‘I asked old Pomeroy. He says the fireplace was cleared out the day before.’

‘Well, we’ll have to see if the experts can tell us if it’s the same kind as the brandy glass. Rather, let us hope they can say definitely that it’s not the same. Oh Lord!’

He got up, stretched himself, and leant over the window-sill. The moon was out, and the sleeping roofs of Ottercombe made such patterns of white and inky black as woodcut draughtsmen love. It was a gull’s-eye view Alleyn had from the parlour window, a setting for a child’s tale of midnight wonders. A cat was sitting on one of the crooked eaves. It stared at the moon and might have been waiting for an appointment with some small night-gowned figure that would presently lean, dreaming, from the attic window. Alleyn had a liking for old fairy tales and found himself thinking of George Macdonald and the Back of the North Wind. The Coombe was very silent in the moonlight.

‘All asleep,’ said Alleyn, ‘except us, and Mr Robert Legge. I wish he’d come home to bed.’

‘There’s a car now,’ said Fox, ‘up by the tunnel.’

It was evidently a small car and an old one. With a ramshackle clatter it drew nearer the pub, and then the driver must have turned his engine off and coasted down to the garage. There followed the squeak of brakes. A door slammed tinnily. Someone dragged open the garage door.

‘That’s him,’ said Fox.

‘Good,’ said Alleyn. ‘Pop into the passage, Fox, and hail him in.’

Fox went out, leaving the door open. Alleyn heard slow steps plod across the yard to the side entrance. Fox said, ‘Good evening, sir. Is it Mr Legge?’

A low mumble.

‘Could you spare us a moment, sir? We’re police officers. Chief Inspector Alleyn would be glad to have a word with you.’

A pause, another mumble, and then approaching steps.

‘This way, sir,’ said Fox, and ushered in Mr Robert Legge.

Alleyn saw a medium-sized man who stooped a little. He saw a large head, white hair, a heavily-lined face and a pair of callused hands. Legge, blinking in the lamplight, looked a defenceless, a rather pathetic figure.

‘Mr Legge?’ said Alleyn. ‘I’m sorry to bother you so late in the evening. Won’t you sit down?’

Fox moved forward a chair and, without uttering a word, Legge sat in it. He was under the lamp. Alleyn saw that his clothes, which had once been good, were darned and faded. Everything about the man seemed bleached and characterless. He looked nervously from Alleyn to Fox. His lips were not quite closed and showed his palpably false teeth.

‘I expect,’ said Alleyn, ‘that you have guessed why we are here.’

Legge said nothing.

‘We’re making inquiries about the death of Mr Luke Watchman.’

‘Oh, yes?’ said Legge breathlessly.