And--the long and short of it is, my lad!" he went on, first interrupting himself, and then giving me an odd look; "the long and short of it is, it's a queer thing that Crone should have come by his death close to the spot where you found yon man Phillips! There may be nothing but coincidence in it--but there's no denying it's a queer thing.

Go and order a conveyance, and we'll drive out yonder." In pursuance of the determination I had come to, I said no more about Crone to Mr.Lindsey.I had made up my mind on a certain course, and until it was taken I could not let out a word of what was by that time nobody's secret but mine to him, nor to any one--not even to Maisie Dunlop, to whom, purposely, I had not as yet said anything about my seeing Sir Gilbert Carstairs on the night of Phillips's murder.

And all the way out to the inn there was silence between Mr.Lindsey and me, and the event of the morning, about Gilverthwaite's will, and the odd circumstance of its attestation by Michael Carstairs, was not once mentioned.

We kept silence, indeed, until we were in the place to which they had carried Crone's dead body.

Mr.Murray and Sergeant Chisholm had got there before us, and with them was a doctor--the same that had been fetched to Phillips--and they were all talking together quietly when we went in.