“What’s the verdict, then, Doctor?” Coombe asked.

“There’ll have to be a p.m., of course. On the face of it: Stunned and drowned.” He looked at Alleyn. “Or, as you would say, Asphyxia following cranial injury.”

“I was attempting to fox the hotel porter.”

“I see. Good idea.”

“And when would it have taken place?” Coombe insisted.

“Again, you’ll have to wait before you get a definite answer to that one. Not less than an hour ago, I’d have thought. Possibly, much longer.”

He stood up and wiped his hands on his handkerchief. “Do you know,” he said, “I saw her. I saw her — it must have been about seven o’clock. Outside the church, with Mrs. Carstairs. She was going in to early service. I’d got a confinement on the Island, and was walking down to the foreshore. Good Lord!” said Dr. Mayne. “I saw her!”

“That’s a help, Doctor,” said Coombe. “We were wondering about church. Now, that means she couldn’t have got over here until eight at the earliest, wouldn’t you say?”

“I should say so. Certainly. Rather later, if anything.”

“And Mr. Alleyn found her after nine. I suppose you didn’t notice anyone about the cottages or anything of the sort, Doctor?”

“Not a soul. It was pouring heavens-hard…Wait a moment, though.”

“Yes?”

He turned to Alleyn. “I’ve got my own launch and jetty, and there’s another jetty straight opposite on the foreshore by the cottages. I took the launch across. Well, the baby being duly delivered. I returned by the same means and I do remember that when I’d started up the engine and cast off I saw that fantastic kid — Wally Trehern — dodging about on the road up to the spring.”

“Did you watch him?” Coombe asked.

“Good Lord, no. I turned the launch and had my back to the Island.”

“When would that be, now, Doctor?”

“The child was born at 7:30. Soon after that.”

“Yes. Well. Thanks,” said Coombe, glancing rather selfconsciously at Alleyn. “Now: any ideas about how it happened?”

“On what’s before us, I’d say that if this bit of rock is the instrument, it struck the head from above. Wait a minute.”

He climbed to the higher level above the shelf, and Coombe followed him.

Alleyn was keeping a tight rein on himself. It was Coombe’s case, and Alleyn was a sort of accident on the scene. He thought of Patrick Ferrier’s ironical remark: “Matter of protocol”—and silently watched the two men as they scrambled up through bracken to the top level.

Dr. Mayne said: “There are rocks lying about up here. And, yes… But this is your pigeon, Coombe. You’d better take a look.”

Coombe joined him.

“There’s where it came from,” said Mayne, “behind the boulder. You can see where it was prized up.”

Coombe at last said, “We’d better keep off the area, Doctor.” He looked down at Alleyn: “It’s clear enough.”

“Any prints?”

“A real mess. People from above must have swarmed all over it when the rain came. Pity.”

“Yes,” Alleyn said. “Pity.”

The other two men came down.

“Well,” Dr. Mayne said. “That’s that. The ambulance should be here by now. Glad you suggested it. We’ll have to get her across. How’s the tide?” He went through the exit gate and along the footpath to a point from where he could see the causeway.

Alleyn said to Coombe: “I asked the porter to get on the line to Pender, and say you’d want him. I hope that was in order.”

“Thanks very much.”

“I suppose you’ll need a statement from me, won’t you?”

Coombe scraped his jaw. “Sounds silly, doesn’t it?” he said. “Well, yes, I suppose I will.” He had been looking sideways at Alleyn, off and on, for some time.

“Look,” he said abruptly. “There’s one thing that’s pretty obvious about this affair, isn’t there? Here’s a case where a Yard man with a top reputation is first on the scene and, you might say, starts up the investigation. Look at it what way you like, it’d be pretty silly if I just said ‘Thanks, chum’ and let it go at that. Wouldn’t it now? I don’t mind admitting I felt it was silly, just now, with you standing by, tactful as you please and leaving it all to me.”

“Absolute rot,” Alleyn said. “Come off it.”

“No, I mean it. And, anyway,” Coombe added on a different note, “I haven’t got the staff.” It was a familiar plaint.

“My dear chap,” Alleyn said, “I’m meant to be on what’s laughingly called a holiday. Take a statement, for pity’s sake, and let me off. I’ll remove Miss Pride and leave you with a fair field. You’ll do well. ‘Coombe’s Big Case’ ”… He knew, of course, that this would be no good.

“You’ll remove Miss Pride, eh?” said Coombe. “And what say Miss Pride’s the key figure still? You know what I’m driving at. It’s sticking out a mile. Say I’m hiding up there behind that boulder. Say I hear someone directly below and take a look-see. Say I see the top of an open umbrella and a pair of female feet, which is what I’ve been waiting for. Who do I reckon’s under that umbrella? Not Miss Elspeth Cost. Not her. Oh, dear me no!” said Coombe in a sort of gloomy triumph. “I say: ‘That’s the job,’ and I bloody well let fly! But I bring down the wrong bird. I get—”

“All right, all right,” Alleyn said, exasperated by the long buildup. “And you say: ‘Absurd mistake. Silly old me! I thought you were Miss Emily Pride.’ ”

The upshot, as he very well knew it would be, was an understanding that Coombe would get in touch with his Chief Constable, and then with the Yard.

Coombe insisted on telling Dr. Mayne that he hoped Alleyn would take charge of the case. The ambulance men arrived with Pender, and for the second time in twenty-four hours Miss Cost went in procession along Wally’s Way.

Alleyn and Coombe stayed behind to look over the territory again. Coombe had a spring tape in his pocket and they took preliminary measurements and decided to get the area covered in case of rain. He showed Alleyn where the trip wire had been laid: through dense bracken on the way up to the shelf.

Pender had caught a glint of it in the sunshine and had been sharp enough to investigate.

They completed their arrangements. The handbag, the string of beads and the umbrella to be dropped at the police station by Pender, who was then to return with extra help if he could get it. The piece of rock would be sent with the body to the nearest mortuary at Dunlowman. Alleyn wanted a pathologist’s report on it as a possible weapon.

When they were outside the gates, Alleyn drew Coombe’s attention to the new notice, tied securely to the wire netting.

“Did you see this?”

It had been printed by a London firm.

“When the hell was this put up?” Coombe ejaculated. “It wasn’t here yesterday; there’d have been no end of a taking-on.”

“Perhaps this morning. It’s been rained on. More than that — it’s muddied. As if it had lain face-downwards on the ground Look. Glove marks. No fingerprints, though.”

“P’raps she dropped it.”

“Perhaps,” Alleyn said. “There’s another on display in the hotel letter-rack. It wasn’t there last night”

“Put them there herself? Miss Pride?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“There you are!” Coombe said excitedly. “She came along the footpath. Somebody spotted her, streaked up Wally’s Way, got in ahead and hid behind the boulder. She hung up her notice and went back to the pub. Miss Cost arrives by the other route, goes in, picks up her beads and Bob’s your uncle.”