Two heads are better than one, and--well, I'm open to conviction still, of course." But even Langholm was not conscious of the sinister play upon words; he had taken out his pocket-book, and was nervously turning to the leaves that he had filled during his most sleepless night in town.
"Got it all down ?" said Steel.
"Yes," replied Langholm, without raising his eyes; "at least I did make some notes of a possible--if not a really damning--case against the man I mean." "And what may the first point be ?" inquired Steel, who was gradually drifting back into the tone which Langholm had resented on the shore; he took no notice of it now.
"The first point," said Langholm, slowly, "is that he was in Chelsea, or at least within a mile of the scene of the murder, on the night that it took place." "So were a good many people," remarked Steel, smiling as he dipped the sculls in and out, and let his supple wrists fall for the feather, as though he were really rowing.
"But he left his--he was out at the time!" declared Langholm, making his amended statement with all the meaning it had for himself.
"Well, you can't hang him for that." "He will have to prove where he was, then." "I am afraid it will be for you to prove a little more first." Langholm sat very dogged with his notes.

There had been a pause on Steel's part; there was a thin new note in his voice.

Langholm was too grimly engrossed to take immediate heed of either detail, or to watch the swift changes in the face which was watching him.

And there he lost most of all.
"The next point is that he undoubtedly knew Minchin in Australia--" "Aha!" "That he was and is a rich man, whereas Minchin was then on the verge of bankruptcy, and that Minchin only found out that he was in England thirty-six hours before his own death, when he wrote to his old friend for funds." "And you have really established all that!" Steel had abandoned all pretence of rowing; his tone was one of admiration, in both senses of the word, and his dark eyes seemed to penetrate to the back of Langholm's brain.
"I can establish it," was the reply.
"Well! I think you have done wonders; but you will have to do something more before they will listen to you at Scotland Yard.

What about a motive ?" "I was coming to that; it is the last point with which I shall trouble you for the present." Langholm took a final glance at his notes, then shut the pocket-book and put it away.