Naturally, they steered clear of all reference to the tragedy in the
presence of the servant. Their talk dealt chiefly with sporting matters.
Brett, carried swiftly along the level road, kept his eyes fixed on
Beechcroft and its contiguous hamlet until they vanished in the middle
distance.
"This is the most curious inquiry I was ever engaged in," he communed.
"Winter, of course, will fasten on to Capella like a horse leech when he
knows the facts. Yet Capella is neither a coward nor an ordinary villain.
For some ridiculous reason, I have a sneaking sympathy with him. Had he
stormed and blustered when I pitched into him to-day I would have thought
less of him. And his wife! What mysterious workings of Fate brought those
two together and then disunited them? They become fascinated one with the
other whilst the brother's corpse is still palpitating beneath that
terrible stroke. They get married, with not unreasonable haste, but no
sooner do they reach Beechcroft, a house of evil import if ever bricks and
mortar had such a character, than they are driven asunder by some malign
influence.
"And now, after eighteen months, I am asked to take up the tangled clues,
if such may be said to exist. It is a difficult, perhaps an impossible,
undertaking. Yet if I have done so much in a day, what may not happen in a
fortnight!"
Long afterwards, recalling that soliloquy, he wondered whether or not,
were he suddenly endowed with the gift of prophecy, he would,
nevertheless, have pursued his quest.
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