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irreverently known to his intimates as "New every morning."

"Well, how are you feeling?" he asked. "You looked rather chippy yesterday. However, I suppose it brings a job of work your way."

"Confound it," said Marryatt, "that's the trouble. The jury at the inquest are bound to bring in suicide; and then I can't bury the man in the churchyard, and all the villagers will say I refused out of spite, because the poor old chap used to give these atheist lectures on the village green."

"Rot!" said Gordon; "if they do find suicide, they'll certainly say he was of unsound mind."

"Yes," echoed Reeves, "if they do bring in suicide."

"But surely you can't doubt it," urged Marryatt energetically. "The man's just gone bankrupt, and it was an ugly case, from what I hear; several innocent people who'd been fools enough to believe in him left in the cart. At the same time, the smash came very suddenly, and that makes it unlikely that anybody could want to murder the man so soon. Oh, you'll find it's suicide right enough."

"Well," said Reeves a little stiffly, "we're going to do our best to find out between us. I've the greatest respect for the police as a body, but I don't think they're very good at following up clues. When I was in the Military Intelligence one was constantly putting material at the disposal of the police which they were too supine or too stupid to use."