Vita came into the library when I had finished telephoning. I was sitting at Magnus's desk by the window, staring out to sea.

"Darling," she said, "I've been thinking," and she came and stood behind me, putting her hands on my shoulders. "When the inquest is over, don't you think it would be best if we went away? It would be rather awkward for us to go on staying here, and sad for you, and in a way the whole point of it has gone, hasn't it?"

"What point?" I asked.

"Well, the loan of the house, now Magnus is dead. I can't help feeling an interloper, and that we've really no right to be here. Surely it would be much more sensible if we spent the rest of the holidays somewhere else? It's only the beginning of August. Bill was saying over the telephone how lovely Ireland is; they've found a delightful hotel in Connemara, some old castle or other, with its own private fishing."

"I bet he has," I said. "Twenty guineas a night, and full of your compatriots."

Don't be unfair! He was just trying to be helpful. He took it for granted you would want to get away from here.

"Well, I don't," I said. "Not unless the lawyer kicks us out, and that's a different matter."

I told her that the cremation was fixed for Thursday, and that Dench would be coming down, and perhaps some of Magnus's staff as well. The prospect of guests for lunch or dinner, or even the night, took her mind off the longer-term suggestion of Ireland, but as it turned out we were spared the worst of it, for Dench and Magnus's senior assistant, John Willis, elected to travel down together through the Wednesday night, attend the cremation, accept our hospitality for lunch, and return to London by a night-train. The boys were sent off for the whole of Thursday for a fishing expedition in charge of the obliging Tom. I remember little of the cremation service, beyond thinking how Magnus might have devised a simpler method of disposing of the dead by chemicals instead of by fire. Our companions in mourning, Herbert Dench and John Willis, were quite unlike what I had imagined. The lawyer was big, hearty, un-pompous, ate an enormous lunch, and regaled us while we consumed our funeral meats with stories of Hindu widows committing suttee on their husbands pyres. He had been born in India, and swore he had witnessed such a sacrifice as a babe in arms.

John Willis was a little mouse-like man, with intent eyes behind horn-rimmed spectacles, who would not have looked out of place behind a bank's grille; I could not picture him at Magnus's elbow, ministering to live monkeys or dissecting their brain cells. He barely uttered. Not that this signified, for the lawyer spoke enough for all. Lunch over, we walked through to the library, and Herbert Dench bent to his dispatch-case for a formal reading of the will, in which apparently John Willis figured as well as I. Vita, tactfully, was about to withdraw, but the lawyer told her to stay.

"No necessity for that, Mrs. Young," he said cheerfully. "It's very short and to the point."

He was right. Legal language apart, Magnus had left whatever financial assets he possessed at the time of his death to his own college for the advancement of biophysics. His flat in London and his personal effects there were to be sold, and the money given to the same cause, with the exception of his library, which he bequeathed to John Willis in gratitude for ten years of professional co-operation and personal friendship. Kilmarth, with all its contents, he left to me, for my own use or to dispose of as I wished, in memory of years of friendship dating back to undergraduate days, and because the former occupants of the house would have wished it so. And that was all. "I take it," said the lawyer, smiling, "that by the former occupants he is referring to his parents, Commander and Mrs. Lane, whom I believe you knew?"

"Yes," I said, bewildered, "yes, I was very fond of them both."

"Well, there we are. It's a delightful house. I hope you will be very happy here."

I looked at Vita. She was lighting a cigarette, her usual defence in a moment of sudden shock. "How… how extraordinarily generous of the Professor," she said. "I really don't know what to say. Of course it's up to Dick whether he intends to keep it or not. Our future plans are in a state of flux at present."

There was a moment's awkward silence, as Herbert Dench looked from one to the other of us.

"Naturally," he said, "you will have a great deal to discuss together. You realise, of course, that the house and contents will have to be valued for probate. I would appreciate it if I could see over it, by the way, if it wouldn't be too much trouble?"

"Why, of course."

We all rose to our feet, and Vita said, "The Professor had a laboratory in the basement, a most alarming place — at least, so my small sons thought. I suppose the things there would hardly go with the house but should be returned to his laboratory in London? Perhaps Mr. Willis would know what they are."

Her face was all innocence, but I had the impression that her mention of the laboratory was deliberate, and she wanted to know what was there.

"A laboratory?" queried the lawyer. "Did the Professor do any work down here?" He addressed himself to Willis. The little mouse-like man blinked behind his horn-rimmed spectacles. "I very much doubt it," he said with diffidence, "and, if he did, it would be of little scientific importance, and have no connection with his work in London. He may have made a few experiments, just to amuse himself on a rainy day — certainly nothing more, or he would have mentioned it to me."

Good man. If he knew anything he was not going to commit himself. I could see that Vita was on the point of saying I had told her the contents of the laboratory were of inestimable value, so I suggested that we should inspect the laboratory before visiting the rest of the house. "Come along," I said to Willis, "you're the expert. The room used to be an old laundry in Commander Lane's day, and Magnus kept a lot of bottles and jars in it." He looked at me, but said nothing. We all trooped down to the basement, and I opened the door.

"There you are," I said. "Nothing very exciting. Just a lot of old jars, as I told you."

Vita's face was a study as she looked around her. Amazement, disbelief; and then a swift glance of enquiry at me.

No monkey's head, no embryo kittens, only the empty rows of bottles. She had the supreme intelligence to remain silent.

"Well, well," said the lawyer, "the valuer might put a price of sixpence apiece on the jars. What do you say, Willis?"

The biophysicist ventured a smile. "I would think", he said, "that Professor Lane's mother may have preserved fruit here in former days."

"A still-room, didn't they call them?" laughed the lawyer. "The still-room maid would make preserves for the whole year. Look at the hooks in the ceiling! They probably hung the meat here too. Great sides of ham. Well, Mrs. Young, this will be your province, not your husband's. I recommend an electric washing-machine in the corner to save your laundry bills. Expensive to instal, but it will pay for itself in a couple of years, with a young family."

He turned, still laughing, back into the passage, and we followed. I locked the door behind me. Willis, who was hovering in the rear, bent to pick up something from the stone floor. It was a label from one of the jars. He gave it to me without a word, and I put it in my pocket. Then we tramped upstairs to inspect the remainder of the house, Herbert Dench making the remarkable suggestion that if we wanted to turn the property into an investment we might split the whole place up into flatlets for summer visitors, keeping for our own use the bedroom-suite with the view of the sea. He was still extolling the idea to Vita as we wandered round the garden. I saw Willis glance at his watch.

"You must have had about enough of us," he said. I told Dench on the way down that we would call in at Divisional Headquarters at Liskeard and answer any questions the police might want to put to us. "If you'd telephone for a taxi we could go there straight away, and have dinner in Liskeard later before catching the night train."

"I'll drive you myself," I said. "Hold on, there's something I want to show you. I went upstairs, and after a few minutes came back with the walking-stick. This was near Magnus's body. It belongs with the others in the London flat. Do you think they will let me keep it?"

"Surely," he said, "and the other sticks too. I'm so glad you've got this house, by the way, and I hope you won't part with it."

"I don't intend to." Vita and Dench were still a short distance off on the terrace.

"I think", said Willis quietly, "we had better tell more or less the same story at the inquest. Magnus was an enthusiastic walker, and if he wanted some exercise after hours in the train it was typical of him."

"Yes," I said.

"Incidentally, a young friend of mine, a student, has been looking up historical stuff for Magnus at the B.M. and the Public Record Office. Do you want him to continue?"

I hesitated. "It might be useful. Yes… If he turns anything up ask him to send it to me here."

"I'll do that."

I noticed for the first time an expression of loss, of emptiness, behind the horn-rimmed spectacles.

"What are your own plans?" I asked.

"I shall go on just the same," I suppose, he said. "Try to carry on something of Magnus's work. But it will be tough going. As boss and colleague he will be irreplaceable. You probably realise that."

"I do."

The others came up, and nothing further was said between Willis and myself. After a cup of tea, which none of us wanted but Vita insisted on getting, Willis suggested the move to Liskeard. I knew now why Magnus had chosen him as senior member of his staff. Professional competence apart, loyalty and discretion were the qualities behind that mouse-like appearance.