It was presumably necessary that
the theft should be discovered, and your ingenious idea of a revengeful
enemy appealed to me, Wigan. I elaborated the idea to Sir Arthur, you
will remember."
I had nothing to say--no fault to find with his argument so far. Quarles
rather enjoyed my silence, I fancy.
"Sir Arthur unconsciously gave me a great deal of information," he went
on. "First, it was curious that the wreaths which came that night should
be left in the hall. It would have been more natural to place them in
the drawing-room. Why were they not put there? It looked as if there were
a desire not to open the room again. Another wreath might have come later
when it would have been very inconvenient to open the door, and not to
have put the other wreath into the room might have caused comment in the
light of after events. Again, influenza is a fairly common complaint, and
Sir Grenville died of a sudden and unexpected collapse; yet Sir Arthur
said it was by his father's desire that the coffin was plain. A man
suffering from influenza does not expect to die, and it seemed strange to
me that he should arrange details of his funeral.
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