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Rh 'Delighted to help you, if I can.' Granville lounged back carelessly on the garden-seat, but his keen glance lost not a line of the other's profile, as Alfred bent forward with his eyes upon the ground; and those lines seemed strangely hardened.

'Thank you. The case is, briefly, this,' Alfred continued: 'somebody—no matter who—has been missing for some days. The number of days is of no consequence either. The police were not informed immediately. They only heard of it last night. But, this afternoon, they found'

Alfred checked himself, sat upright, shifted his position, and met Granville's gaze.

'What should you consider incontestable evidence of drowning, Gran?'

'The body.'

'Of course. But you have to look for bodies. What should you find, to make you search with the absolute certainty of discovering the body at last?'

'Nothing else could make it an absolute certainty. But lots of things would set you searching—a hat, for instance.'