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Rh "Let us open the window then."

The situation and attitude of the dead on discovery were imitated, and Hardcastle examined the spot. Then he himself occupied the position and looked out.

"I will ask for a ladder presently, and examine the face of the wall. Ivy, I see. Ivy has told me some very interesting secrets before to-day, Sir Walter."

"I dare say it has."

"If you will remind me at luncheon, I can tell you a truly amazing story about ivy—a story of life and death. A man could easily go and come by this window."

"Not easily I think," said Henry. "It is rather more than thirty-five feet to the ground."

"How do you know that?"

"The police, who made the original inquiry and were stopped, as you will remember, from Scotland Yard, measured it the second morning afterwards—on Monday."

"But they did not examine the face of the wall?"

"I think not. They dropped a measure from the window."

The other pursued his examination of the room.

"Old furniture," he said; "very old evidently."

"It was collected in Spain by my grandfather many years ago."

"Valuable, no doubt?"

"I understand so."

"Wonderful carving. And this door?"