CHAPTER

IN THE CHIEF DETECTIVE INSPECTOR'S ROOM at New Scotland Yard, Garfield perched himself on a high stool and fiddled with a thick batch of documents. Silverdale rolled himself a cigarette and found himself a chair.

      "I think two of the men who have been disillusioned in this affair," said Garfield, "have been Velvet Fred and Knuckleduster. They banked blindly on Eston, who has a certain quality of leadership, and they were staggered when they found he had lost the game. Fred is an adroit and dangerous rogue to a point, but he is easily influenced in certain ways. He was scared stiff after we had had that talk with him at St. Ronan's Place—and yet he was back playing the game with Eston about as soon as he left us. Now it was clear that, after what he told us he would not go back to Eston willingly. The bigger man had him completely terrorized and he must have grabbed him almost as soon as we let him go.

      "Velvet has more brains than Jim, but he is the weaker of the two men, so I tackled him first. He was quaking like a jelly when I entered his cell and I knew he would say anything I wanted. I was afraid he might be too much inclined to say what he thought I wanted rather than the truth. Prisoners who have got wound up are that way sometimes.

      "'I don't want any lies from you,' I told him. 'You may be charged as an accessory to murder, or you may not. If you can answer my questions frankly, we'll decide what to do about you.'

      "He was in a pitiable condition. 'I couldn't help it,' he whined. 'It was Eston.'

      "'Yes,' I said. 'You went to Eston after you left us and gave the whole show away so far as you were able. He might never have guessed we associated him with the business if it hadn't been for that. Why did you do it?'

      Then, at last, it began to come out. The poor devil was bound to Eston by two ties. In the first place he sincerely believed that Eston would do him in some way unless he made some amends for having told us something. In the second place, Eston was a good paymaster and had promised Velvet that if the big scheme he had in hand came off, Velvet Fred would be well in it to the extent of £50,000."

      Jimmie Silverdale knocked the ash off his cigarette. "Did Velvet believe that?" he asked.

      "Well, mutual trust has not, in my experience, always been a distinguishing characteristic of thieves. Still, from Velvet Fred's point, there was a possibility to make his mouth water. If he stood out, there was the certainty of Eston's vengeance. I don't think myself that Eston would have killed him. What I imagine would have happened would be that we —the police—would get an anonymous tip and Velvet would have somehow been found in very compromising circumstances. These things have occurred. Anyway, whatever the reason, Fred was for Eston. He was not on the inside —Eston was not showing his hand to any accomplice if he could help it. Velvet had to do what he was told and to make guesses.

      "Nor was Knuckleduster Jim anything but an instrument. He is a different type from Velvet. He has less brains but is more of a tough. He is dogged as a bulldog and not at all averse from violence. I got him talking when I told him Eston had fallen into our trap, and he has since made a voluntary statement. I was able to convince him that I knew a great deal by using what Velvet had told me, or guessed at.

      "Between the two of them, the story becomes more or less straightforward, added to what we already know. Eston had been planning his scheme for months. Whether Nora Dring was part of the original plot or not, one cannot be certain. Eston would naturally take measures to get into association with Hilary Sloane, and had probably schemed to do it through some mutual friend. When he discovered that Miss Dring was an old acquaintance, it simplified matters from his point of view. He was able the more completely to influence her.

      "Now as I have said, Knuckleduster was not the sort of man to shrink from the part for which Eston had cast him. Mind you, I think he would, at that time, have hesitated at murder. On the other hand, Nora Dring could not be trusted to effectively dispose of an ablebodied man like Harold Saxon if he was at liberty to defend himself.

      "So, first of all, Eston has the flat burgled by Velve-t-for papers, mark you. Obviously he wanted a marriage certificate. Then he lured away the housekeeper with a bogus message and let Knuckleduster loose with instructions that he was to tie up Saxon and leave him. He gave Jim to understand at that time that it was a question of blackmail and that in case things went wrong, he wished to have Saxon helpless after an interview he proposed to have with the aëroplane manufacturer.

      "As a matter of fact, of course he never intended to go near the flat. He got in touch with the Dring woman and the affair came off as he had planned. Once the murder was committed, neither Knuckleduster nor Velvet could fail to appreciate that Eston had been playing an even deeper game than they had realized. But by that time they were involved—particularly Jim. Eston explained to him that the murder was sheer coincidence, but Knuckleduster knew exactly how much value to put upon that.

      "I don't suppose Knuckleduster had any qualms of conscience but he recognized that, if ever the worst came to the worst, his story of innocent complicity in the murder was liable to be disbelieved. He was not altogether reluctant to throw his hand in with Eston.

      "That, Jimmie, is in effect, where we stand at this moment with the case. There are a few minor people round the edges who helped Eston in various ways, but they will not matter to any great extent."

      The telephone bell jangled and Garfield slid off the high stool to answer it. "Hello! Hello! . . . Yes, this is Garfield. . . . Yes! Ah, thank you." He put down the receiver and turned towards Silverdale.

      "Miss Nora Dring died in hospital half an hour ago."

      Jimmie nodded solemnly. "I'll not say I'm sorry. For her it is perhaps the best thing that could have happened."

      "It is the end of an episode," agreed Garfield.