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“Hmm,” she said. “Just stop and think of the timing. Thomas was killed just over a day after learning of the guns. Sunday night to Tuesday morning—that’s the time span we’re working with.

So how did the three backers—or any one of them—discover that Thomas knew about the guns and intended to alert the authorities, all within that relatively short period of time?

” She looked at the others. “I just can’t see it, can you?

If Chesterton didn’t know—and given he didn’t move the guns, he didn’t—then how could his backers have learned about Thomas? ”

Stokes pulled a disgusted face. “Even though each of them is a gentleman and possesses the required hat and coat of the right sort, their denials were beyond believable, and their alibis are far too sound. Cardwell’s murderer isn’t one of them.”

“About the murderer being a gentleman,” Jordan said.

“I had a word with Mudd and Rawlings about the possibility that the murderer wasn’t actually a gentleman but a hired assassin dressed for the part.

” He grimaced. “They laughed. Apparently, the assassin who might pass for our unknown gentleman simply doesn’t exist. According to them, assassins are highly secretive—obviously—but also are not the sort who would know how to pass for a gentleman, hat and coat or not. ”

“Regardless,” Penelope said, “a hired killer means premeditation—meaning the person came to the office intending to kill Thomas. The killer would have come prepared with his own knife, not trusted to find a likely implement on Thomas’s desk.

A hired killer would have used his own knife and taken it away with him. ”

Stokes nodded. “The use of the letter knife argues that the killing was spontaneous, not planned. It was an opportunistic crime driven by a spur-of-the-moment decision.”

“We also mustn’t forget,” Barnaby said, “that Thomas recognized the man and knew him well enough to let his killer follow him into his office.” He looked at the others. “Whoever killed Thomas wasn’t a complete unknown, so not a hired killer or any of Chesterton’s backers.”

Stokes sighed. “Excellent points, all.” He looked around their circle. “So where does that leave us?”

“More specifically,” Penelope said, “ who does that leave us? Whose name is, however unconfidently, still on our list?”

Stokes’s office door slammed open, startling Penelope as well as Barnaby, Stokes, and Jordan.

They swung around to see Morgan clutching at the swinging door.

“Sorry, sorry!” Belatedly, the young constable rapped his knuckles on the wooden panel while the huge grin on his face grew. “But you’ll all want to hear this!”

At Stokes’s nod, Morgan bounded into the room, closely followed by Constable Walsh. Both were beaming fit to burst.

Stokes was struggling to find a frown. “Close the door, Walsh.” As Walsh obeyed, Stokes looked at Morgan. “All right. Out with it. What have you found?”

Barnaby held up a staying hand. “In the interests of our understanding, start at the beginning rather than the end. You were sent to the Fox to see if you could find witnesses to confirm that Thomas Cardwell was there on Sunday evening and followed Chesterton when he left for the warehouse.”

Morgan was nodding. “And we found our witnesses, right enough. Both the barmaid and the barman remember Thomas being there on Sunday evening. They’re an observant pair—I suppose they have to be with a clientele like that.

They’re always on the lookout for troublemakers.

That’s why Cardwell caught their attention, not that they knew it was him.

Apparently, he was wearing an old frieze coat with a cap pulled low on his forehead, and he was slouching back in the darkest corner and watching the three regulars who were talking with Chesterton.

It was Cardwell’s focus on that table that triggered the barman’s and barmaid’s instincts, but Cardwell simply watched, so they let him be. ”

“Then,” Walsh said, “the three gents up and left, but Cardwell remained in his corner, watching Chesterton.”

“And then,” Morgan took back the telling, “Chesterton finished his pint and left. Cardwell watched him go, then came to the bar and asked the barman if he had a hack for hire. Just for a few hours, maybe the night.”

“And?” Penelope demanded. The constables’ excitement was infectious.

“And,” Morgan replied, “the Fox does hire horses, and the barman fitted Cardwell up with one. That’s when the barman got a better look at Thomas’s face, and without us saying anything, the barman said he thought he looked like the brother of one of their regular gents.”

“Excellent!” Stokes looked up from his notes. “That’s going to make life easier.”

Morgan grinned. “We haven’t got to the good bit yet.”

Barnaby waved him on. “Stick to the what-came-next, or you’ll lose us.”

“Right.” Morgan paused for a second to gather his thoughts.

“Anyway, the barman watched Thomas ride off. The land’s very flat there—well, we all saw that when we went to the warehouse.

The barman said Thomas rode out onto the road, but seemed to pause and cast about, then he rode off southwestward across the fields. ”

Jordan’s eyes had narrowed as he envisaged the scene. “In the direction of the warehouse.” He met Morgan’s bright eyes. “So as we thought, Thomas followed Chesterton, almost certainly to the warehouse.”

“Another point ticked off.” Stokes made a note in his book.

Walsh added, “The barman said that Thomas brought the horse back a bit over an hour later. They were still open, but about to shut up for the night.”

“Good.” Stokes looked up. “Is that it?”

“No!” Morgan’s blue eyes were alight. “There’s more!

I thought to ask the barman and barmaid if they saw anyone unusual—not a regular—around on the next night.

The Monday night when we know Chesterton came in again and paid the three gents.

And both barman and barmaid described another man—a different geezer.

This one was tightlipped, not as tall as the first—Cardwell—and in the barmaid’s words, looked to have borrowed an old coat and cap from some poorhouse, but she noticed his linen and waistcoat were much better quality.

And this second geezer was watching Chesterton and the three gents, too.

And to cap it all, when Chesterton left, this second bloke also hired a hack from the house and, as far as the barman could tell, followed Chesterton. ”

“The barman said it was like a sideshow,” Walsh put in, “all following Chesterton.”

Morgan nodded. “The barman said as the second man also brought the hired horse back before they shut for the night. I asked whether he—the barman—saw any resemblance to the three gents, and he said that night it was too dark to see much, but from what he did see, he didn’t think so.”

Stokes looked at Morgan—who had all the appearance of a puppy who had just delivered a bone to its master—then Stokes transferred his gaze to Walsh, who was merely looking hopeful, and nodded. “That is one excellent piece of detective work on both your parts.”

Both constables all but preened under the rare but well-deserved praise.

Barnaby leaned forward, drawing Stokes’s attention. “So there was another man who learned about the guns.” Barnaby looked at Penelope and Jordan, then back at Stokes. “Who was he?”

“And was he the man who killed Thomas Cardwell?” Penelope mused. “If so, why?”

Jordan was frowning. “What led this other man to follow Chesterton?” He met Penelope’s eyes. “Was it the same reason that prompted Thomas to follow Chesterton—meaning because of our gentlemen dupes and their unexplained additional income?”

“That,” Barnaby said, “would make the second man either Sir Ulysses or Keeble.”

“Or someone sent by one or the other to follow their son,” Morgan volunteered.

Penelope felt as if they were literally spinning, juggling facts and conjecture.

Stokes broke the momentary silence. “The essential question still before us is this: Who was the gentleman who met Thomas Cardwell on Tuesday morning at his office door—the man Thomas recognized enough to greet, then allow to follow him inside? The man who, a little while later, departed the office via the rear door and, in between, left Thomas Cardwell stabbed to death with his own letter knife.”

Stokes glanced around, clearly inviting comment.

After a moment, Penelope asked, “Have we been approaching the murder—the motive for it—from the wrong angle?” She glanced at Barnaby, then looked at Stokes.

“What if it’s not about the guns per se but about the exposure of the gun-running scheme?

We know Thomas intended to alert the authorities to the existence of the scheme. ”

Barnaby frowned. “I think you’re right, but regardless, that’s a valid way forward motive-wise. So who does the exposure of the scheme threaten?”

They batted possibilities back and forth, but inevitably returned to the three gentlemen dupes and Sir Ulysses and Keeble.

“But,” Penelope said, “if we’re now on the right track as to motive, then the killer can only be someone who knew about the guns. By that reasoning, it can’t be the three dupes because, naive as they are, they never knew about the guns. We all agree on that.”

Barnaby nodded. “If they didn’t know about the guns, they couldn’t have known there was any threat hanging over them.” He looked at Stokes. “Based solely on motive, that leaves us with Chesterton, Winter, Haverstock, Huxtable, and this other man who followed Chesterton and learned about the guns.”

Stokes humphed. “And we know it can’t be Chesterton, and we’ve just proved his three backers were otherwise engaged at the time of Thomas’s murder.”