It was his third visit to headquarters that day in search of Doctor Warren, and he would state the object of his seeking to none other.  Now he smiled at the man he had been looking for.  They had met previously.

“Ah, good afternoon, Doctor Warren.  I’ve been looking for you,” was the colonel’s greeting.  “If you’re not busy, sir, I’d like just a few minutes of your time—­officially, of course.”

“Always ready for duty, Colonel.  I guess you military men know that we doctors are in a sort of class with yourselves when it comes to that.”

“You’re right.  Now I won’t be much more than a minute, and what I want to ask you, I can propound right here as well as anywhere.  You know I’m working to save Darcy?”

“So I’ve heard.”

“Well, you examined Mrs. Darcy soon after she was found dead.  You may, or you may not, have formed an opinion as to who killed her, but I judge you are positive as to how she was killed—­I mean the nature of the wound.”

“There were two wounds you know—­a fracture of the skull just back of the right ear, and a stab wound in the left side which punctured the heart.  Either would have caused death.”

“Can you tell which killed her?”

“I should say the stab wound, but I can not be positive.  You understand, Colonel, that I am to go on the stand for the prosecution and tell all I know about this case.”

“Oh, yes, I realize that, of course.  You are practically a witness against Darcy.  And I don’t, for one moment, wish you to think that I am trying to get advance information to use in his favor.  This is simply in the matter of justice, the ends of which I know you wish to serve, as I do myself.  So if I ask anything improper please stop me.  But since you will testify about these wounds, and since you have already pretty well described them to the newspaper reporters, it can do no harm to repeat the details to me.”

“None in the least, Colonel.”

“Then you feel sure the stab wound killed her?”

“Reasonably so.  Of course, as I said, either blow could have caused death, but blows on the head, even when the skull is badly fractured, as in this case, do not invariably cause death instantly.  In fact the victim usually lingers for several hours in an unconscious state.  Not so, however, in the case of a stab wound in or near the heart.  That is almost always fatal within a short space of time—­a minute or two.  So, while it is possible that Mrs. Darcy was first stunned by a blow on the head, which eventually would have killed her, I think death almost at once followed the stab wound.”

“Could both have been delivered by the same person?”

“Of course.  First the blow on the head, followed by the stab wound.”

“And there were no other injuries on the body?”

“None, except minor bruises caused by the fall to the floor.  But they were superficial.”