“Who knew better than Yale the name of the murderer and how the murder was committed? You remember that he was able to reconstruct the crime by feeling the weapon with which it was committed. And, in consequence, a black man was arrested, in exactly the spot where Derrick Yale said he would be. Naturally when these facts were disclosed Yale’s reputation rose sky-high. It was the very situation that he expected. He knew now that a man threatened by the Crimson Circle would be inclined to call in his assistance, and that is just what happened.
“By being near his victims and gaining their confidence—for Yale was a most convincing type of man—he was able to urge them to pay the demands of the Crimson Circle, and if they refused he was on hand to encompass their death.
“Froyant might not have died, and certainly would not have died at Yale’s hands, but for the fact that, annoyed by losing so much money, he made inquiries himself. Starting on a hypothesis which was based upon the faintest suspicion, he worked up the case against Derrick Yale, and was able to identify Lightman and Derrick Yale as one and the same person. On the night of his death he sent for us, intending to make this disclosure, and as a proof that he was in some fear he had two loaded revolvers by his hand, and it is well known that Froyant disliked intensely the employment of firearms.
“And you will remember, if you have read the official minutes of the case, the Commissioner rang up Froyant in response to a call which Harvey Froyant had put through. That call gave Yale his opportunity. It was an excuse for Froyant sending us out of the room. I went first, never dreaming that he would dare do what he did. When we went into the room we wore our overcoats, and I particularly noticed that Derrick Yale kept his hand in his pocket. On the hand, gentlemen,” he said impressively, “was a motor-driver’s gauntlet, and in that hand was the knife that slew Froyant.”
“But why did he wear the glove?” asked the Prime Minister.
“In order that his hand, which I should see immediately afterwards, should not be bloodstained. The moment my back was turned, he lunged straight at Froyant’s heart, and Froyant must have died instantly. He slipped off the glove and left it on the table, walked to the door, and seemed to be carrying on a conversation with a man who was already dead.
“I knew this had happened, but I had no proof. He had brought my daughter there, intending to get her into the house, which we immediately searched, with the intention of accusing her of the crime. But she very wisely went no farther than to the back of the house and then, suspecting his plot, went home. But I am anticipating. Amongst the people whom we had to guard was James Beardmore, and James Beardmore was a land speculator, a man who knew all kinds of people, good and bad. That day he was expecting a visit from Marl, whom he had never seen, and he mentioned Marl’s name earlier in the day to his son, but not to Derrick Yale. As Marl came toward the house the last person in the world he expected to see was his fellow criminal of Toulouse Gaol, a man whom he had betrayed to his death.
“Derrick Yale must have been standing at the end of the shrubbery, and Marl caught a momentary glimpse of him and went back to the village, ostensibly to London, in a panic of fright, determined, in his fear, that he would kill Lightman before Lightman killed him. His courage must have oozed. He was not a particularly brave man, and instead he wrote a letter to Yale, pushing it under his window—a letter which Yale read and partially burnt. What the letter was I cannot tell you, except it was probably a statement that if he, Marl, was left alone, he would leave Yale alone. He could not have known in what capacity Mr. Derrick Yale was posing. The words ‘Block B’ undoubtedly referred to the Block at Toulouse Prison.
“From that moment Marl was a doomed man. He was conducting a little blackmail of his own with Brabazon, an agent of the Crimson Circle, and Brabazon must have intimated the danger to Yale who, in his capacity as detective, visited the shop to which all the Crimson Circle letters were addressed, and on the pretext of aiding justice opened them of course and saw their contents, without having the responsibility of being the person to whom they were addressed.
“It was Brabazon’s intention to bolt on the day following Marl’s murder, and with that object he had cleared out the whole of Marl’s balance and had made preparations for flight. On Marl’s death suspicion naturally fell upon him and, intimated by the Crimson Circle that he was in danger, he hurried off to the riverside house which we searched.”
Detective-Inspector Parr chuckled.
“When I say ‘we searched it,’ I mean Yale searched it. In other words, he went into the room where he knew Brabazon was, and came down reporting that all was clear.”
“There is one point I’d like you to clear up—the chloroforming of Yale in his office,” said the Prime Minister.
“That was clever, and deceived me for a moment. Yale handcuffed, strapped and chloroformed himself after he had put the money in
