‘So Richard Warwick was a drinking man, eh?’ he commented. ‘You know, I’ve heard that said of him before. And all those pistols and air-guns and rifles. A little queer in the head, if you ask me.’ ‘Could be,’ Inspector Thomas replied laconically. The telephone rang. Expecting his sergeant to answer it, the inspector looked meaningfully at him, but Cadwallader had become immersed in his notes as he strolled across to the armchair and sat, completely oblivious of the phone. After a while, realizing that the sergeant’s mind was elsewhere, no doubt in the process of composing a poem, the inspector sighed, crossed to the desk, and picked up the receiver. ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘Yes, speaking…Starkwedder, he came in? He gave you his prints?…Good…yes–well, ask him to wait…yes, I shall be back in half an hour or so…yes, I want to ask him some more questions…Yes, goodbye.’ Towards the end of this conversation, Miss Bennett had entered the room, and was standing by the door.
