"Finding this ornament here, near where the will was hidden. If we had found it on the high road now----"
"Yes! Yes! It is odd, I admit," interrupted the Squire again; "but that does not prove Mallien's implication in this sorry business."
"It proves that he was here in this secluded spot at one time or another, since he lost the opal among those grasses."
"Mallien may have wandered round the garden as we are doing."
"We came deliberately here because the will was found in this place by Mrs. Beatson. But what took Mallien to the sundial?"
Rupert slipped the ornament into his waistcoat pocket. "You will find it difficult to fasten the guilt of the crime on Mallien," he said dryly.
"You say that because the man is Miss Mallien's father and you wish to shield her," returned the barrister coolly. "All the same, if Lawson, for instance, knew the circumstances, he would build up a very pretty case against our disagreeable friend."
"Mallien knew about the will before Leigh was murdered, as you know from the story of Mrs. Beatson. The will meant much to him, so it is just possible that he came to the Vicarage to get it from Leigh. Failing to get it given to him freely, he struck----"
"What else can you believe when the ornament, which we both know belongs to Mallien, is found on the edge of the hole where the will was buried?"
"Oh, undoubtedly. And the more precisely he explains the less I shall believe his explanation. He has missed this ornament, you may be sure, long ago, and has had plenty of time to make up a story accounting for the loss. However, whether he is guilty or innocent, the finding of this opal in the matrix will settle him."
"Hang it, Hendle, you are slow in the uptake," cried Carrington exasperated. "Why, a child could understand. All you have to do is to go to Mallien and threaten to show this jewel to Lawson, calling me as a witness, and accusing him of murdering the vicar. Then he'll climb down and you won't need to consider him with regard to the fortune."
Rupert said nothing for the moment, but turned on his heel and forced his way through the tangled path back to the rickety gate. When he and the barrister were well on the road home, he spoke again and very dryly.