“None—­except that, as I have told you, Faversham himself saw the murderer, except his face, and Dixon saw his back.  A slight man in corduroys—­that’s all Dixon can say.  Faversham and the Dixons were alone in the house, except for a couple of maids.  Perhaps”—­he hesitated—­“I had better tell you some other facts that Faversham told me—­and the Superintendent of Police.  They will of course come out at the inquest.  He and Melrose had had a violent quarrel immediately before the murder.  Melrose threatened to revoke his will, and Faversham left him, understanding that all dispositions in his favour would be cancelled.  He came out of the room, spoke to Dixon in the gallery and walked to his own sitting-room.  Melrose apparently sat down at once to write a codicil revoking the will.  He was disturbed, came out into the gallery, and was shot dead.  The few lines he wrote are of course of no validity.  The will holds, and Faversham is the heir—­to everything.  You see”—­he paused again—­“some awkward suggestions might be made.”

“But,” cried Tatham, “you say Dixon saw the man?  And the muddy footmarks—­in the house—­and on the terrace!”

* * * * *

“Don’t mistake me, for heaven’s sake,” said Undershaw, quickly.  “It is impossible that Faversham should have fired the shot!  But in the present state of public opinion you will easily imagine what else may be said.  There is a whole tribe of Melrose’s hangers-on who hate Faversham like poison; who have been plotting to pull him down, and will be furious to find him after all in secure possession of the estate and the money.  I feel tolerably certain they will put up some charge or other.”

“What—­of procuring the thing?”

Undershaw nodded.

Tatham considered a moment.  Then he rang, and when Hurst appeared, all white and disorganized under the stress of the news just communicated to him by Undershaw’s chauffeur, he ordered his horse for eight o’clock in the morning.  Victoria looked at him puzzled; then it seemed she understood.

But every other thought was soon swallowed up in the remembrance of the widow and daughter.

“Not to-night—­not to-night,” pleaded Undershaw who had seen Netta Melrose professionally, only that morning.  “I dread the mere shock for Mrs. Melrose.  Let them have their sleep!  I will be over early to-morrow.”

XXI

By the first dawn of the new day Tatham was in the saddle.  Just as he was starting from the house, there arrived a messenger, and a letter was put into his hand.  It was from Undershaw, who, on leaving Duddon the night before, had motored back to the Tower, and taken Faversham in charge.  The act bore testimony to the little doctor’s buffeted but still surviving regard for this man, whom he had pulled from the jaws of death.  He reported in his morning letter that he had passed some of the night in conversation with Faversham, and wished immediately to pass on certain facts learnt from it, first of all to Tatham, and then to any friend of Faversham’s they might concern.