If he did, he would not carry it constantly about with him. It was therefore my idea that the murderer had received the idol from a friend on the day of the crime. That friend, to possess such an idol, must have been in communication with New Zealand. The chain of thought is somewhat complicated, but it began with curiosity about the idol, and ended in my looking up the list of steamers going to the Antipodes. Then I carried out a little design which need not be mentioned at this moment. In due time it will fit in with the hanging of Mrs Vincent’s assassin. Meanwhile, I followed up the clue of the banknotes, and left the green-stone idol to evolve its own destiny. Thus I had two strings to my bow.
The crime was committed on the twentieth of June, and on the twenty-third two fifty-pound notes, with numbers corresponding to those stolen, were paid into the Bank of England. I was astonished at the little care exercised by the criminal in concealing his crime, but still more so when I learned that the money had been banked by a very respectable solicitor. Furnished with the address, I called on this gentleman. Mr Maudsley received me politely, and he had no hesitation in telling me how the notes had come into his possession. I did not state my primary reason for the inquiry.
‘I hope there is no trouble about these notes,’ said he when I explained my errand. ‘I have had sufficient already.’
‘Indeed, Mr Maudsley, and in what way?’
For answer he touched the bell, and when it was answered, ‘Ask Mr Ford to step this way,’ he said. Then turning to me, ‘I must reveal what I had hoped to keep secret, but I trust the revelation will remain with yourself.’
‘That is as I may decide after hearing it. I am a detective, Mr Maudsley, and you may be sure, I do not make these inquiries out of idle curiosity.’
Before he could reply, a slender, weak-looking young man, nervously excited, entered the room. This was Mr Ford, and he looked from me to Maudsley with some apprehension.
‘This gentleman,’ said his employer, not unkindly, ‘comes from Scotland Yard about the money you paid me two days ago.’
‘It is all right, I hope?’ stammered Ford, turning red and pale and red again.
‘Where did you get the money?’ I asked, parrying this question.
‘From my sister.’
I started when I heard this answer, and with good reason. My inquiries about Roy had revealed that he was in love with a hospital nurse whose name was Clara Ford. Without doubt she had obtained the notes from Roy after he had stolen them from Ulster Lodge. But why the necessity of the robbery?
‘Why did you get a hundred pounds from your sister?’ I asked Ford.
He did not answer, but looked appealingly at Maudsley. That gentleman interposed.
‘We must make a clean breast of it, Ford,’ he said with a sigh. ‘If you have committed a second crime to conceal the first, I cannot help you. This time matters are not at my discretion.’
‘I have committed no crime,’ said Ford desperately, turning to me. ‘Sir, I may as well admit that I embezzled one hundred pounds from Mr Maudsley to pay a gambling debt. He kindly and most generously consented to overlook the delinquency if I replaced the money. Not having it myself I asked my sister. She, a poor hospital nurse, had not the amount. Yet, as non-payment meant ruin to me, she asked a Mr Julian Roy to help her. He at once agreed to do so, and gave her two fifty-pound notes. She handed them to me, and I gave them to Mr Maudsley who paid them into the bank.’
This, then, was the reason of Roy ’s remark. He did not refer to his own ruin, but to that of Ford. To save this unhappy man, and for love of the sister, he had committed the crime. I did not need to see Clara Ford, but at once made up my mind to arrest Roy. The case was perfectly clear, and I was fully justified in taking this course. Meanwhile I made Maudsley and his clerk promise silence, as I did not wish Roy to be put on his guard by Miss Ford, through her brother.
‘Gentlemen,’ I said, after a few moments’ pause, ‘I cannot at present explain my reasons for asking these questions, as it would take too long and I have no time to lose. Keep silent about this interview till tomorrow, and by that time you shall know all.’
‘Has Ford got into fresh trouble?’ asked Maudsley anxiously.
‘No, but some one else has.’
‘My sister,’ began Ford faintly, when I interrupted him at once.
‘Your sister is all right, Mr Ford. Pray trust in my discretion. No harm shall come to her or to you, if I can help it – but, above all, be silent.’
This they readily promised, and I returned to Scotland Yard, quite satisfied that Roy would get no warning. The evidence was so clear that I could not doubt the guilt of Roy. Else how had he come in possession of the notes? Already there was sufficient proof to hang him, yet I hoped to clinch the certainty by proving his ownership of the green-stone idol. It did not belong to Vincent, or to his dead wife, yet some one must have brought it into the study. Why not Roy, who, to all appearances, had committed the crime, the more so as the image was splashed with the victim’s blood? There was no difficulty in obtaining a warrant, and with this I went off to Gower Street.
Roy loudly protested his innocence. He denied all knowledge of the crime and of the idol. I expected the denial, but I was astonished at the defence he put forth. It was very ingenious, but so manifestly absurd that it did not shake my belief in his guilt. I let him talk himself out – which perhaps was wrong – but he would not be silent, and then I took him off in a cab.
‘I swear I did not commit the crime,’ he said passionately. ‘No one was more astonished than I at the news of Mrs Vincent’s death.’
‘Yet you were at Ulster Lodge on the night in question?’
‘I admit it,’ he replied frankly. ‘Were I guilty I would not do so. But I was there at the request of Vincent.’
‘I must remind you that all you say now will be used in evidence against you.’
‘I don’t care! I must defend myself. I asked Vincent for a hundred pounds, and -’
‘Of course you did, to give to Miss Ford.’
‘How do you know that?’ he asked sharply.
‘From her brother, through Maudsley. He paid the notes supplied by you into the bank. If you wanted to conceal your crime you should not have been so reckless.
‘I have committed no crime,’ retorted Roy fiercely.
‘I obtained the money from Vincent, at the request of Miss Ford, to save her brother from being convicted for embezzlement.’
‘Vincent denies that he gave you the money!’
‘Then he lies. I asked him at the Chestnut Club for one hundred pounds. He had not that much on him, but said that two hundred were in his desk at home. As it was imperative that I should have the money on the night, I asked him to let me go down for it.’
‘And he refused!’
‘He did not. He consented, and gave me a note to Mrs Vincent, instructing her to hand me over a hundred pounds. I went to Brixton, got the money in two fifties, and gave them to Miss Ford. When I left Ulster Lodge, between eight and nine, Mrs Vincent was in perfect health, and quite happy.’
‘An ingenious defence,’ said I doubtfully, ‘but Vincent absolutely denies that he gave you the money.’
Roy stared hard at me to see if I were joking. Evidently the attitude of Vincent puzzled him greatly.
‘That is ridiculous,’ said he quietly. ‘He wrote a note to his wife instructing her to hand me the money.’
‘Where is that note?’
‘I gave it to Mrs Vincent.’
‘It cannot be found,’ I answered. ‘If such a note were in her possession it would now be in mine.’
‘Don’t you believe me?’
‘How can I against the evidence of those notes and the denial of Vincent?’
‘But he surely does not deny that he gave me the money?’
‘He does.’
‘He must be mad,’ said Roy in dismay. ‘One of my best friends, and to tell so great a falsehood. Why, if -’
‘You had better be silent,’ I said, weary of this foolish talk. ‘If what you say is true, Vincent will exonerate you from complicity in the crime. If things occurred as you say, there is no sense in his denial.’
