“Here is where the body lay; that big dark stain and the splashes all around mark the spot. Traces of carpet slippers and ‘number nine’ boots, you observe, but all very confused. Then two sets of tracks leading to and from the kitchen; whoever the murderer was, he came in that way. You have the boot, Hastings? Give it to me.” He compared it carefully with the prints. “Yes, both made by the same man, Robert Grant. He came in that way, killed the old man, and went back to the kitchen. He had stepped in the blood; see the stains he left as he went out? Nothing to be seen in the kitchen⁠—all the village has been walking about in it. He went into his own room⁠—no, first he went back again to the scene of the crime⁠—was that to get the little jade figures? Or had he forgotten something that might incriminate him?”

“Perhaps he killed the old man the second time he went in?” I suggested.