To any one but Pointer it would have seemed a blameless record. Even a Lux camera might have passed as innocent in such hands, but the Professor had bought it last Monday, and in Folkstone—Folkestone, the end of the railway line on which Tunbridge Wells lies!
Pointer marked his report with a sign that meant that the thinker's home was to be the object of special, but very discreet attention by the policemen who passed it, and that the passing of it should be included in their programme as often as possible.
He added in his neat legible writing that the Folkestone salesman should be skilfully tapped for possible further details of last Sunday evening. Then he wrote out some instructions for his own C.I.D. and wound up by cabling to his confreres in Brussels for particulars of Orison's life while there.
Pointer's man had already learnt that the Professor had apparently spent last Sunday afternoon travelling to Folkestone, and Monday and Tuesday in his study at Hampstead.
All seemed quite as it should be, bar that untimely purchase of a camera. But Pointer took no one at his face value. Or at least very few people.
It was now high time to drive off for Tangye's office. Pointer was shown in at once. Tangye met him with some impatience.
"Some important development, I suppose? Since you've asked me to lose a week-end in town."
"The case is developing," Pointer assured him a little grimly, "but do you think it's quite fair to your old clerk to let him in for perjury? For a criminal prosecution? We have a very reliable witness who saw you during five to six last Tuesday—not here in your office."
"Impossible!" Tangye said fiercely, "a damned lie!"
"What was in that package, sir, that you were seen carrying out of the tradesmen's gate at Riverview about half-past five?"
Tangye seemed to shrink into his clothes. His knuckles whitened as he gripped the edge of the writing-table.
"I tell you I wasn't near the place," he began to bluster. "Mistaken identity!"
"Independent witnesses," Pointer bluffed back.
Tangye rose, and Pointer had to take his leave; to find Haviland waiting for him in his room at the Yard. The Superintendent had had a chat with Mrs. Bligh's maid. Tangye had brought the camera in question with him when he came to lunch at Tunbridge on Sunday. The maid explained that her mistress then expected to be invited on a certain yachting cruise to Egypt, and since her hostessto-be was a keen photographer, she had asked Tangye to buy her the best camera for temples and indoor work, and to show her how to use it.
"But she either lost it, or it didn't please her, or something. Anyway, she didn't have it with her when she came home. Nor he neither. I know, for I went out to the car. There wasn't any camera in it," the maid explained.
In the course of further conversation she let it drop that at the best of times Mrs. Bligh was not a lady who permitted questions, and that since she had not received the invitation in question, it would be as much as the maid's life was worth to speak of photography in any form.
Pointer had already had a private note issued to all photographic dealers, second-hand shops, and even to all dustmen in town, asking them to watch out for a large box-camera which might have been left for repairs, or been thrown out, broken up. So far nothing had resulted. He had not thought that it would.
What had become of Tangye's—or Mrs. Bligh'scamera? Duly entering its absence in his notes of the case, he turned to some other work, but within an hour there came another message over the 'phone from the stockbroker. Would Pointer make it convenient to see him again at his office?
It was a very chastened Tangye who was speaking.
Pointer dropped everything and hurried into the city. Tangye shook hands almost eagerly.
"So glad I could catch you. I wanted to see you again at once. I want to—er—modify—er—In fact, I've a damned unpleasant statement to make." He spoke as though it were the fault of the detective-officer, then he got himself in hand again. "It's about my alibi. There's no use trying to throw dust in your eyes, I find."
Pointer thought that bricks rather than dust had been used, but he only bowed.
"As a matter of fact," Tangye avoided Pointer's placid gaze, "I spent part of those two hours which interest you so much with Miss Saunders, in the Old Deer Park."
Tangye went on to tell of an appeal to him on Tuesday from his wife's companion after she had received notice to leave Riverview at once. They had met in the Park, talked it over until at half-past five, he had driven back to his office to see what could be done.
"Miss Saunders, of course, will bear out every word of this," he finished.
"Of course," Pointer echoed politely.
Tangye shot him a glance, but the Chief Inspector took his leave without further comment. He was due in the Assistant Commissioner's room.
Pointer and his superiors at New Scotland Yard did not see eye to eye about Mrs. Tangye's death. The Assistant Commissioner agreed with Wilmot that only a very active fancy could find a crime in it. Barbara Ash's little story gave Captain Pelham food for thought, however, and he sat awhile digesting it.
"Looks as though you were going to be right once again, Pointer, in that it was a murder, but mistaken in your theory of how it happened."
"I don't think that's possible," Pointer was never conceited, but he spoke very firmly. "In many cases, my theory might be wrong or right, and yet the case would stand. But not here. Either Mrs. Tangye was murdered as I imagine, or she wasn't murdered at all. It's that cousin of her's, Oliver, that complicates all the reasoning."
"You mean that if he dove-tailed with the murderer by chance, or intention, your idea of an appointment in the Riverview morning-room loses all its force? That's one of the things I want to talk to you about.
"We've had a private report from a man whom, even to you, I can only call Captain X. He's been doing some secret service work in Morocco. Personally, from what he told me, I haven't the shadow of a doubt that the Olivier whom the French shot was Oliver Headly. In in any case, Oliver was a doomed man from the time the French and Spaniards joined forces. He knew too much. And he knew it too accurately. When they caught him, he got a note through to Captain X, giving him some very important information. Unfortunately he had clearly sent a. previous note which never reached its billet. The Riffs caught the carrier, X thinks. In this second note he winds up with 'Don't forget the message to my cousin.' He signs his note, as he always did, merely with a circle. X says he met Olivier and is absolutely sure that he was an Englishman, a man of education, a bad hat, and a plucky devil. His age he puts at the age Headly would be now, and he once saw a book in his possession with the initials O. H. inside it. I think all this rules Mrs. Tangye's cousin out. Of course there's just a chance that he wasn't Olivier, and therefore, may still be alive, but I think it's hardly worth considering. Meanwhile, there's another point.
"Vardon's uncle, he's an M.P. for God knows where, has been writing to us," Pelham went on pensively. He was a long, loose-limbed, clever-looking man "A nasty note. Wants to know if we are armed with lettres de cachet, and threatens to set the press on to asking if Habeas Corpus is dead or not. We've got to let Vardon go. Or arrest him. That's an order from on high. Now, what shall it be?"
Pointer had expected this.
"Very good, sir. Vardon shall be told at once that he can go where he likes. Fortunately where he likes will be Patagonia."
"I'm glad that's your idea of good fortune. I suppose you chatter Patagonian too, like a native, and will be off there before we know where you are?"
Pointer laughed.
"No, sir, I'm not interested in Patagonia—so far. What I mean is that he'll be practically