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as I know nobody was invited to attend the funeral. That doesn’t necessarily mean much, because it’s a tradition of the Gregor family to bury their dead secretly, at night. Duchlan’s father’s funeral, I believe, took place by torchlight.”
    â€œI would like,” Dr. Hailey said, “to know whether or not Miss Gregor attended the funeral of her sister-in-law. If I were Dundas I should make a point of getting information about that.”
    McDonald shook his head.
    â€œYou would find it very difficult to get information. One has only to mention Duchlan’s wife to produce an icy silence.”
    â€œDid she discuss her sister-in-law with the Ardmore witch?”
    â€œOh, no. She discussed nothing. She blamed nobody. She merely said that being Irish she believed in fortune-telling. She was very much afraid that her husband might hear of her visit, but he never did.”
    McDonald lit his pipe.
    â€œAnnie Nannie speaks very well of her client, and she’s not given to flattery. By all accounts Duchlan’s wife was a fine woman. ‘It fair broke my heart,’ she said, ‘to see her sitting crying in my cottage, and her that kind and good to everybody.’”
    The doctor took a pinch of snuff.
    â€œIt’s curious that both father and son should have married Irish women,” he said.
    â€œYes. And women so like one another too. Those who remember Eoghan’s mother say she was the image of his wife. Mrs. Eoghan’s very popular in the village, far more so, really, than Miss Gregor was.”
    â€œHow about the servants at the castle?”
    â€œThey love her. Dundas has been going into that too; he’s got an idea that the Campbell girls didn’t like Miss Gregor and he’s been trying to find out if either of them went to her bedroom on the night she was killed. There’s nothing, as a matter of fact, to show that any of the servants went to Miss Gregor’s room after Christina, her maid, had left it for the night.”
    â€œIs Dundas still hopeful of being able to solve the mystery?” Dr. Hailey asked.
    â€œNo.” Dr. McDonald moved his leg again. “In a sense,” he said, “I’m here in the capacity of an ambassador. Dundas wants your help; but he’s too proud to ask for it—after what he said to you. He suggested that, as one of your professional brethren, I might carry the olive branch.”
    â€œI’m afraid not.”
    â€œI hope you won’t stand too much on ceremony…You have him at your mercy.”
    â€œThat’s not the way to look at it.” Dr. Hailey took a pinch of snuff. “If I go to Duchlan now I’ll be compelled to work along Inspector Dundas’s lines. I’ve no doubt they’re good lines, but they are not mine. I should only confuse his mind and my own.”
    â€œI see. You insist on a free hand.”
    â€œNot that exactly. What I’m really asking is a free mind. I don’t want to co-operate. You can tell Dundas that, if he likes, I’ll work at the problem independently of him. Any discoveries I may make will belong to him, of course.”
    â€œHe won’t consent to that. He’ll give you a free hand only so long as he’s with you in all you do.”
    There was a moment of silence. Then Dr. Hailey made up his mind.
    â€œTell him,” he said, “that I can’t accept these terms. I’m an amateur, not a professional, and my studies of crime are undertaken only because they interest me. When I work alone my mind gropes about until it finds something which appeals to it. I follow a line of investigation often without knowing exactly why I’m following it—it would be intolerable to have to explain and justify every step. And Dundas would certainly insist on such explanations. The detection of crime, I think, is an art more than a science, like the practice of medicine.”
    Dr. McDonald did not