the criminal has all the luck. Verdict, persons unknown."
"So Scotland Yard leaves it at that?"
"Unless Mr. Fortune has something up his sleeve."
"Nary card. But you know we've missed something, Bell."
"Have we, indeed, sir? And where shall we look for it?"
"Oh, watch out. Watch everybody."
"Life is short, sir," said Superintendent Bell gloomily, and with that they parted.
The Superintendent was a true prophet. The sensational inquest upon Stephenson Charlecote ended in an unsatisfactory verdict of murder by some person or persons unknown. It was obvious that public opinion, and the coroner, as the voice thereof, directed suspicion against Geoffrey. He made a bad witness. He was agitated, nervous, and under the coroner's hostile examination lost his temper.
When he was asked if he knew that his father had on the morning of the murder made a will leaving everything to him, he displayed a violent agitation, swore (not merely as a witness but with profane oaths) that he knew nothing about it, insulted the coroner, and roared out a declaration that he would not touch the money, which disgusted everybody as a bit of false melodrama. If distrust and dislike were grounds for hanging a man, the jury would
