The Ashiel Mystery

"I was satisfied, then, that the shot had not been fired from this particular part of the rose-bed, and I proceeded to search for other footprints farther down the bed. I did not feel much hope of being successful, since, if our man had had the forethought to leave so many traces of some one else's presence, it was unlikely he would have neglected to ensure that his own should be absent. And as I expected, I found none.

"But at the end of the garden, where it is bounded by the holly hedge, I came across something which puzzled me. There were two narrow depressions on the flower-bed, about an inch wide by less than a foot long. They were parallel to each other, and at right angles to the hedge, and separated by a distance of six or seven feet. Near one, which was almost in the middle of the bed, was another mark which I could not understand. It was only a few inches long and, in shape, a narrow oval. I could not at first imagine what any of them represented, and it was only quite suddenly, as I was giving it up and going away, that the truth flashed across my mind. I had been looking regretfully at the track I myself had left by the side of the hedge on my way to and from the middle of the bed.

"'What I want,' I said to myself, 'is one of those planks raised off the ground by two little supports, one at each end, that gardeners use to avoid stepping on the beds when they are going through the process of bedding out,' And even as I said it, I realized that the same idea had occurred to some one else, and that the marks I had been examining might have been made by just such a contrivance as the one I was thinking of. A short search showed me the plank itself, kept in a tool-house conveniently near the spot, and, with a rake taken from the same place, I seized the opportunity of raking out my own footmarks from the rose-bed.

"And now who could this be who had so carefully manufactured a false scent, and so cleverly avoided being himself suspected? My previous theory, that some envoy of the Nihilists had been lurking in the neighbourhood, seemed not to meet the new conditions. For how could a mere stranger have gained possession of the misleading boots, or how returned them to their proper place? And how, for that matter, could a stranger have obtained the use of Sir David's rifle, if his rifle had indeed been used?