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Rh Stephen Heneage was one of those who stood in this position.

They were talking about the murder, or rather the Colonel was talking and they were listening.

"There is one point," he remarked, filling his glass and beaming good-humouredly upon his companions, "which seems to have been entirely overlooked. I am referring to the sex of the supposed assassin!"

Wrayson looked up inquiringly. It was a point which interested him.

"Nearly all of you have assumed," the Colonel continued, "that it must have taken a strong man to draw the cord tight enough to have killed that poor fellow without any noticeable struggle. As a matter of fact, a child with that particular knot could have done it. It requires no strength, only delicacy of touch, rapidity and nerve."

"A woman, then" Wrayson began.

"Bless you, yes! a woman could have done it easily," the Colonel declared, "only unfortunately there don't seem to have been any women about. Why, I've seen it done in Korea with a turn of the wrist. It's all knack."

Wrayson shuddered slightly. The Colonel's words had troubled him more than he would have cared to let any one know.

"Woman or man or child," Mason remarked, "the person who did it seems to have vanished in some remarkable manner from the face of the earth."

"He certainly seems," the Colonel admitted, "to have covered up his traces with admirable skill. I have read every word of the evidence at the inquest, and I can understand that the police are completely confused."