The Murder at Jex Farm | Page 4

silence for a minute, and he went rather pale as I watched him.
"The man who committed this murder, Mr. Jex, never wore a cyclist's
boot."
"I'll tell you what," he said after a longish pause, "we'd trampled down
the ground a good bit all round; we must have trampled out the

murderer's footprints." "It's just possible," said, "but not likely that you
shouldn't have left a square inch of shoeprint anywhere. However, that
is of no matter to me at present. I've another bit of evidence that I'll
work out first." "A clue?" asked Jex eagerly, "what is it?" "Well, Mr.
Jex, you'll excuse me for not mentioning it just at present. You'll know
soon enough." I gave him a moment to think over the matter, then I
went on--
"Now, sir, I should like to ask you one or two more questions, if you're
quite agreeable." "Fire away," said Jex, regaining his assurance. "I'm
here to answer you." "I'm told you used to meet Miss Judson on your
return from shooting, or what not, at the orchard gate?" "That's so." "At
nightfall?" "Yes as it grew from dusk to dark." "Might she be expecting
you there on the 17th just as night fell?" "Likely she might." "But about
that time you were drinking in the bar parlour of the Lion?'" "Well, if
you call two goes of whisky and water after a long day's walking,
drinking, I was." "The landlady is an old friend of your mother's, I'm
told." Jex laughed. "Whoever told you that, told you wrong; my mother
does not particularly cotton to Mrs. Jones." "What! the two old ladies
don't hit it off, don't they?" "Who told you that Mrs. Jones was an old
lady?" said Jex, "she's a young one and a very pretty one into the
bargain." "Then that accounts," said I, "for the present of rabbits, eh?"
Jex winked.
I have mentioned a fourth inmate at Jex Farm at the time of the murder
in the person of Miss Maud Lewsome, a young lady friend of Miss
Judson's, and a distant cousin of hers, but no blood relation of the Jex
family. Miss Lewsome had come as a friend of Miss Judson, and had
resided at the Farm some five weeks. She is a tall, dark, handsome girl,
gentle and reserved in manner, but as I should judge, extremely
intelligent. I hear that the profession in life is the literary one, but
whether in the way of book-writing or journalism I am not told. She
had also been for a short time on the stage. I have as yet had hardly any
conversation with Miss Lewsome, so overcome is she with nervous
shock of the tragedy of which her dearest friend has been the victim.
I need not reproduce here at any length the evidence of the country

surgeon who made the post mortem, as given at the inquest. It was to
the effect that death had not resulted as at first reported in all the papers
from a single bullet, but from three bullet wounds in the side of the
head, one just behind the ear and two just above it. The shots must have
been fired from the distance of a few yards, for there was no burning or
discolouration of the skin. That they must have been fired in rapid
succession was evident from the fact of the three wounds being within
a circle whose radius was not more than three inches in length. The
charges of powder, in the doctor's opinion, must have been light, for
after passing through the walls of the skull, there was little penetration.
The bullets, three, had been extracted--very small round leaden bullets
of the size of large peas, not of the conical shape used in revolvers of
the more expensive kind. Death must have been instantaneous for the
bullets were all three found buried in the brain, one still spherical, the
others flattened by contact with bone.
Now it is obvious that this increases the difficulty connected with the
fact that no one at the Farm, neither Mrs. Jex nor Miss Lewsome nor
any of the labourers or female servants who were indoors and at supper
at the time, had heard the sound of firearms. It is true that on the
evening of the 17th half a gale of wind was blowing from the
north-west, and the orchard, where the fatal shots were fired, is nearly
south-east of the house; all doors and windows were closed, the night
being cold and rainy but the sitting-room faces the south-east, and
though a tall yew hedge interposed, it was difficult to see how three
pistol shots fired less than forty yards away should not be audible by
the inmates of the room. Was Mrs. Jex hard