It was also suggested by the prosecution that John probably had the other suit secreted near the scene of the murder.
Certain it was that he had not been able either to produce it or to account for its mysterious disappearance.
The probability of Sandy Beg being the murderer was then advanced; but Sandy was known to have sailed in a whaling vessel before the murder, and no one had seen him in Stromness since his departure for Wick after his dismissal from Peter Fae's service.
No one?
Yes, some one had seen him.

That fatal night, as Ragon Torr was crossing the moor to Peter's house--he having some news of a very particular vessel to give--he heard the cry of "Murder," and he heard Hacon Flett call out, "I know thee, John Sabay.

Thou hast stabbed my master!" and he instantly put himself in the way of the flying man.
Then he knew at once that it was Sandy Beg in John Sabay's clothes.
The two men looked a moment in each other's face, and Sandy saw in Ragon's something that made him say, "She'll pat Sandy safe ta night, an' that will mak her shure o' ta lass she's seeking far." There was no time for parley; Ragon's evil nature was strongest, and he answered, "There is a cellar below my house, thou knows it weel." Indeed, most of the houses in Stromness had underground passages, and places of concealment used for smuggling purposes, and Ragon's lonely house was a favorite rendezvous.

The vessel whose arrival he had been going to inform Peter of was a craft not likely to come into Stromness with all her cargo.
Towards morning Ragon had managed to see Sandy and send him out to her with such a message as insured her rapid disappearance.

Sandy had also with him a sum of money which he promised to use in transporting himself at once to India, where he had a cousin in the forty-second Highland regiment.
Ragon had not at first intended to positively swear away his friend's life; he had been driven to it, not only by Margaret's growing antipathy to him and her decided interest in John's case and family, but also by that mysterious power of events which enable the devil to forge the whole chain that binds a man when the first link is given him.