"Do you really think that any man who was in possession of his senses would do such a thing?
Take a piece of cord from a coil--leave the coil where anybody could find it--strangle a man with the severed piece and leave it round the victim's neck?
Absurd! No--a thousand times no!" "Well--and what then ?" asked Bent.
"Ah! Somebody cut that piece off--for the use it was put to," answered Brereton.

"But--who ?" Bent made no reply for a while.

Then, as they reached the outskirts of the town, he clapped a hand on his companion's arm.
"You're forgetting something--in spite of your legal mind," he said.
"The murderer may have been interrupted before he could remove it.

And in that case----" He stopped suddenly as a gate opened in the wall of a garden which they were just passing, and a tall man emerged.

In the light of the adjacent lamp Bent recognized Mallalieu.