seven years ago, he left three thousand pounds.  It was invested in Canadian stock and brought in a little over a hundred a year.  By his will my mother was to have the income of that for life and on her death it was to pass to Millicent, subject to the payment of a lump sum of five hundred pounds to me.  But my father privately suggested to me that if I should have no particular use for the money at the time, he would propose my letting Millicent have the income of it until I did want it, as she would not be particularly well off.  You see, Mr. Carrados, a great deal more had been spent on my education and advancement than on her; I had my pay, and, of course, I could look out for myself better than a girl could.”

“Quite so,” agreed Carrados.

“Therefore I did nothing about that,” continued the lieutenant.  “Three years ago I was over again but I did not see much of them.  They were living in lodgings.  That was the only time since the marriage that I have seen them until last week.  In the meanwhile our mother had died and Millicent had been receiving her income.  She wrote me several letters at the time.  Otherwise we did not correspond much, but about a year ago she sent me their new address—­Brookbend Cottage, Mulling Common—­a house that they had taken.  When I got two months’ leave I invited myself there as a matter of course, fully expecting to stay most of my time with them, but I made an excuse to get away after a week.  The place was dismal and unendurable, the whole life and atmosphere indescribably depressing.”  He looked round with an instinct of caution, leaned forward earnestly, and dropped his voice.  “Mr. Carrados, it is my absolute conviction that Creake is only waiting for a favourable opportunity to murder Millicent.”

“Go on,” said Carrados quietly.  “A week of the depressing surroundings of Brookbend Cottage would not alone convince you of that, Mr. Hollyer.”

“I am not so sure,” declared Hollyer doubtfully.  “There was a feeling of suspicion and—­before me—­polite hatred that would have gone a good way towards it.  All the same there was something more definite.  Millicent told me this the day after I went there.  There is no doubt that a few months ago Creake deliberately planned to poison her with some weed-killer.  She told me the circumstances in a rather distressed moment, but afterwards she refused to speak of it again—­even weakly denied it—­and, as a matter of fact, it was with the greatest of difficulty that I could get her at any time to talk about her husband or his affairs.  The gist of it was that she had the strongest suspicion that Creake doctored a bottle of stout which he expected she would drink for her supper when she was alone.  The weed-killer, properly labelled, but also in a beer bottle, was kept with other miscellaneous liquids in the same cupboard as the beer but on a high shelf.  When he found that it had miscarried he poured away the mixture, washed out the bottle and put in the dregs from another.  There is no doubt in my mind that if he had come back and found Millicent dead or dying he would have contrived it to appear that she had made a mistake in the dark and drunk some of the poison before she found out.”