Jonah's Luck. Fergus Hume

James Browne of Elgar Avenue, Tarhaven. We were fellow students."

      "I know him," said the Inspector, taking down the name. "Can he vouch for your respectability?"

      Herries smiled bitterly.

      "Respectability and myself parted company long ago," said he with a shrug, "but Browne knows all that I am telling you now, even to the courting of my cousin Maud."

      "What did he think of your quarrelling with your uncle?"

      "He approved of my leaving the house. As to the quarrel, Browne knows that I have a fiery temper."

      "Oh," interrupted Trent in his peculiar tone, and thinking that he had chanced upon something suspicious. "So you have a fiery temper?"

      "Yes," admitted Herries, not dreaming of what such an admission might mean to him. "But only when it is aroused by injustice and insults. Last night it was not so roused. I went to bed shortly before eight o'clock, ignorant, as I have said several times, that my uncle was in the house. Had I known that, I would have gone on to Tarhaven, weary though I was, rather than have slept under the same roof with a man who insulted my mother and myself shamefully."

      Trent shook his head.

      "All very fine. But the key of Sir Simon's room was found on the floor of your bedroom. The razor, with which his throat was cut, was in your possession, and there is blood on the sleeve of your shirt."

      The young man hastily stripped off his coat, and held the right hand sleeve of his shirt under the lamp, close to Trent's eyes.

      "There are the smears," he said quietly, "and you will see that they are made by fingers dipped in blood having been drawn down the sleeve. Could I have done that myself? Also, when I found the razor on my quilt when I awoke, I called up the landlord to ask him what it meant. I knew nothing of the crime at the time, neither did Narby, as he will tell you. Were I guilty, would I have acted in so foolish a manner?"

      "Oh yes, you would," said Trent, dictatorially, "criminals are very artful, as I have often found."

      It was apparently impossible to convince a man so bent upon finding proofs of guilt where none existed, so Herries abandoned persuasion and turned away with a shrug.

      "I have nothing more to say!"

      "Yes, you have," insisted Trent, stupidly. "Why did you conceal that Sir Simon expected you last night?"

      "He did not. He never knew that I was here, or even in England, as we had not corresponded since he turned me out of his house at Tarhaven two years ago. The maid Elspeth said that Sir Simon expected a gentleman. I was not the man."

      "You were the only stranger who came last night," said Trent digging his pencil thoughtfully into the book.

      "No. The expected visitor must have come last night, and have slept here. Mr. Narby will tell you that Mrs. Narby saw him pass through the tap-room at eight this morning."

      "Did he not stop to pay the bill?"

      "Mrs. Narby thought that the man was Sir Simon." The Inspector rose quickly.

      "What?" he asked in an amazed tone.

      "I am only telling you what Narby told me, before either of us knew that a murder had taken place," said Herries tartly. "He declared that his wife had seen the gentleman, who occupied this parlour last night,--and he was Sir Simon, as we know--pass through the tap-room at eight as he had arranged."