But look here, Mr. Paynter; there's another and better argument against any outsider from the village or countryside having committed the crime. Granted he might have slipped past us somehow, and gone for the Squire. But why should he go for him in the wood?
How did he know he was in the wood? You remember how suddenly the poor old boy bolted into it, on what a momentary impulse.
'It's the last place where one would normally look for such a man, in the middle of the night. No, it's an ugly thing to say, but we, the group round that garden table, were the only people who knew.
Which brings me back to the one point in your remarks which I happen to think perfectly true."
"What was that?" inquired the other.
"That the murderer was a mystic," said Ashe. "But a cleverer mystic than poor old Martin."
Paynter made a murmur of protest, and then fell silent.
"Let us talk plainly," resumed the lawyer. "Treherne had all those mad motives you yourself admit against the woodcutter.
He had the knowledge of Vane's whereabouts, which nobody can possibly attribute to the woodcutter. But he had much more.
Who taunted and goaded the Squire to go into the wood at all? Treherne. Who practically prophesied, like an infernal quack astrologer, that something would happen to him if he did go into the wood? Treherne. Who was, for some reason, no matter what, obviously burning with rage and restlessness all that night, kicking his legs impatiently to and fro on the cliff, and breaking out with wild words about it being all over soon? Treherne. And on top of all this, when I walked closer to the wood, whom did I see slip out of it swiftly and silently like a shadow, but turning his face once to the moon?
On my oath and on my honor--Treherne."
"It is awful," said Paynter, like a man stunned.
"What you say is simply awful."
"Yes," said Ashe seriously, "very awful, but very simple.
Treherne knew where the ax was originally thrown. I saw him, on that day he lunched here first, watching it like a wolf, while Miss Vane was talking to him. On that dreadful night he could easily have picked it up as he went into the wood.
He knew about the well, no doubt; who was so likely to know any old traditions about the peacock trees? He hid the hat in the trees, where perhaps he hoped (though the point is unimportant) that nobody would dare to look. Anyhow, he hid it, simply because it was the one thing that would not sink in the well. Mr. Paynter, do you think I would say this of any man in mere mean dislike?
Could any man. say it of any man unless the case was complete, as this is complete?"
"It is complete," said Paynter, very pale. "I have nothing left against it but a faint, irrational feeling; a feeling that, somehow or other, if poor Vane could stand alive before us at this moment he might tell some other and even more incredible tale."
Ashe made a mournful gesture.
"Can these dry bones live?" he said.
"Lord Thou knowest," answered the other mechanically.
"Even these dry bones--"
And he stopped suddenly with his mouth open, a blinding light of wonder in his pale eyes.
"See here," he said hoarsely and hastily. "You have said the word.
What does it mean? What can it mean? Dry? Why are these bones dry?"
The lawyer started and stared down at the heap.
"Your case complete!" cried Paynter, in mounting excitement.
"Where is the water in the well? The water I saw leap like a flame?
Why did it leap? Where is it gone to? Complete! We are buried under riddles."
Ashe stooped, picked up a bone and looked at it.
"You are right," he said, in a low and shaken voice:
"this bone is as dry--as a bone."
"Yes, I am right," replied Cyprian. "And your mystic is still as mysterious as a mystic."
There was a long silence. Ashe laid down the bone, picked up the ax and studied it more closely. Beyond the dull stain at the corner of the steel there was nothing unusual about it save a broad white rag wrapped round the handle, perhaps to give a better grip. The lawyer thought it worth, noting, however, that the rag was certainly newer and cleaner than the chopper.
But both were quite dry.
"Mr. Paynter," he said at last, "I admit you have scored, in the spirit if not in the letter. In strict logic, this greater puzzle is not a reply to my case. If this ax has not been dipped in water, it has been dipped in blood; and the water jumping out of the well is not an explanation of the poet jumping out of the wood. But I admit that morally and practically it does make a vital difference.
We are not faced with a colossal contradiction, and we don't know how far it extends. The body might have been broken up or boiled down to its bones by the murderer, though it may be hard to connect it with the conditions of the murder.
It might conceivably have been so reduced by some property in the water and soil, for decomposition varies vastly with these things. I should not dismiss my strong prima facie case against the likely person because of these difficulties.
But here we have something entirely different. That the bones themselves should remain dry in a well full of water, or a well that yesterday was full of water--that brings us to the edge of something beyond which we can make no guess.
There is a new factor, enormous and quite unknown.
While we can't fit together such prodigious facts, we can't fit together a case against Treherne or against anybody. No; there is only one thing to be done now. Since we can't accuse Treherne, we must appeal to him. We must put the case against him frankly before him, and trust he has an explanation--and will give it.
I suggest we go back and do it now."
Paynter, beginning to follow, hesitated a moment, and then said:
"Forgive me for a kind of liberty; as you say, you are an older friend of the family. I entirely agree with your suggestion, but before you act on your present suspicions, do you know, I think Miss Vane ought to be warned a little? I rather fear all this will be a new shock to her."
"Very well," said Ashe, after looking at him steadily for an instant.
"Let us go across to her first."
