“Mrs. Herne, the servants, and Messrs. Hale and Clancy were examined.  All insist that Miss Loach was in her usual health and spirits, and had no idea of committing suicide, or of being in any danger of sudden death.  The weapon cannot be discovered, nor the means—­save as we suggest above—­ whereby the assassin can have made his escape.  The whole affair is one of the most mysterious of late years, and will doubtless be relegated to the list of undiscovered crimes.  The police have no clue, and apparently despair of finding one.  But the discovery of the mystery lies in the bell.  Who rang it? or did it ring of itself, as we suggest above.”

Cuthbert laid down the paper with a shrug.  The article did not commend itself to him, save as the means of making a precis of the case.  The theory of the bell appeared excessively weak, and he could not understand a man being so foolish as to put it forward.

“If the button was pressed down by Miss Loach, the bell would have rung at once,” argued Cuthbert; “and when it slipped up, even with the heat, the ringing would have stopped.  But the bell rang at eleven, and the girl was in the room two minutes later.  Someone must have rung it.  But why did someone do this, and how did someone escape after ringing in so fool-hardy a manner?”

He could not find an answer to this question.  The whole case was indeed most perplexing.  There seemed absolutely no answer to the riddle.  Even supposing Miss Loach had been murdered out of a long-delayed revenge by a member of the Saul family—­ and that theory appeared ridiculous to Mallow—­the question was how did the assassin escape?  Certainly, having regard to the cards still being on the lap of the deceased, and the closing of the door at a time when the policeman was not in the vicinity, the assassin may have escaped in that way.  But how did he come to be hidden in the bedroom, and how did he kill the old lady before she had time to call out or even rise, seeing that he had the whole length of the room to cross before reaching her?  And again, the escape of the assassin at this hour did not explain the ringing of the bell.  Cuthbert was deeply interested, and wondered if the mystery would ever be solved.  “I must see Jennings after all,” he thought as the train steamed into Paddington.

And see Jennings he did, sooner than he expected.  That same evening when he was dressing to go out, a card was brought.  It was inscribed “Miles Jennings.”  Rather surprised that the detective should seek him out so promptly, Cuthbert entered his sitting-room.  Jennings, who was standing with his back to the window, saluted him with a pleasant smile, and spoke to him as to an equal.  Of course he had every right to do so since he had been at school with Mallow, but somehow the familiarity irritated Cuthbert.

“Well, Jennings, what is it?”

“I came to ask you a few questions, Mallow.”

“About what?”