She spoke in a tone which invited confidence, but Rolfe was not prepared to go to the length of trusting the young woman he saw before him, despite her assurance that she was in the confidence of Mrs. Holymead. He rose to his feet with a keen glance at Mademoiselle Chiron's handkerchief, which she had rolled into a little ball in her hand.

"I cannot disclose my business to you, mademoiselle," he said courteously. "I must see Mrs. Holymead personally, so I shall call again when she has returned."

"But, monsieur, why will you not tell me?" she asked coaxingly. "You are a police agent? Have you therefore come to see Madame about the case?"

Rolfe showed that he was taken aback by the direct question.

"The case!" he stammered. "What case?"

"Why, monsieur, what case should it be but that of which I have so often heard Madame speak? Le judge—the good friend of Monsieur and Madame Holymead, who was killed by the base assassin! Madame is disconsolate about his terrible end!" Mademoiselle Chiron here applied the handkerchief to her eyes on her own account. "Have you come to tell her that you have caught the wicked man who did assassinate him? Madame will be overjoyed!"

"Why, hardly that," replied Rolfe, completely off his guard. "But we're on the track, mademoiselle—we're on the track."

"And is it that you wanted me to tell Madame?" persisted Mademoiselle Chiron.

"I wanted to ask her a question or two about several things," said Rolfe, who had determined to disclose his hand sufficiently to bring Mrs. Holymead back to London if she had anything to do with the crime. "I want to ask her about some letters that were stolen—no, I won't say stolen—letters that were removed from Riversbrook. I have been informed that even if these letters are no longer in existence she can give the police a good idea of what was in them."

The telephone bell in the corner of the room rang suddenly. Mademoiselle Chiron ran to answer it, and accidentally dropped her handkerchief on the floor in picking up the receiver.

Mademoiselle Chiron began speaking on the telephone, but she stopped suddenly, staring with frightened eyes into the mirror at the other side of the room. The glass reflected the actions of Rolfe at the table. Seated with his back towards her, he had taken advantage of her being called to the telephone to examine her handkerchief, which he had picked up from the floor. He had produced from his pocketbook the scrap of lace and muslin which he had found in the murdered man's hand. He had the two on the table side by side comparing them, and Mademoiselle Chiron noticed a smile of satisfaction flit across his face as he did so. While she looked he restored the scrap to his pocket-book, and the pocket-book to his pocket. Hastily she turned to the telephone again and continued, in a voice which a quick ear would have detected was slightly hysterical.

Then she hung up the receiver and turned to Rolfe.

"But, monsieur, you were saying—"

Rolfe handed the handkerchief to its owner with a courtly bow which he flattered himself was equal to the best French school.

"I picked this up off the floor, mademoiselle. It is yours, I think?"

"This?" Mademoiselle Chiron touched the handkerchief with a dainty forefinger. "It is my handkerchief. I dropped it."

"It is very pretty," said Rolfe, with simulated indifference. "I suppose you bought that in Paris. It does not look English,''

"But no, monsieur, it is quite Engleesh. I bought it in the shop."

"Indeed! A London shop?" inquired Rolfe, with equal indifference.

"The lingerie shop in Oxford Street—what do you call it—Hobson's?"

"I'm sure I don't know—these ladies' things are a bit out of my line," said Rolfe, rising as he spoke with a smile, in which there was more than a trace of self-satisfaction.

He felt that he had acquitted himself with an adroitness which Crewe himself might have envied. He had made an important discovery and extracted the name of the shop where the handkerchief had been bought without—so he flattered himself—arousing any suspicions on the part of the lady. Rolfe knew from his inquiries in West End shops that handkerchiefs of that pattern and quality were stocked by many of the good shops, but the fact that he had found a handkerchief of this kind in the house of a lady who had abstracted secret letters from the murdered man's desk, and had, moreover, discovered the name of the shop where she bought her handkerchiefs, convinced him that he had struck a path which must lead to an important discovery.

Mademoiselle Chiron followed Rolfe into the hall and watched his departure from a front window. When she saw his retreating figure turn the corner of the street she left the window, ran upstairs quickly, and knocked lightly at the closed door.

The door was opened by Mrs. Holymead, who appeared to be in a state of nervous agitation. Her large brown eyes were swollen and dim with weeping, her hair had become partly unloosened, her face was white and her dress disordered. She caught the Frenchwoman by the wrist and drew her into the bedroom, closing the door after her.

"What did he want, Gabrielle?" she gasped. "What did he say? Has he come about—that?"

Gabrielle nodded her head.

"Gabrielle!" Mrs. Holymead's voice rose almost to a cry. "Oh, what are we to do? Did he come to arrest—"

"No, no! He was not so bad. He did not come to do dreadful things, but just to have a little talk.''

"A little talk? What about?"

"He wanted to see you, and ask you one or two little questions. I put him off. He was like wax in my hands. Pouf! He has gone, so why trouble?"

"But he will come again! He is sure to come again!"

"No doubt. He says he will come again—in a week—when you return."

Mrs. Holymead wrung her hands helplessly.

"What are we to do then?" she wailed.

"We will look the tragedy in the face when it comes. Ma foi! What have you been doing to yourself? For nothing is it worth to look like that." With deft and loving fingers Gabrielle began to arrange Mrs. Holymead's hair. "We will have everything right before this little police agent returns. We will show him he is the complete fool for suspecting you know about the murder."

"But what can you do, Gabrielle?" asked Mrs. Holymead.

She looked at Gabrielle with her large brown eyes, as though she were utterly dependent on the other's stronger will for support and assistance. Mademoiselle Chiron stopped in her arrangement of Mrs. Holymead's hair and, bending over, kissed her affectionately.

"Ma petite," she said, "do not worry. I have thought of a plan—oh, a most excellent plan—which I will myself execute to-morrow, and then shall all your troubles be finished, and you will be happy again."



CHAPTER XXII

"A lady to see you, sir."

"What sort of a lady, Joe?"

"Furren, I should say, sir, by the way she speaks. I arskt her if she had an appointment, and she said no, but she said she wanted to see you on very urgent and particular business. I told her most people says that wot comes to see you, but she says hers was reely important. Arskt me to tell you, sir, that it was about the Riversbrook case."

"The Riversbrook case? I'll see her, Joe. Has not Stork returned yet?"

"No, sir."

"Tell him to go to his dinner when he comes back. Show the lady in, Joe."

Crewe regarded his caller keenly as Joe ushered her in, placed a chair for her, and went out, closing the door noiselessly behind him. She was a tall, well-dressed, graceful woman, fairly young, with dark hair and eyes. She looked quickly at the detective as she entered, and Crewe was struck by the shrewd penetration of her glance.

"You are Monsieur Crewe, the great detective—is it not so?" she asked, as she sat down. The glance she now gave the detective at closer range from her large dark eyes was innocent and ingenuous, with a touch of admiration. The contrast between it and her former look was not lost on Crewe, and he realised that his visitor was no ordinary woman.

"My name is Crewe," he said, ignoring the compliment. "What do you wish to see me for?"

The visitor did not immediately reply. She nervously unfastened a bag she carried, and taking out a singularly unfeminine-looking handkerchief—a large cambric square almost masculine in its proportions, and guiltless of lace or perfume—held it to her face for a moment. But Crewe noticed that her eyes were dry when she removed it to remark:

"What I say to you, monsieur, is in strictest confidence—as sacred as the confession."

"Anything you say to me will be in strict confidence," said Crewe a little grimly.

"And the boy? Can he not hear through the keyhole?" Crewe's visitor glanced expressively at the door by which she had entered.

"You are quite safe here, madame—mademoiselle, I should say," he added, with a quick glance at her left hand, from which she slowly removed the glove as she spoke.

"Mademoiselle Chiron, monsieur," said Gabrielle, flashing another smile at him. "I am Madame Holymead's relative—her cousin. I come to see you about the dreadful murder of the judge, Madame's friend."

"You come from Mrs. Holymead?" said Crewe quickly. "Then, Mademoiselle Chiron, before—"

"No, no, monsieur, no!" Her agitation was unmistakably genuine. "I do not come from Madame Holymead. I am her relative, it is true, but I come—how shall I say it?—from myself. I mean she does not know of my visit to you, monsieur."

"I quite understand," replied Crewe.

"Monsieur Crewe," said Gabrielle hurriedly, "although I have not come from Madame Holymead, it is for her sake that I come to see you—to save her from the persecution of one of your police agents who wants to ask her questions about this so sordid—so terrible a crime! He has come once, this agent—last night he came—and he told me he wanted to question Madame Holymead about the murder of her dear friend the judge. I do not want Madame worried with these questions, so I told him Madame was away in the motor in the country; but he says he will come again and again till he sees her. Madame is distracted when she learns of his visit; it opens up her bleeding heart afresh, for she and her husband were intime with the dead judge, and deeply, terribly, they deplore his so dreadful end. I see Madame cry, and I say to myself I will not let this little police agent spoil her beauty and give her the migraine: his visits must be, shall be, prevented. I have heard of the so great and good Monsieur Crewe, and I will go and see him. We will—as you say in your English way—put our heads together, this famous detective and I, and we will find some way of—how do you call it?—circumventing this police agent so that my dear Madame shall cry no more. Monsieur Crewe, I am here, and I beg of you to help me."

Crewe listened to this outburst with inward surprise but impassive features. Apparently the police had come to the conclusion that they had blundered in arresting Birchill for the murder of Sir Horace Fewbanks, and had recommenced inquiries with a view to bringing the crime home to somebody else. He did not know whether their suspicions were now directed against Mrs. Holymead, but they had conducted their preliminary inquiries so clumsily as to arouse her fears that they did. So much was apparent from Mademoiselle Chiron's remarks, despite the interpretation she sought to place on Mrs. Holymead's fears. He wondered if the "police agent" was Rolfe or Chippenfield. It was obvious that the cool proposal that he should help to shield Mrs. Holymead against unwelcome police attentions covered some deeper move, and he shaped his conversation in the endeavour to extract more from the Frenchwoman.

"I am very sorry to hear that Mrs. Holymead has been subjected to this annoyance," he said warily. "This police agent, did he come by himself?"

"But yes, monsieur, I have already said it."

"I know, but I thought he might have had a companion waiting for him in a taxi-cab outside. Scotland Yard men frequently travel in pairs."

"He had no taxi-cab," declared Mademoiselle Chiron, positively. "He walked away on foot by himself. I watched him from the window."

Crewe registered a mental note of this admission. If she had watched the detective's departure from the window she evidently had some reason for wanting to see the last of him. Aloud he said:

"I expect I know him. What was he like?"

"Tall, as tall as you, only bigger—much bigger. And he had the great moustache which he caressed again and again with his fingers." Gabrielle daintily imitated the action on her own short upper lip.

"I know him," declared Crewe with a smile. "His name is Rolfe. There should be nothing about him to alarm you, mademoiselle. Why, he is quite a ladies' man."

Gabrielle shrugged her shoulders disdainfully.

"That may be," she replied; "but I like him not, and I do not wish him to worry Madame Holymead."

"But why not let him see Mrs. Holymead?" suggested Crewe, after a short pause. "As he only wants to ask her a few short questions, it seems to me that would be the quickest way out of the difficulty, and would save you all the trouble and worry you speak of."

"I tell you I will not," declared Gabrielle vehemently. "I will not have Madame Holymead worried and made ill with the terrible ordeal. Bah! What do you men—so clumsy—know of the delicate feelings of a lady like Madame Holymead? The least soupcon of excitement and she is disturbed, distraite, for days. After last night—after the visit of the police agent—she was quite hysterical."

"Why should she be when she had nothing to be afraid of?" rejoined Crewe.

He spoke in a tone of simple wonder, but Gabrielle shot a quick glance at him from under her veiled lashes as she replied:

"Bah! What has that to do with it? I repeat: Monsieur Crewe, you men cannot understand the feelings of a lady like Madame Holymead in a matter like this. She and her husband were, as I have said before, intime with the great judge. They visited his house, they dined with him, they met him in Society. Behold, he is brutally, horribly killed. Madame, when she hears the terrible news, is ill for days; she cannot eat, she cannot sleep; she can interest herself in nothing. She is forgetting a little when the police agents they catch a man and say he is the murderer. Then comes the trial of this man at the court with so queer a name—Old Bailee. The papers are full of the terrible story again; of the dead man; how he looked killed; how he lay in a pool of blood; how they cut him open! Madame Holymead cannot pick up a paper without seeing these things, and she falls ill again. Then the jury say the man the police agents caught is not the murderer. He goes free, and once more the talk dies away. Madame Holymead once more begins to forget, when this police agent comes to her house to remind her once more all about it. It is too cruel, monsieur, it is too cruel!"

Gabrielle's voice vibrated with indignation as she concluded, and Crewe regarded her closely. He decided that her affection for Mrs. Holymead was not simulated, and that it would be best to handle her from that point of view.

"I am sorry," he said coldly, "but I do not see how I can help you."

"Monsieur," said the Frenchwoman, clasping her hands, "I entreat you not to say so. It would be so easy for you to help—not me, but Madame."

"How?"

"You know this police agent. You also are a police agent, though so much greater. Therefore you whisper just one little word in the ear of your friend the police agent, and he will not bother Madame Holymead again. I think you could do this. And if you need money to give to the police agent, why, I have brought some." She fumbled nervously at her hand-bag.

"Stay," said Crewe. "What you ask is impossible. I have nothing whatever to do with Scotland Yard. I could not interfere in their inquiries, even if I wished to. They would only laugh at me."

Gabrielle's dark eyes showed her disappointment, but she made one more effort to gain her end. She leant nearer to Crewe, and laid a persuasive hand on his arm.

"If you would only make the effort," she said coaxingly, "my beautiful Madame Holymead would be for ever grateful."

"Mademoiselle, once more I repeat that what you ask is impossible," returned Crewe decisively. "I repeat, I cannot see why Mrs. Holymead should object to answering a few questions the police wish to ask her. She is too sensitive about such a trifle."

Gabrielle shrugged her shoulders slightly in tacit recognition of the fact that the man in front of her was too shrewd to be deceived by subterfuge.

"There is another reason, monsieur," she whispered.

"You had better tell it to me."

"If you had been a woman you would have guessed. The great judge who was killed was in his spare moments what you call a gallant—he did love my sex. In France this would not matter, but in England they think much of it—so very much. Madame Holymead is frightened for fear the least breath of scandal should attach to her name, if the world knew that the police agent had visited her house on such an errand. Madame is innocent—it is not necessary to assure you of that; but the prudish dames of England are censorious."

"The Scotland Yard people are not likely to disclose anything about it," said Crewe.

"That may be so, but these things come out," retorted Gabrielle.

"Monsieur," she added, after a pause, and speaking in a low tone, "I know that you can do much—very much—if you will, and can stop Madame Holymead from being worried. Would you do so if you were told who the murderer was—I mean he who did really kill the great judge?" Crewe was genuinely surprised, but his control over his features was so complete that he did not betray it. "Do you know who Sir Horace Fewbanks's murderer is?" he asked, in quiet even tones. "Monsieur, I do. I will tell you the whole story in secret—how do you say?—in confidence, if you promise me you will help Madame Holymead as I have asked you." "I cannot enter into a bargain like that," rejoined Crewe. "I do not know whether Mrs. Holymead may not be implicated—concerned—in what you say."

"Monsieur, she is not!" flashed Gabrielle indignantly. "She knows nothing about it. What I have to tell you concerns myself alone."

"In that case," rejoined Crewe, "I think you had better speak to me frankly and freely, and if I can I will help you."

"You are perhaps right," she replied. "I will tell you everything, provided you give me your word of honour that you will not inform the police of what I will tell you."

"If you bind me to that promise I do not see how I can help you in the direction you indicate," said Crewe, after a moment's thought. "If the police are asked to abandon their inquiries about Mrs. Holymead, they will naturally wish to know the reason."

"You are quite right," said Gabrielle. "I did not think of that. But if I tell you everything, and you have to tell the police agents so as to help Madame, will you promise that the police agents do not come and arrest me?"

"Provided you have not committed murder or been in any way accessory to it, I think I can promise you that," rejoined Crewe.

"Monsieur, I do not understand you, but I can almost divine your meaning. Your promise is what you call a guarded one. Nevertheless, I like your face, and I will trust you."

Gabrielle relapsed into silence for some moments, looking at Crewe earnestly.

"Monsieur," she said at length, "it is a terrible story I have to relate, and it is difficult for me to tell a stranger what I know. Nevertheless, I will begin. I knew the great judge well."

"You knew Sir Horace Fewbanks?" exclaimed Crewe.

"He was—my lover, monsieur."

She brought the last two words out defiantly, with a quick glance at Crewe to see how he took the avowal. She seemed to find something reassuring in his answering glance, and she continued, in more even tones:

"I had often seen him at the house of Madame Holymead when I came to London to visit her. I admired Sir Horace when I saw him—often he used to call and dine, for he was the friend of Monsieur Holymead. But Madame told me that the great judge was what in England you call a lover of the ladies—that he was dangerous—so I must be careful of him. I used to look at him when he called, and thought he was handsome in the English way, and sometimes he looked at me when he was unobserved, and smiled at me. But Madame did not like me looking at him; she said I was foolish; she warned me to be careful."

Gabrielle shrugged her shoulders expressively.

"Of what use was Madame's warning? It did but make me wish to know more of this great lover of my sex. He saw that, and made the opportunity, and made love to me. He was so ardent, so fervid a lover that I was conquered.

"After we had been lovers I told him my secret—that I was married. Pierre Simon, my husband, was a bad man, and so I left him. But Madame must not know that I was married, for that is my secret. It does not do to tell everything—besides, it would have distressed her.

"Monsieur, I was happy with my lover, the great judge. He was charming. He had that charm of manner which you English lack. Faithful? I do not know. Often we were together, and often we wrote letters when to meet was impossible. He kept my letters—they amused him so, he said—they were so French, so piquant, so different to English ladies' letters. Alas, monsieur, there had been others—many others there must have been, for he understood my sex so well.

"One afternoon I was out for a walk looking in the great shops in Regent Street, when I felt a hand placed on my shoulder, and looking round I saw Pierre, my husband. He was pleased at the meeting, but I was not pleased. He took me to a cafe where we could talk. It was what he always did talk about—money, money, money. He always wanted money. He said I must find him some, and when I told him I had none he said I must find some way of getting it, or he would come to the house and expose my secret. I walked away out of the cafe and left him there. But I soon saw him again, and again. He followed me and talked to me against my will.

"Monsieur, I was very much distressed, and for a long time I tried to think of a way to get rid of Pierre, for I was afraid that he would come to the house and tell Madame Holymead I was married. Then I thought of the great judge, my lover. He would know how to send Pierre away, for Pierre would be frightened of him. But Sir Horace was in Scotland, shooting the poor birds. But I wrote to him and asked him for my sake to come at once, because I was in distress and needed help. Monsieur, he came—but he came to his death. He sent me a letter to meet him at Riversbrook at half-past ten o'clock. He was sorry it was so late, but he thought it would be safer not to come to the house till after dark in the long summer evening, for people were so censorious. I was to tell Madame Holymead that I was going to the theatre with a friend.

"I was so pleased to think that I would get rid of Pierre, that on the morning, when he stopped me to ask me again about the money, I showed him the letter of the great judge, and told him I would make the judge put him in prison if he did not go away and leave me alone. 'He is your lover,' said Pierre. 'I will kill him.' But I laughed, for I knew Pierre did not care if I had many lovers. I said to him, 'Pierre, you would extort the money'—blackmail, the English call it, do they not, Monsieur Crewe?—'but you would not kill. Sir Horace is not afraid of you. If you go near him he would have you taken off to gaol,' But Pierre he was deep in thought. Several times he said, 'I want money,' Each time I said to him, 'Then you must work for it,' 'That is no way to get money,' he answered. 'This great judge, he has much money, is it not so?'

"I left him, monsieur, thinking of money. But I did not know how bad his thoughts were. I returned home, and I told Madame Holymead I would go to the theatre that night. I left the house at eight o'clock, and after walking along Piccadilly and Regent Street took the train to Hampstead. Then I walked up to the house of Sir Horace so as not to be too early. The gate was open and I thought that strange, but I had no thought of murder. As I walked up the garden I heard a shot—two shots—and then a cry, and the sound of something falling on the floor. The door of the house was open, and the light was burning in the hall. Upstairs I heard the noise of footsteps—quick footsteps—and then I heard them coming down the staircase. I was afraid, and I hid myself behind the curtains in the hall. The footsteps came down, and nearer and nearer, and when they passed me I looked out to see. Monsieur, it was Pierre. I called to him softly, 'Pierre, Pierre!' He looked round, and his face, it was so different—so dreadful. He did not know my voice, and he ran away from me with a cry.

"Monsieur, my heart is a brave one. I have not what you call nerves, but when I knew I was alone in the great house with I knew not what, a great fear clutched me. I stood still in the hall with my eyes fixed on the stairs above. At first all was silent, then I heard a dreadful sound—a groan. I wanted to run away then, monsieur, but the good God commanded me to go up and into the room, where a fellow creature needed me. I went upstairs, and along to the door of a room which was half open. I pushed it wide open and went in.

"Mon Dieu! the judge was alone there, dying. Pierre had shot him. He lay along the floor, gasping, groaning, and the blood dripping from his breast. When I saw this I ran forward and took his poor head on my knee, and tried to stop the blood with my handkerchief. But as I did this the judge groaned once more. He knew me not, though I called him by name. In terrible agony he writhed his head off my breast. His hand clutched at the hole in his breast, closing on my handkerchief. And so he died.

"Monsieur, strange it may seem, but I do assure you that I became calm again when he was dead. I rose to my feet and looked round me in the room. On the floor near him I saw a revolver. I picked it up and hid it in my bag. The tube of it was warm. Then I sat down in a chair and thought what I must do. The police must not know I was there. They must not know he was my lover. I thought of my letters that I wrote to him. He had them hidden in a little drawer at the back of his desk—a secret drawer. Often had he showed me my letters there, and once he had showed me where to find the spring that opened the drawer. So I searched for the spring and I found it. The drawer opened and there were my letters tied together. I took them all and hid them in my bag, and then I closed the hiding place. There remained but the handkerchief which my lover held in his hand. I tried to get it out, but I could not. In my hurry I dragged it out—it came away then, but left a little bit in his hand. It did not show. I dared not wait longer. I turned out the light, and hurried out of the room and downstairs. Again I turned out the light, and closed the door, and hurried away.

"That, monsieur, is my story."



CHAPTER XXIII

As Gabrielle finished her story, she cast a quick glance at Crewe's face as though seeking to divine his decision. But apparently she could read nothing there, and with an imperious gesture she exclaimed:

"You will do what I ask now that I have exposed my secret—my shame to you—and told everything? You will save Madame Holymead from being persecuted by these police agents?"

"I must ask you a few questions first."

The contrast between the detective's quiet English tones and the Frenchwoman's impetuous appeal was accentuated by the methodical way in which Crewe slowly jotted down an entry in his open notebook. Her dark eyes sparkled in an agony of impatience as she watched him.

"Ask them quick, monsieur, for I burn in the suspense."

"In the first place, then, have you any—"

"Hold, monsieur! I know what you would ask! You would say if I have any proofs? Stupid that I am to forget things so important. I have brought you the proofs."

She fumbled at the clasp of her hand-bag, as she spoke, and before she had finished speaking she had torn it open and emptied its contents on the table in front of Crewe—a dainty handkerchief and a revolver.

"See, monsieur!" she cried; "here is the handkerchief of which I told you. It is that which the judge seized when I tried to stop the blood flowing in his breast—look at the corner and you will see that a little bit has been torn off by his almost dead hand. And the revolver—it is that which I picked up on the floor near him. I have had it locked up ever since."

Crewe examined both articles closely. The revolver was a small, nickel-plated weapon with silver chasing, with the murdered man's initials engraved in the handle. It had five chambers, and one of the cartridges had been discharged. The other four chambers were still loaded. Crewe carefully extracted the cartridges, and examined them closely. One of them he held up to the light in order to inspect it more minutely.

"Did you do this?" he asked: "Have you been trying to fire off the revolver?"

"No, no, monsieur," she exclaimed quickly. "I would not fire it, I do not understand it. I have been careful not to touch the little thing that sets it going."

"The trigger," said Crewe. He again studied the cartridge that had attracted his attention. It had missed fire, for on the cap was a dint where the hammer had struck it. He placed the four cartridges on the table and turning his attention to the handkerchief examined it minutely. It was one of those filmy scraps of muslin and lace which ladies call a handkerchief—an article whose cost is out of all proportion to its usefulness. Gabrielle, who was watching him keenly as he examined it, exclaimed:

"The handkerchief—a box of them—were given me by Sir Horace because he knew I love pretty things."

She laid a finger on the missing corner, which might indeed have been torn off in the manner described. A scrap of the lace was missing, and it was evident that it had been removed with violence, for the lace around the gap was loosened, and the muslin slightly frayed.

"You say that the corner was torn off when you wrenched the handkerchief from the dead man's hold?" said Crewe. "But it was not found in his hand by the police or anyone else. And he was not buried with it, for I examined the body carefully. What became of it?"

Gabrielle looked at him quickly as though she suspected some trap.

"You would play with me," she said at length. "What became of it? Why, you must surely know that the police of Scot—Scotland Yard have it. The police agent who called on Madame had it. What is his name—Rudolf?"

"Rolfe?" exclaimed Crewe. "Has he got it?"

"Yes," she replied. "He did not show it to me, but I saw it nevertheless. I dropped my handkerchief when I spoke at the telephone and Monsieur Rolfe picked it up. Quickly he studied my handkerchief—not this one, monsieur, but one of the same kind—and from his pocket-book he took out the missing piece that was in the dead man's hand and he studied them side by side. He thought I did not see—that my back was turned—but I saw in the mirror which hung on the wall. Then, when I finished my telephone, he bowed and said, 'Your handkerchief, mademoiselle.' It was not so badly done—for a clumsy police agent."

She was not able to recognise how keen was Crewe's interest in her statement, but she saw that she had pleased him.

"It is because of this that he will come again," she continued. "It is because of this that he would question Madame Holymead. And then what will happen? I do not know. The police make so many mistakes—blunders you English call them. Would they arrest her with their blunders? That is why I come to you to ask you to save her."

"May I have the revolver and the handkerchief?" asked Crewe. "I will take great care of them."

"They are at your disposal, for you will use them to confront the police agent."

Crewe again examined the articles in silence before taking them to his secretaire and locking them up in one of the pigeon-holes. Then he turned to Gabrielle, whose large luminous eyes met his unhesitatingly. She even smiled slightly—a frank engaging smile, as she remarked:

"And now, monsieur, any more questions?"

Crewe smiled back at her.

"You have told a remarkable story, mademoiselle, and corroborated it with two important pieces of evidence, which are in themselves almost sufficient to carry conviction," he said. "But the Scotland Yard police are a suspicious lot, and it is necessary for me to have further information in order to convince them—if I am to help you as you wish."

Gabrielle flashed a look of gratitude at Crewe. She understood from his words that he believed her story and was disposed to help her, although the police of Scotland Yard might prove harder to convince than him.

"Bah! those police agents—they are the same everywhere," she exclaimed. "They deal so much with crime that their minds get the taint, and between the false and true they cannot tell the difference. Que voulez-vous? They are but small in brains. With you, the case is different. You have it here—and there." She touched her temples lightly with a finger of each hand. "Proceed, monsieur: ask me what questions you will. I shall endeavour to answer them."

"You said that as you were hiding behind the curtains on the stairway landing, Pierre, your husband, rushed down past you. You are quite sure it was he?"

"Of that, monsieur, unfortunately there is no doubt. I saw his face quite distinctly when he passed me, and when he turned round."

"The light would be shining from behind, and would not reveal his face very closely," suggested Crewe.

"Nevertheless, monsieur, it was quite sufficient for me to see Pierre clearly. His head was half-turned as he ran, as though he was looking back expecting to see the judge rise up and punish him for his dreadful deed, and I saw him en silhouette, oh, most distinctly—impossible him to mistake. I called softly—'Pierre!' just like that, and he turned his face right round, and then with a cry he disappeared along the path."

"About what time was this?"

"The time—it was half-past ten, for that was the time I was to be there according to the letter the judge sent me."

"But are you sure it was half-past ten? Weren't you early? Wasn't it just about ten o'clock?"

"No, monsieur," she replied sadly. "If it had been ten o'clock I would have been in time to save the life of my lover—to prevent this great tragedy which brings grief to so many."

Crewe looked at her sharply, and then nodded his head in acquiescence of the fact that much misery would have been averted if she had been in time to save the life of Sir Horace Fewbanks.

"When you went into the room, Sir Horace Fewbanks, you say, was lying on the floor, dying. Whereabouts in the room was he?"

"If he had been in this room he would have been lying just behind you, with his head to the wall and his feet pointing towards that window. He struggled and groaned after I went in, and altered his position a little, but not much. He died so."

Crewe rapidly reviewed his recollection of the room in which the judge had been killed. Once again Gabrielle's statement tallied with his own reconstruction of the crime and the manner of its perpetration. If the murder had been committed in his office the second bullet would have gone through the window instead of imbedding itself in the wall, and the judge would have fallen in the spot where she indicated.

"And where was the writing-desk from where you got your letters?" was Crewe's next question.

"It was over there—almost by that—your little bookcase there."

She pointed to a small oaken bookstand which stood slightly in advance of the more imposing shelves in which reposed the portentous volumes of newspaper clippings and photographs which constituted Crewe's "Rogues' Library."

"Now we come to the letters. You took them from the secret drawer in the desk. Why did you remove them?"

"Because I would not have the police agents find them, for then they would want to know so much."

"And what did you do with them?"

"Monsieur Crewe, I destroyed them. When I got home I burnt them all—I was so frightened."

"You mean you were frightened to keep them in your possession after the judge was killed?"

"Yes. What place had I to keep them safe from prying eyes? So, monsieur, I burnt them all—one by one—and the charred fragments I kept and took into the Park next day, where I scattered them unobserved."

"And what became of the letter you wrote to Sir Horace Fewbanks at Craigleith Hall, asking him to come to London and save you from your husband's persecutions?"

She looked at him earnestly in the endeavour to ascertain if he had laid a trap for her.

"Sir Horace destroyed it in Scotland, I suppose, if the police did not find it."

"Strange that he should have kept all your other letters so carefully and destroyed that one. Perhaps it was in his pocket-book that was stolen."

"I do not know. What does it matter? It has gone." She shrugged her shoulders lightly and indifferently.

"Do you know who stole the pocket-book?"

"No, monsieur. I thought it was stolen in the train."

"That is the police theory," replied Crewe. "But let that go. Have you, since the night of the murder, seen anything of Pierre?"

"Monsieur, I have not. It is as though the earth has him swallowed. He keeps silent with the silence of the grave."

"He is wise to do so," responded Crewe. "Now, mademoiselle, I have no more questions to ask you. Your confidence is safe; you need be under no apprehensions on that score."

"I care not for myself, Monsieur Crewe, so long as Madame Holymead is freed from the persecutions of the police agents," replied Gabrielle, rising from her seat as she spoke. "If, after hearing my story, you could but give me the assurance—"

"I think I can safely promise you that Mrs. Holymead will not be troubled with any further police attentions," said Crewe, after a moment's pause.

Gabrielle broke into profuse expressions of gratitude as she turned to go.

"For the rest then, I care not what happens. I am—how do you say it—I am overjoyed. Je vous remercie, monsieur, I beg you not, I can find my way out unattended."

But Crewe showed her to the stairs, where again he had to listen to her profuse thanks before she finally departed. He watched her graceful figure till it was lost to sight in the winding staircase, and then he turned back to his office. In the outer office he stopped to speak to Joe, who, perched on an office-footstool, was tapping quickly on the office-table with his pen-knife, swaying backwards and forwards dangerously on his perch in the intensity of his emotions as he played the hero's part in the drama of saving the runaway engine from dashing into the 4.40 express by calling up the Red Gulch station on the wire.

"Joe," said Crewe, "I'll see nobody for an hour at least—nobody. You understand?"

Joe came out of the cinema world long enough to nod his head in emphatic understanding of the instructions. In his own room Crewe pulled out his notebook and once more gave himself up to the study of the baffling Riversbrook mystery, in the new light of Gabrielle's confession.

Part of her story, he reflected, must be true. She had produced Sir Horace's revolver, and, still more important, a handkerchief which he had clutched in his dying struggles. It was obvious that she or some other woman had been at Riversbrook the night of the murder, and in the room with the murdered man before he died. That tallied with Birchill's statement to Hill that he had seen a woman close the front door and walk along the garden path while he was hiding in the garden. Crewe, recalling Gabrielle's description of the room, came to the conclusion that it was probably she who had been with the judge in his dying moments. No one but a person who had actually seen it could have described the room with such minuteness.

She had been in the room, then. For what object? For the reasons stated in her confession? Crewe shook his head doubtfully.

"She evaded the trap about the pocket-book, but she made one bad mistake," he mused. "The letters in the secret drawer were taken away, and I have no doubt were burnt as she says. But were they her letters? Was Sir Horace her lover? At any rate, she did not get hold of them in the way she said. They were not taken away on the night Sir Horace was murdered, for the simple reason that they were not in the secret drawer at the time."



CHAPTER XXIV

Rolfe was spending a quiet evening in his room after a trying day's inquiries into a confidence trick case; inquiries so fruitless that they had brought down on his head an official reproof from Inspector Chippenfield.

Rolfe had left Scotland Yard that evening in a somewhat despondent frame of mind in consequence, but a brisk walk home and a good supper had done him so much good, that with a tranquil mind and his pipe in his mouth, he was able to devote himself to the hobby of his leisure hours with keen enjoyment.

This hobby would have excited the wondering contempt of Joe Leaver, whose frequent attendance at cinema theatres had led him to the conclusion that police detectives—who, unlike his master, had to take the rough with the smooth—spent their spare time practising revolver shooting, and throwing daggers at an ace of hearts on the wall. Rolfe's hobby was nothing more exciting than stamp collecting. He was deeply versed in the lore of stamps, and his private ambition was to become the possessor of a "blue Mauritius." His collection, though extensive, was by no means of fabulous value, being made up chiefly of modest purchases from the stamp collecting shops, and finds in the waste-paper-baskets at Scotland Yard after the arrival of the foreign mails.

That day he had made a particularly good haul from the waste-paper-baskets, for his "catch" included several comparatively good specimens from Japan and Fiji. He sat gloating over these treasures, examining them carefully and holding each one up to the light as he separated it from the piece of paper to which it had been affixed. He pasted them one by one in his stamp album with loving, lingering fingers, adjusting each stamp in its little square in the book with meticulous care. He was so absorbed in this occupation that he did not hear the ascending footsteps drawing nearer to his door, and did not see a visitor at the door when the footsteps ceased. It was Crewe's voice that recalled him back from the stamp collector's imaginary world.

"Why, Mr. Crewe," said Rolfe, with evident pleasure, "who'd have thought of seeing you?"

"Your landlady asked me if I'd come up myself," said Crewe, in explaining his intrusion. "She's 'too much worried and put about, to say nothing of having a bad back,' to show me upstairs."

"I've never known her to be well," said Rolfe, with a laugh. "Every morning when she brings up my breakfast I've got to hear details of her bad back which should be kept for the confidential ear of the doctor. But she regards me as a son, I think—I've been here so long. But now you are here, Mr. Crewe—" Rolfe waited in polite expectation that his visitor would disclose the object of his visit.

But Crewe seemed in no hurry to do so. He produced his cigar case and offered Rolfe a cigar, which the latter accepted with a pleasant recollection of the excellent flavour of the cigars the private detective kept. When each of them had his cigar well alight, Crewe glanced at the open stamp album and commenced talking about stamps. It was a subject which Rolfe was always willing to discuss. Crewe declared that he was an ignorant outsider as far as stamps were concerned, but he professed to have a respectful admiration for those who immersed themselves in such a fascinating subject. Rolfe, with the fervid egoism of the collector, talked about stamps for half an hour without recalling that his visitor must have come to talk about something else.

"I've got a small stamp collection in my office," said Crewe, when Rolfe paused for a moment. "It belonged to that Jewish diamond merchant who was shot in Hatton Gardens two years ago. You remember his case?"

"Rather! That was a smart bit of work of yours, Mr. Crewe, in laying your hands on the woman who did it and getting back the diamond."

Crewe smiled in response.

"The Jew was very grateful, poor fellow. He died in the hospital after the trial, so she was lucky to escape with twelve years. He left me a diamond ring and a stamp album that had come into his possession."

"I should like to see it," said Rolfe eagerly. "It is more than likely that there are some good specimens in it. The Jews are keen collectors. If you let me have a look at it, I'll tell you what the collection is worth."

"You can have it altogether," said Crewe. "I'll send my boy Joe round with it in the morning."

"Oh, Mr. Crewe, it's very good of you," said Rolfe, with the covetousness of the collector shining in his eyes.

"Nonsense! Why shouldn't you have it? But I didn't come round here solely to talk about stamps, Rolfe. I came to have a little chat about the Riversbrook case. How are you getting on with it?"

"Why, really," said Rolfe, "I've not done much with it since, since—"

"Since Birchill was acquitted, eh! But you are not letting it drop altogether, are you? That would be a pity—such an interesting case. Whom have you your eye on now as the right man?"

Rolfe, who thought he detected a suspicion of banter in Crewe's remarks, evaded the latter question by answering the first part of Crewe's inquiry.

"Why hardly that, Mr. Crewe. But the chief is not very keen on the case. Birchill's acquittal was too much of a blow to him. He reckons that nowadays juries are too soft-hearted to convict on a capital charge."

"It's just as well that they are too soft-hearted to convict the wrong man," said Crewe.

"Yes; you told me from the first that we were on the wrong track," was the reply. "I haven't forgotten that and the chief is not allowed to forget it, either. All the men at the Yard know that you held the opinion that we had got hold of the wrong man when we arrested Birchill, and he has had to stand so much chaff in the office, that he's pretty raw about it." Rolfe spoke in the detached tone of a junior who had no share in his chief's mistakes or their attendant humiliation, and he added, "That's once more that you've scored over Scotland Yard, Mr. Crewe, and you ought to be proud of it." He glanced covertly at Crewe to see how he took the flattery.

"So you've done very little about the case since Birchill was acquitted?" was his only remark.

"I've been so busy," replied Rolfe, again evading the question, and avoiding meeting Crewe's glance by turning over the leaves of his stamp album. "You see, there has been a rush of work at Scotland Yard lately. There is that big burglary at Lord Emden's, and the case of the woman whose body was found in the river lock at Peyton, and half a dozen other cases, all important in their way. There has been quite an epidemic of crime lately, as you know, Mr. Crewe. I don't seem to get a minute to myself these times."

"Rolfe," said Crewe drily, "you protest too much. You don't suppose that after coming over here to see you that I can be deceived by such talk?"

Rolfe flushed at these uncompromising words, but before he could speak Crewe proceeded in a milder tone.

"I don't blame you a bit for trying to put me off. It's all part of the game. We're rivals, in a sense, and you are quite right not to lose sight of that fact. But as a detective, Rolfe, your methods lack polish. Really, I blush for them. You might have known that I came over here to see you to-night because I had an important object in view, and you should have tried to find out what it was before playing your own cards,—and such cards, too! You're sadly lacking in finesse, Rolfe. You'd never make a chess player; your concealed intentions are too easily discovered. You must try not to be so transparent if you want to succeed in your profession."

Crewe delivered his reproof with such good humour that Rolfe stared at him, as if unable to make out what his visitor was driving at.

"I don't know what you are talking about, Mr. Crewe," he said at length.

"Oh, yes, you do. You know I'm speaking about your latest move in the Riversbrook case, which you've been so busy with of late. And I've come to tell you in a friendly way that once more you're on the wrong track."

"What do you mean?" asked Rolfe quickly.

"Why, Princes Gate, of course," replied Crewe cheerily. "You don't suppose that a fine-looking young man like yourself could be seen in the neighbourhood of Princes Gate without causing a flutter among feminine hearts there, do you?"

"So the servants have been talking, have they?" muttered Rolfe.

"They have and they haven't. But that's beside the point. What I want to say is that you're on the wrong track in suspecting Mrs. Holymead, and I strongly advise you to drop your inquiries if you don't want to get yourself into hot water. She's as innocent of the murder of Sir Horace Fewbanks as Birchill is, but you cannot afford to make a false shot in the case of a lady of her social standing, as you did with a criminal like Birchill."

At this rebuke Rolfe gave way to irritation.

"Look here, Mr. Crewe, I'll thank you to mind your own business," he said. "It's got nothing to do with you where I make inquiries. I'll have you remember that! I don't interfere with you, and I won't have you interfering with me."

"But I'm interfering only for your own good, man! What do you suppose I'm doing it for? I tell you you're riding for a very bad fall in suspecting Mrs. Holymead and shadowing her."

Crewe's plain words were an echo of a secret fear which Rolfe had entertained from the time his suspicions were directed towards Mrs. Holymead. But he was not going to allow Crewe to think he was alarmed.

"If I'm making inquiries about Mrs. Holymead, it's because I have ample justification for doing so," he said stiffly.

"And I tell you that you have not."

"Prove it!" exclaimed Rolfe defiantly.

Crewe produced from his pocket a revolver and a lady's handkerchief, and handed them to Rolfe without speaking.

Rolfe's embarrassment was almost equal to his astonishment as he examined the articles. In the handkerchief with its missing corner, he speedily recognised something for which he had searched in vain. He had never confided to Crewe the discovery of the missing corner in the dead man's hand, and therefore the production of the handkerchief by Crewe considerably embarrassed him. He longed to ask Crewe how he had obtained possession of the handkerchief, but he could not trust his voice to frame the question without betraying his feelings, so he picked up the revolver and examined it closely. Then he put it down and again gave his attention to the handkerchief, bending his head over it so that Crewe should not see his face.

"You do not seem very astonished at my finds, Rolfe," said Crewe quizzically. "Perhaps you've seen these articles before?"

"No, I haven't," said Rolfe, still avoiding his visitor's eye.

"Well, the torn handkerchief is not exactly new to you," said Crewe. "You've got the missing part; you found it in Sir Horace's hand after he was murdered."

"You're too clever for me, and that's the simple truth, Mr. Crewe," said Rolfe, in a mortified tone. "I did find a small piece of a lady's handkerchief in his hand, and here it is." He produced his pocket-book and took out the piece. "How you found out I had it, is more than I know."

"Mere guess-work," said Crewe.

Rolfe shook his head slowly.

"I know better than that," he said. "You're deep. You don't miss much. I wish now that I had told you about that bit of handkerchief at the first. But Chippenfield and I wanted to have all the credit of elucidating the Riversbrook mystery. I hunted high and low to get trace of this handkerchief, but I couldn't. And now you've beaten me, although you couldn't have known at first that there was such a thing as a missing handkerchief in the case. I hope you bear me no malice, Mr. Crewe."

"What for, Rolfe?"

"For not telling you about the handkerchief, after I found this piece in Sir Horace's hand."

"Not in the least," said Crewe. "Why should you have told me? I don't tell you everything that I find out. It's all part of the game. That piece of the handkerchief was a good find, Rolfe, and I congratulate you on getting it. How did you come to discover it?"

"I was trying to force open the murdered man's hand, and I found it clenched between the little finger and the next. Of course it was not visible with his hand closed. Chippenfield, who missed it, didn't half like my discovery, and all along he underestimated the value of it as a clue."

"Well, he has had to pay for his folly."

"He has, and serves him right," replied Rolfe viciously. "He's the most pig-headed, obstinate, vain, narrow-minded man you could come across." It occurred to Rolfe that it was not exactly good form on his part to condemn his superior officer so vigorously in the presence of a rival, so he broke off abruptly and asked Crewe how he came into possession of the revolver and handkerchief.

Crewe's reply was that he had obtained these articles under a promise of secrecy from some one who had assured him that Mrs. Holymead had no connection with the crime. When he was at liberty to tell the story as it had been told to him, Rolfe would be the first to hear it.

"Mrs. Holymead had no connection with the crime?" exclaimed Rolfe impatiently. "Perhaps you don't know that the morning after the murder was discovered she went out to Riversbrook and removed some secret papers from the murdered man's desk—papers that he had been in the habit of hiding in a secret drawer?"

"Yes, I know that," said Crewe.

"Well, doesn't that look as if she knew something about the crime?"

"Not necessarily."

"Well, to me it does. What were these secret papers? They were letters, I am told."

"I believe so. And you, Rolfe, as a man of the world, know that a married woman would not like the police to get possession of letters she had written to a man of the reputation of Sir Horace Fewbanks."

"I admit that her action is capable of a comparatively innocent interpretation, but taken in conjunction with other things it looks to me mighty suspicious. In Hill's statement to us he told us that on the night of the murder, Birchill when hiding in the garden waiting for the lights to go out before breaking into the house, heard the front door slam and saw a stylish sort of woman walk down the path to the gate."

"That was not Mrs. Holymead," said Crewe.

"How do you know? If it was not her, who was it? Do you know?"

"I think I know, and when I am at liberty to speak I will tell you."

"Then there is a third point," continued Rolfe. "Look at this handkerchief you brought. I saw a handkerchief of exactly similar pattern at Mrs. Holymead's house when I called there."

"Wasn't that the property of her French cousin, Mademoiselle Chiron?"

"Yes, she dropped it on the floor while I was there. But it is probable the handkerchief was one of a set given her by Mrs. Holymead."

"Quite probably, Rolfe. But scores of ladies who are fond of expensive things have handkerchiefs of a similar pattern. You will find if you inquire among the West End shops, that although it is a dainty, expensive article from the man's point of view, there is nothing singular about the quality or the pattern."

"Perhaps so," said Rolfe, "but the possession of handkerchiefs of this kind is surely suspicious when taken in conjunction with her removal of the letters. I wish I could get hold of that infernal scoundrel Hill again. I am convinced that he knows a great deal more about this murder than he has yet told us, and a great deal more about Mrs. Holymead and her letters. I've had his shop watched day and night since he disappeared, but he keeps close to his burrow, and I've not been able to get on his track."

"I'd give up watching for him if I were you," said Crewe, as he flicked the ash of his cigar into the fireplace. "You're not likely to find him now. As a matter of fact, he has left the country."

"Hill left the country?" echoed Rolfe. "I think you are mistaken there, Mr. Crewe. He had no money; how could he get away?"

Crewe selected another cigar from his case and lighted it before answering.

"The fact is, I advanced him the money," he said. "Technically it's a loan, but I do not think any of it will be paid back."

Rolfe stared hard at Crewe to see if he was joking.

"What on earth made you do that?" he demanded at length. "Hill may be the actual murderer for all we know."

"Not at all," was the reply. "Before I helped him to leave England I satisfied myself that he had absolutely nothing to do with the murder. He does not know who shot Sir Horace Fewbanks, though, of course, he still half believes that it was Birchill. When I got in touch with him after his disappearance he was in a pitiable state of fright—waking or sleeping, he couldn't get his mind off the gallows. There were two or three points on which I wanted his assistance in clearing up the Riversbrook case, and I promised to get him out of the country if he would make a clean breast of things and tell me the truth as far as he knew it. He made a confession—a true one this time. I took it down and I'll let you have a copy. There are a few interesting points on which it differs materially from the statement he made to the police when you and Chippenfield cornered him."

"What are they?" asked Rolfe.

"In the first place the burglary was his idea, and not Birchill's," replied Crewe. "After the quarrel between Sir Horace and the girl Fanning, he went out to her flat and suggested to Birchill that he should rob Riversbrook. Hill's real object in arranging this burglary was to get possession of the letters which Mrs. Holymead subsequently removed, but he did not tell Birchill this. His plan was to go to Riversbrook the morning after the burglary and then break open Sir Horace's desk and open the secret drawer before informing the police of the burglary. To the police and Sir Horace it would look as though the burglar had accidentally found the spring of the secret drawer. With these letters in his possession Hill intended to blackmail Sir Horace, or Mrs. Holymead, without disclosing himself in the transaction.

"When Sir Horace returned unexpectedly from Scotland on the 18th of August, Hill had just removed the letters from the desk, being afraid that when Birchill broke into the house he might find them accidentally. He was naturally in a state of alarm at Sir Horace's return. He tried to get an opportunity to put the letters back as Sir Horace might discover they had been removed, but Sir Horace dismissed him for the night before he could get such an opportunity. Then he went to Fanning's flat and told Birchill that Sir Horace had returned. Birchill was in favour of postponing the burglary, but Hill, who had possession of the letters, and did not know when he would get an opportunity to put them back, urged Birchill to carry out the burglary. He assured Birchill that Sir Horace was a very sound sleeper and that there would be no risk. In order to arouse Birchill's cupidity and to protect himself from the suspicions of Sir Horace regarding the letters, he told Birchill that he had seen a large sum of money in his possession when he returned, and that this money would probably be hidden in the secret drawer of the desk, until Sir Horace had an opportunity of banking it. He told Birchill to break open the desk, and explained to him how to find the spring of the secret drawer."

"What a damned cunning scoundrel he is," exclaimed Rolfe, in unwilling admiration of the completeness of Hill's scheme. "Don't you think, Mr. Crewe, that, after all, he may be the actual murderer—that he told you a lot of lies just as he did to us? Holymead in his address to the jury made out a pretty strong case against him."

"No one knows better than Holymead that Hill did not commit the murder," said Crewe. "Hill is an incorrigible liar, but he has no nerve for murder."

"Did he put the letters back?" asked Rolfe. "He told me that Mrs. Holymead stole them the day after the murder was discovered. But he is such a liar—"

"I believe he spoke the truth in that case," said Crewe. "He told me he put the letters back in the secret drawer the night after the murder, when he went to Riversbrook to report himself to Chippenfield. He put them back because he was afraid that if the police found them in his possession, they would think he had a hand in the murder. His idea was to remove them from the secret drawer after the excitement about the murder died down, and then blackmail Mrs. Holymead, but she acted with a skill and decision that robbed him of his chance to blackmail her."

"How did you get hold of the cunning scoundrel?" asked Rolfe. "I've had his wife's shop watched day and night, as I've said. I made sure he would try to communicate with her sooner or later, but he didn't."

"It was Joe who found him," said Crewe. "I knew you were watching Mrs. Hill's shop, so it was superfluous for me to set anybody to watch it. Besides, I didn't think Hill would visit his wife or attempt to communicate with her, for he would think that the police, if they wanted him, would be sure to watch the shop. I tried to consider what a man like Hill would do in the circumstances. He had no money—I knew that—and, so far as I was able to ascertain, he had no friends who were likely to hide him. Without friends or money he could not go very far. Finally it occurred to me that he might be hiding somewhere in Riversbrook—either in that unfinished portion of the third floor, or in one of the outbuildings. He knew the run of the rambling old place so well. Have you ever been over it carefully? No. Well, there are several good places in the upper stories where a man might conceal himself. I put Joe on the job, and after watching for several nights Joe got him. Hill had made a hiding place in the loft above the garage. It appears that he subsisted on the stores that had been left in the house; he was able to make his way into the main building through one of the kitchen windows. He was on one of these foraging expeditions when Joe discovered him—emaciated, dirty, and half demented through terror of the gallows."

"So that is how you got him!" said Rolfe. "I never thought of looking for him at Riversbrook. Sometimes I am inclined to agree with you that he had no nerve for murder. But an unpremeditated murder doesn't want much nerve. He might have done it in a moment of passion." Rolfe was endeavouring to take advantage of Crewe's communicative mood and to arrive by a process of elimination at the person against whom Crewe had accumulated his evidence.

"It was not Hill," said Crewe. "The murder was committed in a moment of passion, and yet it was far from being unpremeditated."

"You are trying to mystify me," said Rolfe despairingly.

"No; it is the case itself which has mystified you," replied Crewe.

"It has," was Rolfe's candid confession. "The more thought I give it, the more impossible it seems to see through it. Was Sir Horace killed before dusk—before the lights were turned on? If he was killed after dark, who turned out the lights?"

"He was killed between 10 and 10.30 at night," said Crewe. "The lights were turned out by the woman Birchill saw leaving the house about 10.30. But she was not the murderer, and she was not present in the room, or even in the house, when Sir Horace was shot. She arrived a few minutes too late to prevent the tragedy. Turning out the lights was an instinctive act due to her desire to hide the crime, or rather to hide the murderer."

"How do you know all this?" asked Rolfe, who had been staring at Crewe with open-mouthed astonishment.

"That woman was not Mrs. Holymead," continued Crewe. "I had a visit to-day from the woman who did these things, and as evidence of the truth of her story she brought me the revolver and the handkerchief."

"What did she come to you for?" asked Rolfe, with breathless interest. "What did she want?"

"She came to me to make a full confession," said Crewe, in even tones.

"A confession!" exclaimed Rolfe. "She ought to have come to the police. Why didn't she come to us?"

Crewe smiled at the puzzled, indignant detective.

"I think she came to me because she wanted to mislead me," he said.



CHAPTER XXV

Joe Leaver, worn out after nearly a week's work of watching the movements of Mr. Holymead, had fallen asleep in an empty loft above a garage which overlooked Verney's Hotel in Mayfair. He had seen Mr. Holymead disappear into the hotel, and he knew from the experience gained in his watch that the K.C. would spend the next couple of hours in dressing for dinner, sitting down to that meal, and smoking a cigar in the lounge. So Joe had relaxed, for the time being, the new task which his master had set him, and had flung himself on some straw in the loft to rest. He did not intend to go to sleep, but he was very tired, and in a few minutes he was in a profound slumber.

In his sleep Joe dreamed that he had attained the summit of his ambition, and was being paid a huge salary by an American film company to display himself in emotional dramas for the educational improvement of the British working classes. In his dream he had to rescue the heroine from the clutches of the villains who had carried her off. They had imprisoned her at the top of a "skyscraper" building and locked the lift, but Joe climbed the fire escape and caught the beautiful girl in his arms. The villains, who were on the watch, set fire to the building, and when Joe attempted to climb out of the window with the heroine clinging round his neck, the flames drove him back. As he stood there the wind swept a sheet of flame towards Joe until it scorched his face. The pain was so real that Joe opened his eyes and sprang up with a cry.

A man was standing over him, a man past middle age, short and broad in figure, whose clean-shaven face directed attention to his protruding jaw. He was wearing a blue serge suit which had seen much use.

"You are a sound sleeper, sonny," said the man, grinning at Joe's alarm. "But when you wake—why you wake up properly; I'll say that for you. You nearly broke my pipe, you woke up that sudden."

He made this remark with such a malicious grin that Joe, whose face was still smarting, had no hesitation in connecting his sudden awakening with the hot bowl of the man's pipe. It was a joke Joe had often seen played on drunken men in Islington public-houses in his young days.

"You just leave me alone, will you?" he said, rubbing his cheek ruefully. "It's nothing to do with you whether I'm a sound sleeper or not."

"That's just where you're wrong, young fellow," was the reply. "It's a lot to do with me. Ain't your name Joe Leaver?"

Joe nodded his head.

"How did you find out?" he asked.

"Perhaps a friend of mine pointed you out to me."

"Perhaps he did, and perhaps he didn't," said Joe. "Anyway, what is your name?"

"Mr. Kemp is my name, my boy. And unless you're pretty civil I'll give you cause to remember it."

"What have you got to do with me?" asked the boy in an injured tone. "I've never done nothing to you."

"You mind your P's and Q's and me and you'll get along all right," said Mr. Kemp, in a somewhat softer tone. "When you ask me what I've got to do with you, my answer is I've got a lot to do with you, for I'm your guardian, so to speak."

Joe looked at Mr. Kemp with a gleam of comprehension in his amazement. He had had some experience in his Islington days of the strange phenomena produced by drink.

"Rats!" he retorted rudely. "I've never had a guardian and I don't want none. What made you a guardian, I'd like to know?"

"Your father did," was the reply.

"Oh, him!" said Joe, in a tone which indicated pronounced antipathy to his parent. "Do you know him? Are you one of his sort?"

"Now don't try to be insulting, my boy, or I'll take you across my knee. We won't say nothing about where your father is, because in high society Wormwood Scrubbs isn't mentioned. All we'll say is that he has been unfortunate like many another man before him, and that for the present he can't come and go as he likes. But he has still got a father's heart, Joe, and there are times when he worries about his family and about there being no one with them to keep an eye on them and see they grow up a credit to him. He has been particularly worried about you, Joe. So when I was coming away he asked me to look you up if I had time, and let him know how you was getting on, seeing that none of his family has gone near him for a matter of three years or so, though there is one regular visiting day each week."

"I don't want to see him no more," said Joe. "He's no good."

"That's a nice way for a boy to talk about his own father," said Mr. Kemp, in a reproving tone. "I don't know what the young generation is coming to."

"If you want to send him word about me, you can tell him that I'm not going to be a thief," said Joe defiantly.

"No," said Mr. Kemp tauntingly, "you'd sooner be a nark."

"Yes, I would," said the boy.

"And that's what you are now," declared the man wrathfully. "You're a nark for that fellow Crewe. I know all about you."

"I'm earning an honest living," said Joe.

"As a nark," said Mr. Kemp, with a sneer.

"I'm earning an honest living," said the boy doggedly. So much of his youth had been spent among the criminal classes that he still retained the feeling that there was an indelible stigma attached to those individuals described as narks.

"How can any one earn a respectable honest living by being a nark?" asked Mr. Kemp contemptuously. "And more than that, it's one of the best men that ever breathed that you are a-spying on. I'll have you know that he's a friend of mine. That is to say he's done things for me that I ain't likely to forget. There's nothing I won't do for him, if the chance comes my way. I'll see that no harm happens to him through you and your Mr. Crewe. You've got to stop this here spying. Stop it at once, do you understand? For if you don't, by God, I'll deal with you so that you'll do no more spying in this world! And I'd have you and your master know that I'm a man what means what he says." Mr. Kemp shook his fist angrily at Joe as he moved away to the door of the loft after having delivered his menacing warning. "My last words to you is, Stop it!" he said, as he turned to go down the stairs.

Half an hour later Mr. Kemp entered the lounge of Verney's Hotel as though in quest of some one. Most of the hotel guests had finished their after-dinner coffee and liqueurs, and the hall was comparatively empty, but a few who remained raised their eyes in well-bred protest at the intrusion of a member of the lower orders into the corridor of an exclusive hotel. Mr. Kemp felt somewhat out of place, and he stared about the luxuriously furnished lounge with a look in which awe mingled with admiration. Before he could advance further, a liveried porter of massive proportions came up to him and barred the way.

"Now, now, my man," said the porter haughtily, "what do you think you are doing here? This ain't your place, you know. You've made a mistake. Out you go."

"I want to see Mr. Holymead," said Mr. Kemp in a gruff voice.

Verney's was such a high-class hotel that seedy-looking persons seldom dared to put a foot within the palatial entrance. The porter, unused to dealing with the obtrusive impecunious type to which he believed Mr. Kemp to belong, made the mistake of trying to argue with him.

"Want to see Mr. Holymead?" he repeated. "How do you know he's here? Who told you? What do you want to see him for?"

"What's that got to do with you?" retorted Mr. Kemp. "You don't think Mr. Holymead would like me to discuss his business with the likes of you? That ain't what you're here for. You go and tell Mr. Holymead that some one wants to see him. Tell him Mr. Kemp wants to see him." Mr. Kemp drew himself up and buttoned the coat of his faded serge suit.

The porter, uncertain how to deal with the situation, looked around for help. The manager of the hotel emerged from the booking office at that moment, and the porter's appealing look was seen by him. The manager approached. He was faultlessly attired, suave in demeanour, and walked with a noiseless step, despite his tendency to corpulence. It was his daily task to wrestle with some of the manifold difficulties arising out of the eccentricities of human nature as exhibited by a constant stream of arriving and departing guests. But though he approached the distressed porter with full confidence in his ability to deal with any situation, his eyebrows arched in astonishment as he took in the full details of the intruder's attire.

"What does this mean, Hawkins?" he exclaimed, in a tone of disapproval.

The porter trembled at the implication that he had grievously failed in his duty by allowing such an individual as Mr. Kemp to get so far within the exclusive portals of Verney's, and in his nervousness he relaxed from the polish of the hotel porter to his native cockney.

"This 'ere party says 'e wants to see Mr. Holymead, Sir."

The manager went through the motion of washing a spotlessly clean pair of hands, and then brought the palms together in a gentle clap. He smiled pityingly at Hawkins and then looked condescendingly at Mr. Kemp.

"Wants to see Mr. Holymead, does he?" he said, transferring his glance to the worried porter. "And didn't you tell him that Mr. Holymead has gone to the theatre and won't be back for some considerable time?"

"That's a lie!" said Mr. Kemp, who had acquired none of the art of dealing with his fellow men, and was too uneducated to appreciate art in any form. "I've been watching over the other side of the street, and I saw him passing a window not ten minutes ago. I'm going to see him if I wait here all night. I'll soon make meself comfortable on one of them big chairs." He pointed to an empty chair beside a man in evening dress, who was holding a conversation with a haughty looking matron. "You tell Mr. Holymead Mr. Kemp wants to see him," he said to the manager.

"What name did you say?" asked the manager in a tone which seemed to express astonishment that the lower orders had names.

"Mr. Kemp. You tell him Mr. Kemp wants to see him on important business." He walked towards the vacant chair and seated himself on it. He dug his toes into the velvet pile carpet with the air of a man who was trying to take anchor. Fortunately the man on the adjoining chair, and the haughty matron, were so engrossed in their conversation that they did not notice that the air in their immediate vicinity was being polluted by the presence of a man in shabby clothes and heavy boots.

The manager despatched the porter in search of Mr. Holymead and then went in pursuit of Mr. Kemp.

"Will you come this way, if you please, Mr. Kemp?" he said, with a low bow.

He saw that Mr. Kemp was following him and led the way into an unfrequented corner of the smoking room, where, with the information that Mr. Holymead would come to him in a few moments, he asked Mr. Kemp to be seated.

The manager withdrew a few yards, and then took up a position which enabled him to guard the hotel guests from having their digestions interfered with by the contaminating spectacle of a seedy man. To the manager's great relief, Mr. Holymead appeared, having been informed by the hall porter that a party who said his name was Kemp had asked to see him. The manager hurried towards Mr. Holymead and endeavoured to explain and apologise, but the K.C. assured him that there was nothing to apologise for. He went over to the corner of the smoking room, where the visitor who had caused so much perturbation was waiting for him.

"Well, Kemp, what do you want?" There was nothing in his manner to indicate that he was put out by Mr. Kemp's appearance. He spoke in quiet even tones such as would seem to suggest that he was well acquainted with his visitor.

"Can I speak to you on the quiet for a moment, sir?" whispered Kemp hoarsely.

Holymead looked round the room. The manager had gone back to the booking office and Hawkins had vanished. The few people who were in the room seemed occupied with their own affairs.

"No one will overhear us if we speak quietly," he said as he took a seat close to Kemp. "What is it?"

"You're watched and followed, sir," said Kemp in a whisper. "Somebody has been watching this place for days past and whenever you go out you're followed."

"By whom?" asked Holymead.

"By a varmint of a boy—a slippery young imp whose father's in gaol for a long stretch. I got hold of him this afternoon and told him what I'd do to him if he kept on with his game. He's living in an old loft at the back of the hotel garage, and he keeps a watch on you day and night. I thought I'd better come here and tell you, as you mightn't know about him."

"You did quite right, Kemp. What's this boy like?"

"An undersized putty-faced brat with a big head. He's about fourteen or fifteen, I should say."

"Who is he? Do you know him?"

"Leaver is the name, sir. To tell you the truth, I don't know him as well as I know his father. His father is a 'lifer' for manslaughter. I've known him both in and out of gaol. And when I was coming out four months ago Bob Leaver, this here boy's father, asked me to look up his family and send him word about them. I went to the address Bob told me, in Islington, but I found they had all gone. The mother was dead and the kids—a girl and this here boy—had cleared out. The old Jew who had the second-hand clothes shop Mrs. Leaver used to keep told me that the boy had gone off with that private detective, Crewe, more than two years ago. So it looks to me as if he has turned nark and Crewe has put him on to watch you."

"Can you describe this boy more closely?"

"Well, sir, I don't know if I can say anything more about him except that he has red hair and big bright eyes that are too large for his face."

"I thought so," said Holymead as if speaking to himself. "It's the same boy."

"What did you say, sir?" asked Kemp.

"Nothing, Kemp, except that I think I've seen a boy of this description hanging about the street near the hotel."

Holymead rose to his feet as he spoke, as an indication that the interview was at an end. Kemp got up and looked at him anxiously.

"I beg your pardon, sir, for coming here," he said, fumbling with the rim of his hat as he spoke. "I didn't know how you'd take it, but I hope I've done right. They didn't want to let me see you."

"You did quite right, Kemp. I am very much obliged to you." He was feeling in his pocket for silver, but Kemp stopped him.

"No, no, sir. I don't want to be paid anything. I wanted to oblige you like; I wanted to do you a good turn. I'd do anything for you, sir—you know I would."

"I believe you would, Kemp. Good night."

"Good night, sir."

As Kemp passed down the hall he met the manager, who was obviously pleased to see such an unwelcome visitor making his departure. Kemp scowled at the manager as if he were a valued patron of the hotel and said, "It seems to me that you don't know how to treat people properly when they come here."



CHAPTER XXVI

It was the first occasion on which Mrs. Holymead had visited her husband's chambers in the Middle Temple. Mr. Mattingford, who had been Mr. Holymead's clerk for nearly twenty years, seemed to realise that the visit was important, though as a married man he knew that a meeting between husband and wife in town was usually so commonplace as to verge on boredom for the husband. There were occasions when he had to meet Mrs. Mattingford, but these meetings were generally for the purpose of handing over to the lady her weekly dress allowance of ten shillings out of his salary, so that she might attend the sales at the big drapery shops in the West End and inspect the windows containing expensive articles that she could not hope to buy. Mr. Mattingford was an exceedingly thrifty man, and his wife possessed some of the qualities of a spendthrift. Thus it came about that Mr. Mattingford kept up the fiction that he had no savings and that each week's salary must see him through till the next week. Mrs. Mattingford knew that her husband had saved money, and theoretically she would have given a great deal to know how much. She repeatedly accused him of being a miser, but this is a wifely denunciation which in all classes of life is lightly made when the purchase of feminine finery is under discussion. There are some men who resent it, but Mr. Mattingford was not one of these. Protests and prayers, abuse and cajolery, were alike powerless to win his consent to his wife's perpetual proposal that she should be allowed to draw her dress allowance for some months, or even some weeks ahead. Mr. Mattingford had a horror of bad debts. He endeavoured to show his wife that the transaction she proposed was unsound from a business point of view and reckless from a legal point of view. She had no security to offer for the repayment of the advance—even if he were in a financial position to make the advance—and he stoutly declared that he was not. She might die at any moment, and then he would be left with no means of redress against her estate because she had no estate. Of course, if she first insured her life out of her dress allowance and handed the policy to him it would constitute protection for the repayment of the advance, in the event of her death, but it was not any real protection in the event of her continuing to live, for a newly-executed policy had no surrender value. As his own legal adviser, Mr. Mattingford strongly urged himself not to consider his wife's proposal, and such was his respect for the law and for those who had been brought up in a legal atmosphere that he had no hesitation in accepting the advice.

He was a little man of nearly fifty years, with a very bald head and an extremely long moustache, which when waxed at the ends made him look as fierce as a clipped poodle. He knew Mrs. Holymead from his having called frequently at his chief's house in Princes Gate on business matters, and he admired her for her good looks, but still more for her good taste in staying away from her husband's chambers. There were some ladies, the wives of barristers, who almost haunted their husbands' chambers—a practice of which Mr. Mattingford strongly disapproved. It seemed to him an insidious attempt on the part of an insidious sex to force the legal profession to throw open its doors to women. As a man who lived in the mouldy atmosphere of precedent, Mr. Mattingford hated the idea of change, and to him the thought of a lady in wig and gown pleading in the law courts indicated not merely change but a revolution which might well usher in the end of the world. So strict was he in keeping the precincts of the law sacred from the violating tread of women that he never allowed his wife to set foot in the Middle Temple. Their meetings on those urgent occasions when Mrs. Mattingford came to town for her dress allowance in order to go bargain-hunting took place at one of the cheap tearooms in Fleet Street.