"
"And now you don't think so?"
"Now I think that his dead body is there."
"Meaning that Cayley went down and killed him afterwards after
you had come, after the police had come?"
"Well, that's what I shrink from, Bill. It's so horribly
cold-blooded. Cayley may be capable of it, but I hate to think
of it."
"But, dash it all, your other way is cold-blooded enough.
According to you, he goes up to the office and deliberately
shoots a man with whom he has no quarrel, whom he hasn't seen for
fifteen years!"
"Yes, but to save his own neck. That makes a difference. My
theory is that he quarrelled violently with Mark over the girl,
and killed him in sudden passion. Anything that happened after
that would be self-defense. I don't mean that I excuse it, but
that I understand it. And I think that Mark's dead body is in
the passage now, and has been there since, say, half-past two
yesterday afternoon. And to-night Cayley is going to hide it in
the pond."
Bill pulled at the moss on the ground beside him, threw away a
handful or two, and said slowly, "You may be right, but it's all
guess-work, you know.
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