He said again , in a most disconcerting whisper which must have been audible for about fifty yards :sx " Mr. Lawless , sir !sx Jest a minute !sx " I had a good mind to tell him to go to the devil , but something about his attitude made me change my mind and go back to him .sx I said :sx " What is all this ?sx " His fingers caught my arm .sx " Come inside jest a minute , sir !sx " He pulled me across the threshold and latched the door with a soft decisiveness which suggested that he was shutting out the world .sx We were standing in the dark now .sx I said again , irritably :sx " What is all this ?sx What the devil are you playing at ?sx " He dropped his hold of my arm .sx He said .sx " Gently , sir .sx Gently !sx " He had ceased the shouting whisper now but his voice was very low .sx " I only wanted to tell you , sir , in case you came back to-morrow and asked where that gat was you brought in .sx .. " " Gat ?sx " I said .sx " Sorry , sir , that's Yank .sx Gun , I mean .sx " " Good Lord !sx " I said .sx " I'd forgotten it .sx Where is it ?sx Thanks very much .sx I shoved it in the corner here when I came in .sx " I turned round and began to grope against the wall .sx Again Dinwater's fingers caught my sleeve .sx " S'no good , sir , " he said .sx " The Inspector , 'e borrowed it .sx He asked whose it was and I had to tell him .sx Ad your name on the butt , anyhow , didn't it , sir ?sx ... Yes , sir , he borrowed that , and he borrowed mine an' all .sx both on 'em , sir !sx " He broke off there , obviously waiting for me to say something .sx .. The whole beauty of the position suddenly dawned on me .sx I DIDN'T get much sleep that night .sx As I saw things , I wasn't in any enviable situation .sx It was rather like one of those weekly-paper problems :sx A , being in love with C , the wife of B , overhears C telling B that if he does such-and-such , she will kill him .sx The same evening A goes for an entirely lonely walk , carrying a rifle , and returns to his home town to find that at some time during the evening B has been shot .sx A conceals from the Police his knowledge that there was any friction between C and B and forgets , quite genuinely , to mention his own walk with a rifle .sx He find , however , at the end of the evening that the Police not only knew that he had been for a walk with a rifle but have taken the rifle away with them .sx Problem :sx What should A do next ?sx Be sure and post your solutions early in the hope of winning either a gramophone , mangle , or two dozen assorted bulbs .sx But in my case , A didn't seem able to worry about anything except C. The number of times up to midnight and between seven and eight-thirty the next morning that I looked at the telephone ; even sat down in front of it and got hold of the damned thing , I shouldn't like to try and guess .sx I once even went so far as to ask for the Hall number , only to funk it and cancel the call a second later .sx And then , as I was drinking coffee and looking at the omelet which I knew I must eat or reduce Mrs. Yule to real sorrow , I had a call myself .sx I had a presentiment that it was Sheila .sx .. but presentiments sometimes go wrong .sx It wasn't Sheila .sx It was a cold , impersonal and official voice which said it was speaking form Farningham Police Station .sx Inspector Cross would be very much obliged indeed if Mr. Lawless could make it convenient to come over and see him at 10.30 that morning .sx I'd expected this , of course , but I can't say that it was any the more pleasant for that .sx The invitation didn't pretend to disguise itself as anything but an order .sx I said that I supposed I should have to make it convenient , and rang off .sx I looked at my book and found rather a busy morning , and then of course had to ring up old Ware and ask him to do the urgent cases for me .sx He was very decent about it , as always .sx But this was small comfort when I knew I should have every one of the jobs to start all over again the day after .sx Farningham is a good three-quarters of an hour's drive .sx It's not so much the distance as the fact that the road twists and turns so much and is so beastly narrow that you can't ever go over 25 .sx I got into the town with ten minutes to spare , but went straight , like a good little boy , to the Station .sx I was left in an outer room , cooling my heels under the austere eye of the Sergeant whom I had seen in the car the night before .sx Beyond telling me to wait he didn't speak .sx I must say that I always feel very uncomfortable in police stations .sx They've got a curious atmosphere which , even if one's only come in , say , to report the theft of one's own car by somebody else , makes a man feel as if he was once more outside a study door .sx They had me in dead on time ; a small room with white-washed walls , unpleasantly official deal chairs and table , and a cold northern aspect of brickwork which I suspected was the outside of a cell .sx I got my first shock of the morning directly I got into the room .sx My old friend the Inspector was there , looking far less impressive without his hat , but there was some one else too .sx There was the tall , dark fellow in gray , who had been at lunch up at the Hall the day before ; and now I found out his name .sx After I had made my salaams to the Inspector , this other got up and came over to me and shook hands .sx He said :sx " We met yesterday .sx I caught your name but you probably didn't get mine .sx Gethryn .sx " He was , I must say , very civil .sx I wondered what on earth he was doing in this galley , but decided that time must tell me if anything did .sx I took a chair and managed to prevent myself from sitting on its edge and twiddling my hat .sx The Inspector was a long time beginning .sx Whether the silence was his method of getting people all hot and bothered .sx I can't say , but it succeeded in doing this to me , especially when , looking round the room , I saw my gun standing up in a corner .sx The Inspector rested his forearms on his blotter and looked at me .sx " We're sorry to trouble you , Mr. Lawless , " he said , " but it looks at the moment as if you are going to be an important witness .sx We thought we would start off by getting a statement from you .sx " He stopped there .sx I felt bound to say something and so , fatuously , bleated " Quite .sx " He looked at a little sheaf of notes and then began .sx He said :sx " I would like to read to you the notes I made after our little chat last night , and ask you to stop me and correct me if there's anything I've got wrong .sx But first , I'd like to go a little farther back into your evening so as to make my notes complete .sx Would you mind telling , for instance , exactly how you spent your evening from , say , 6.30 p.m. until the time you got down to the Moon Inn at 9.40? " .sx " Not a bit , I went up at six o'clock to the Hall to .sx .. " " You went up to the Hall ?sx On business or .sx .. " I began to get a little hot under the collar .sx I snapped :sx " We'll come to that if you'll let me tell the story in my own way .sx I went up to the Hall at six o'clock to superintend the dressing of an injury to a mare belonging to Lady Grenville .sx I gave the dressing to the groom and watched him apply it and chatted to him for some time .sx I then got into my car and went straight back to my own house , arriving there within five minutes .sx I then took off my clothes , had a bath , put on some other clothes , had a very light meal , thought that to pass the time I would go and shoot at the Rifle Range , walked up to the Rifle Range , did not shoot as I heard there was some one else there and didn't feel particularly like company , and went for a walk instead .sx I walked to the top of Samsford hill , across a field and sat down in a copse belonging to Mr. George Nickells who farms that land .sx There I had a smoke and a rest and eventually returned the same way as I'd come , getting back to The Moon at approximately 9.40. That's the whole tale of my evening .sx Anything else ?sx " " Thank you , Mr. Lawless .sx Well .sx .. one or two points perhaps .sx " Here he began to look at this fellow Gethryn .sx Just sideways glances ; funny sort of glances I thought they were , sort of way a kid will look at its mother to see whether it's behaving properly .sx But apparently he got no help for he went on himself .sx He fumbled about among his notes , made one of two more , and said at last :sx " One point , Mr. Lawless .sx When you went up to the Hall at six to see this horse of Lady Geville's did you by any chance see Lady Greville or Sir Charles , or any one except the groom you mention ?sx " " In addition to the groom , I saw one lodge-keeper , one lodge-keepers wife , the upper part of two stable boys and the lower half of a third .sx " Perhaps it was silly of me to get annoyed , but I didn't like the whole atmosphere , and I suppose really I was a bit frightened .sx And when I get frightened I always get angry .sx The Inspector made the bumble-bee noise that I'd heard once or twice the night before .sx He then said :sx " And you say , Mr. Lawless , that when you took your rifle , " - he gave the slightest nod towards the corner - " and went out intending to , er .sx .. have a shoot at this Rifle Club , you say that the fact of some one else being on the range made you decide not to go there after all .sx Why ?sx " " I think I have already said that it was because I didn't feel like the company .sx " " Oh , I see .sx Who was it , Mr. Lawless , who was shooting on the Range when you passed ?sx " " Haven't the remotest idea .sx I only heard the shots .sx I didn't go through the gate that leads to the Range .sx You can't see the Range from the road .sx There's 300 yards of thick hill in between , and the Range is at the top .sx " " Have you any idea , Mr. Lawless , of who it might have been shooting at that hour ?sx Which would , I suppose , be somewhere between half-past seven and eight o'clock .sx Is that a usual time for members of the Club to be shooting ?sx " " I'm afraid I can't help you much .sx I hardly use the Club at all .sx I didn't think myself that there would be anybody there at that time .sx That's why I went .sx " " Have you any idea , Mr. Lawless , of who this person or persons shooting might have been ?sx " I grinned at bit at that .sx " Certainly , " I said .sx " It was one of the thirty members of the Club .sx I'm afraid I don't know all their names but I could get a list for you quite easily , and let you see it .sx Shall I ?sx " I think he was going to ignore that and go on , but Gethryn put his oar in .sx He said , not looking at me at all , but out of the window :sx " Afraid , I can't follow your logic , Mr. Lawless .sx You're walking along a road , near a Rifle Range which you can't see , and which is 300 yards away from you .sx You hear a shot and you know , not only that that shot was fired on the range but that is was fired by a member of the Club .sx "