Wylde came to the house, leaving fingerprints in the room where, at 6:20 pm, Lady Barnaby was killed with a single blast from a shotgun. The servants heard the shot and rushed to the room, finding their dead mistress. They tried contacting the police, but found that the phone was out of order. One of them went on foot and met Sir George returning from his game. All of the parties involved had alibis – Sir George left his game at 6:30 pm, Sylvia Dale was at the station seeing a friend off on the 6:28 pm train, and Sir George's secretary, Henry Thompson, was in London on business. Wylde admitted that he took his gun to Deering Hill, but stated that he left it outside the door and forgot it when he left the house, after a scene with Lady Barnaby. He left the house at 6:15 pm. He took a longer than usual time to reach his home, but his reason was not believed. Quin asks about the housemaid who gave evidence at the inquest but not at the trial, and Satterthwaite tells him that she has gone to Canada. Satterthwaite wonders if he should interview her. Satterthwaite tracks the maid, Louise Bullard, to Banff and takes the ocean voyage to Canada, and the train to Banff, where he finds her working in a hotel. She speaks of seeing the shape of a giant hand in the sky caused by the smoke of a passing train at the very time she heard the shot. She does tell Satterthwaite that Henry Thompson suggested the post in Canada to her, with its high wages, and she had to leave quickly to take it, as well as refrain from letters to her friends at Deering Hill. Satterthwaite returns to England, meeting Quin in the Arlecchino restaurant. Satterthwaite feels he has no useful evidence, but Quin points out the train smoke that she saw. Trains use the line only at ten minutes to the hour and twenty-eight minutes past; therefore the shot could not have been fired at 6:20 pm. Satterthwaite realises that Sir George put the clocks back by ten minutes to give himself an alibi; he had intercepted his wife's note that morning. He put the telephone out of order to prevent the police from logging an emergency call against a specific time. Having heard the maid's story of the