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."

"As he had arranged?"

"Yes. He paid for the rooms, and a meal last night, so I was told."

"But if he was killed, he couldn't have passed out."

"Not unless he was a spirit," said Herries, with a shrug, "but the man whom Mrs. Narby took to be Sir Simon, certainly, according to her story, had a fur coat on, that belonged to my uncle, the same in which he arrived here last night."

Trent wrinkled his brow perplexedly. What Herries said quite upset his calculations, and he found himself face to face with a criminal mystery, such as had never before come into his official life. The accused man, saw his advantage and followed it up.

"Why should not this unknown man have murdered my uncle," he said quickly, "and have entered my bedroom to implicate me in the crime?"

"Why should he have done that?"

"I cannot say. But my bedroom door was not locked, and I was fast asleep, being quite worn out. The assassin left the razor and the key; 

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