The Man Who Knew Too Much
"Do you mean that you saw the murder?" demanded March, "or the accident? I mean did you see the statue fall?"
"No," said Archer, "I mean I saw the statue fallen."
Prince seemed to be paying but little attention; his eye was riveted on an object lying on the path a yard or two from the corpse. It seemed to be a rusty iron bar bent crooked at one end.
"One thing I don't understand," he said, "is all this blood. The poor fellow's skull isn't smashed; most likely his neck is broken; but blood seems to have spouted as if all his arteries were severed. I was wondering if some other instrument . . . that iron thing, for instance; but I don't see that even that is sharp enough. I suppose nobody knows what it is."
"I know what it is," said Archer in his deep but somewhat shaky voice. "I've seen it in my nightmares. It was the iron clamp or prop on the pedestal, stuck on to keep the wretched image upright when it began to wabble, I suppose. Anyhow, it was always stuck in the stonework there; and I suppose it came out when the thing collapsed."
Doctor Prince nodded, but he continued to look down at the pools of blood and the bar of iron.
"I'm certain there's something more under-
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