Page:The Benson Murder Case (1926).pdf/328

 "Ah, but I've not finished." Vance stood up. "I have hopes of finding the weapon, don't y' know."

Markham now studied him with amused incredulity.

"That, of course, would be a contributory factor. . . . You really expect to find it?"

"Without the slightest diff'culty," Vance pleasantly assured him.

He went to the chiffonier and began opening the drawers.

"Our absent host didn't leave the pistol at Alvin's house; and he was far too canny to throw it away. Being a major in the late war, he'd be expected to have such a weapon: in fact, several persons may actu'lly have known he possessed one. And if he is innocent—as he fully expects us to assume—why shouldn't it be in its usual place? Its absence, d' ye see, would be more incriminatin' than its presence. Also, there's a most int'restin' psychological factor involved. An innocent person who was afraid of being thought guilty, would have hidden it, or thrown it away—like Captain Leacock, for example. But a guilty man, wishing to create an appearance of innocence, would have put it back exactly where it was before the shooting."

He was still searching through the chiffonier.

"Our only problem, then, is to discover the custom'ry abiding place of the Major's gun. . . . It's not here in the chiffonier," he added, closing the last drawer.

He opened a kit-bag standing at the foot of the bed, and rifled its contents.