The Draycott Murder Mystery by Molly Thynne

As Fayre passed down the broad staircase of the Cottage Hospital he reviewed his conversation with the tramp and decided that, considering the little he had gained by it, he might as well have stayed by the comfortable fireside in the library. Cynthia's "hunch" had not amounted to much, after all, and he was sorry, more on her account than his own, for he had not expected anything himself from the interview. It had, however, simplified matters, in so far as it had definitely wiped off the tramp from the possible list of suspects. He had a strong conviction that the man's story was true.

He suddenly became conscious of something hard pressing against the palm of his hand and remembered the little red cap the tramp had given him at parting. It belonged obviously to the pen he had picked up on his visit to the farm and he was in the act of slipping it into his pocket and dismissing it from his mind when a thought struck him which caused him to pause in his descent and stand gazing blankly into the hall below. He had suddenly realized that if the tramp had picked up the cap on the occasion of his arrival at the farm somewhere about seven o'clock the pen must have been dropped still earlier in the evening. Fayre's mind went back to the copper-coloured sequins he had found by the gate. They had been lying close to the pen and he found himself trying to picture what had happened.