Of all these witnesses Brereton asked scarcely anything--but he made it clear that when Harborough was met near his cottage at daybreak that morning by two constables who informed him of what had happened, he expressed great astonishment, jeered at the notion that he had had anything to do with the murder, and, without going on to his own door, offered voluntarily to walk straight to the police-station.
But when Miss Pett--who had discarded her red and yellow turban, and appeared in rusty black garments which accentuated the old-ivory tint of her remarkable countenance--had come into the witness-box and answered a few common-place questions as to the dead man's movements on the previous evening, Brereton prepared himself for the episode which he knew to be important.

Amidst a deep silence--something suggesting to everybody that Mr.Bent's sharp-looking London friend was about to get at things--he put his first question to Miss Pett.
"How long have you known Mr.Kitely ?" "Ever since I engaged with him as his housekeeper," answered Miss Pett.
"How long since is that ?" asked Brereton.
"Nine to ten years--nearly ten." "You have been with him, as housekeeper, nearly ten years--continuously ?" "Never left him since I first came to him." "Where did you first come to him--where did he live then ?" "In London." "Yes--and where, in London ?" "83, Acacia Grove, Camberwell." "You lived with Mr.Kitely at 83, Acacia Grove, Camberwell, from the time you became his housekeeper until now--nearly ten years in all.

So we may take it that you knew Mr.Kitely very well indeed ?" "As well as anybody could know--him," replied Miss Pett, grimly.

"He wasn't the sort that's easy to know." "Still, you knew him for ten years.

Now," continued Brereton, concentrating his gaze on Miss Pett's curious features, "who and what was Mr.Kitely ?" Miss Pett drummed her black-gloved fingers on the edge of the witness-box and shook her head.
"I don't know," she answered.