Page:Lawrence Lynch--The last stroke.djvu/181

Rh should turn his attention to the mystery surrounding the murder of "his cousin's lover," thought otherwise.

"Pshaw!" he objected, "look at the raff of half-grown boys racing up and down these streets from sunset to pretty late bedtime, for kids, and how much different does one boy look from another in the dark? Mrs. Fry herself only saw him out in the twilight."

Ferrars reserved his criticism and opinions for the time.

Doran had taken upon himself the investigation of the "boat puzzle," as he called it, for the skiff remained, after many days, still drawn up, unmoored and unclaimed, by the lake shore; and at last, by dint of much driving up and down the lake shore road and interviewing of boat owners, he brought to Ferrars this unsatisfactory solution.

Two weeks before the murder the skiff had been owned by a certain Jerry Small, hunter and fisherman by choice, blacksmith by profession. On a certain day a man dressed in outing costume had entered Small's shop, asked about the boat, and made him such a liberal offer for it, that Jerry had at once closed with him. The shop stood upon the outskirts of the town and close to the lake. The man had said that he was coming out from the city in a few days for a few weeks in the country, meaning to secure board, if possible,