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Page 104
"You heard what he said about Miss Beverley?"
We were now walking rapidly along the high road, and Harley nodded.
"I did," he said. "I had expected it. He was inspired with this
brilliant idea last night, and his ideas are too few to be lightly
scrapped. If the Chief Constable is anything like the Inspector, what
we are going to do heaven only knows."
"I take it, Harley, that you are convinced of Colin Camber's
innocence?"
Harley did not answer for a moment, whereupon I glanced at him
anxiously, then:
"Colin Camber," he replied, "is of so peculiar a type that I could not
presume to say of what he is capable or is not capable. The most
significant point in his favour is this: He is a man of unusual
intellect. The planning of this cunning crime to such a man would have
been child's play--child's play, Knox. But is it possible to believe
that his genius would have failed him upon the most essential detail of
all, namely, an alibi?"
"It is not."
"Of course it is not. Which, continuing to regard Camber as an
assassin, reduces us to the theory that the crime was committed in a
moment of passion. This I maintain to be also impossible. It was no
deed of impulse."
"I agree with you."
"Now, I believe that the enquiry is going to turn upon a very delicate
point. If I am wrong in this, then perhaps I am wrong in my whole
conception of the case. But have you considered the mass of evidence
against Colin Camber?"
"I have, Harley," I replied, sadly, "I have."
"Think of all that we know, and which the Inspector does not know.
Every single datum points in the same direction. No prosecution could
ask for a more perfect case. Upon this fact I pin my hopes. Where an
Aylesbury rushes in I fear to tread. The analogy with an angel was
accidental, Knox!" he added, smilingly. "In other words, it is all too
obvious. Yet I have failed once, Knox, failed disastrously, and it may
be that in my anxiety to justify myself I am seeking for subtlety where
no subtlety exists."
CHAPTER XXV
AYLESBURY'S THEORY
There were strangers about Cray's Folly and a sort of furtive activity,
horribly suggestive. We had not pursued the circular route by the high
road which would have brought us to the lodge, but had turned aside
where the swing-gate opened upon a footpath into the meadows. It was
the path which I had pursued upon the day of my visit to the Lavender
Arms. A second private gate here gave access to the grounds at a point
directly opposite the lake; and as we crossed the valley, making for
the terraced lawns, I saw unfamiliar figures upon the veranda, and knew
that the cumbersome processes of the law were already in motion.
I was longing to speak to Val Beverley and to learn what had taken
place during her interview with Inspector Aylesbury, but Harley led the
way toward the tower wing, and by a tortuous path through the
rhododendrons we finally came out on the northeast front and in sight
of the Tudor garden.
Harley crossed to the entrance, and was about to descend the steps,
when the constable on duty there held out his arm.
"Excuse me, sir," he said, "but I have orders to admit no one to this
part of the garden."
"Oh," said Harley, pulling up short, "but I am acting in this case. My
name is Paul Harley."
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