'Oh, no. That's just it. It makes a contradiction. It don't explain, for instance,' argued H.M., inspecting his fingers, 'why you were so weepily anxious a moment before that to return and take your punishment…. But let's pass that over. You seem to know an awful lot about this whole case, my lad, that I don't see how you could have learned unless — '
'Unless?' the other prompted, with a pale smile. 'Is this the old bluff? It won't go down, you know.'
'I mean, you were twittin' me with all kinds o' suave digs, just a minute ago, for mismanaging my part of the business to-night.'
'You mean,' said Serpos satirically, 'the sending of a dread Secret-Service agent to Hogenauer's at Moreton Abbot, the quest of the Compleat Burglar, and all that —? My good friend: I heard the whole conversation. I was at Charters's, you know. You could not see me, and I could not see ycu, but I heard you giving instructions to someone you addressed as Blake…'
'Sure, sure. I understand that. But how'd you know it was mismanagement? How'd you know there wasn't some political hanky-panky goin' on, with Hogenauer mixed up in it?'
Serpos's mouth was twisted ironically.
'You underrate me, I think. I suspected a long time ago that Hogenauer, poor Hogenauer, with all this talk of `flying in the air,' was merely engaged in some sort of hypnotic experiments. When I heard about his murder to- night, from an over-talkative policeman who brought me from Moreton Abbot-' Serpos's eyes were feverish with a kind of real inspiration. I believe the whisky was clearing off. 'The lights. The cuff-links. The visit from Dr. Keppel-'
'That's all I wanted to know,' said H.M.
There was such a heavy, dreary, bitter note in his voice, that it seemed to change the atmosphere of the room. It was like a door shut or a conclusion reached.
'That's torn it,' explained H.M., with his head in his hands.
Serpos's voice went up a note or two. 'It's very ingenious of you,' he said with thinning sarcasm, 'but you don't believe you can drag me into, this murder, do you?'
'Well… now. You don't deny you know Hogenauer?' 'I had met him in this house, very briefly. I didn't know …’
H.M. peered up. 'Ever visit his house, son?'
'Never.'
'So,' pursued H.M., 'when you stole the money and cut for it, you merely spent a couple of hours puttin' on your disguise somewhere, and layin' a false trail, and ditchin' the car before you took the train at Moreton Abbot?'
'That is correct.'
'But, before you pinched the money out of Charters's safe, didn't you examine it at all on the off-chance that it might be counterfeit? Didn't that ever occur to you?'
Again Serpos shrugged his shoulders. 'I examined it, yes,' he admitted. 'But it looked quite genuine to me. I know nothing about such matters.'
'And so,' pursued H.M., tapping his pencil softly in measured beats on the top of the skull, 'a moderately good fraud would deceive you, hey?'
'Obviously.'
'In fact, you're as innocent as a babe unborn about all the higher jugglery of bogus money and the tricks of forgers?'
'Quite so.'
H.M. tapped the pencil with soft beats against the skull, and then put it down.
'You're a damned liar, son,' he said harshly. 'One of the first things we learned about you was that, before you came to this job, you worked in a bank.'
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The Murderer
'Would you like to know who the murderer really is?' asked H.M., looking round our group with calm ferocity.
The wind was blowing the curtains at the French window, and a whirl of rain spattered in; but none of us noticed it. Whether or not he was guilty, I will admit that Serpos never lost his nerve. His long-chinned, blue- chinned face was turned a little sideways: he looked like a parody of himself: but his voice did not raise or waver.
'So I worked in a bank,' he said. 'And that proves I know good money from bad. That proves I know it inevitably, by smell or sixth sense, even when the forger is so expert as Willoughby. My good friend, I can drive a car. But I cannot take it to pieces and put it back together again. You, my friend, are the head of an Intelligence Department. But this does not of itself presuppose intelligence, as I think has been demonstrated. By the way, is this an accusation?'
H.M. pointed his pencil.
'Oh, that depends. You say you never visited Hogenauer's house. Then how does it happen that a ?100 counterfeit note, which never left Willoughby's big bundle until you scooped the lot, was found in Hogenauer's house to-night?'
Serpos opened his mouth, and shut it again. He looked like a man under a net. 'It is the first I had heard of it,' he replied. 'That is, if it is true; which I am inclined to doubt.'
'Ever meet Dr. Albert Keppel?'
'Never. I've heard of him. I never met him.'
'Then how did it happen that you telephoned to his hotel at one-thirty tonight, and said you were L., and asked whether the party at the other end of the wire — a police inspector — would like to know the truth about the money?'
Very slowly Serpos glanced round the group. His thin chest did not seem so much to heave as to shake. But not a person in our group moved: Stone, in his white suit, was leaning forward, holding to the edge of the desk; Evelyn had her eyes half closed, but she was not leaning forward; and H.M. remained solid as ever.
'He wouldn't dare,' said Serpos, abruptly and cryptically. His breath seemed to hurt him. 'I do not understand how it is, but you have me answering your questions whether I like or not. This is absurd. I made no telephone call. Who says I did?'
'Dr. Antrim says you did.' 'Then I deny it.'
'Well, let's just test out somethin',' growled H.M. He reached across and picked up the telephone on the desk. 'I'm goin' to make a call, or try to. It won't matter much who I ring up, but for the sake of argument let's try the Cabot Hotel at Bristol. Anybody know the number? Never mind. The Exchange will get it if I give the name. Humph. Exchange!'
Jiggling the hook, he bellowed into the mouthpiece after his usual fashion. Usually there is some inner activity about a telephone, like an uneasy stomach. There was none this time.
'Exchange!' howled H.M., letting off steam at something inoffensive. Only the rain answered him. He sat back with an expression which might have been satisfaction. 'Uh-huh,' he said in a colourless voice. 'Have a go at it if you like. But I think you'll find out that the wires have been cut. Very neat. Sergeant, you might hop outside and see.'
Into Evelyn's face had come a look as though she saw a theory rent in pieces.
'Then,' she said, 'then, after all, Antrim couldn't have heard him telephoning-?'
'You've all been very curious about these sheets and what's written on 'em,' said H.M., picking up the prescriptionblanks from the desk. 'It's now time to see what you all think about who's guilty. Right. Here!' He turned to Stone. 'You got the oratorical manner. You read 'em out one by one. Read mine last, as respect due to the old man; but read your own next to last. I think Mr. Serpos is goin' to find it very interesting.'
Sergeant Davis had left the door partly open when he went out, and there was a draught between door and window: which may have made the light slips flutter in Stone's hands. Stone adjusted his pince-nez more
