"Come in," said the Saint's gentlest voice. "Come in and help me finish my story."
Irelock came in because he had to. With the Saint's iron grip on his arm, he had no option. He was in his pyjamas and a thick camel-hair dressing-gown, and his unnaturally old doll-like face was even greyer than it had been when he had swallowed his recent glassful of whisky and nitroglycerine. Simon closed the door again and stayed with his back to it.
"What's the matter?" demanded Irelock, in a strangely weak voice. "I heard somebody arrive"
"Lots of people have been arriving, dear old fruit," said the Saint heartily. "In fact, the whole cast is more or less assembled. We were only waiting for you to complete the party. And now I want you to tell all these nice kind policemen how you set out to get hold of Ripwell's millions."
"I don't know what you're talking about," said Irelock throatily.
"No?" The Saint's voice returned to gentleness. "Well, you've got a lot of good precedents for that remark. I think nearly all the best murderers have said it. But this time we know too many of the answers. In fact, I think I could almost finish the job without any help from you. We all know how, when you first got the idea of making yourself rich, you tried Ripwell on blackmail-through Ellshaw here. And we were just starting to reconstruct your next move. We've seen how you must have figured out that if you couldn't get anything out of Ripwell, it'd be a damned sight easier to get it out of his son. We've got a good idea of how you set about it. Using Ellshaw again, you must have engineered Kenneth into a gamble with him. You knew Kenneth's weaknesses. You fed him plenty of drink at the same time. Ellshaw is such a damn bad cardsharper that people see through him even when they are tight, as Teal told me. Kenneth saw through him. There was a quarrel, then a fight. Ellshaw got laid out-as you'd planned. And then you sobered Kenneth up and told him Ellshaw was dead. You said you'd find a way to get rid of the body and cover up the evidence, and later you told him you'd done it. And from that moment he was in your power to do what you liked with-while you were making him believe, all the time, that you were his best friend. All you had to do was to hide your partner-Ellshaw-away, while you got rid of Ripwell; and then, after Kenneth had inherited the money, everything was set for you to start putting on the screw."
"That's right, guv'nor," Ellshaw broke in savagely. "That's wot 'e told me. An' I shammed dead, an' everythink. And then the dirty double-crossin' swine------"
"The man's raving," said Irelock unsteadily.
"Nuts," said the Saint crisply. "You're through, and you know it. Kenneth's here to tell the world how you kidded him you were saving him from the gallows. Ellshaw's here to tell us that that's the plot as you put it up to him. And Ellshaw's here as well to tell us how you double-crossed him by killing his wife!"
Ellshaw was coming up out of his chair with a red flame in his eyes. His fingers were curled and rigid like claws.
"Yes, that's wot you did," he snarled. "You told me she wouldn't come to no 'arm-you swore you was only goin' to 'ide 'er away somewhere. And you killed 'er! You murdered my wife! You told me a lot of lies. You knew I wouldn't 've let yer do it if I'd known. And you were goin' to keep me workin' in with you, 'elpin' yer to mike money an' playin' all yer dirty games, when all the time you'd got Florrie's blood on yer 'ands. My Gawd, if 'anging isn't too good for yer---------"
His voice went into a sort of shriek. Oldwood, who was nearest, wrapped powerful arms round him and held him back.
"That's the swine as did it!" screamed Ellshaw. " 'E told me wot 'e was up to, 'ow 'e was goin' to kill Lord Ripwell an' then put the black on 'is son fer 'aving killed me in a fight. I know all about it! An' I can tell yer 'ow 'e meant to kill Mr. Templar in Duchess Plyce "
"Take it easy," said Oldwood, struggling with him.
Teal thrust himself forward at last, a massive figure of belated officialdom coming into its egregious own. He looked at Nulland.
"Is that true?"
The young man swallowed.
"Yes," he said in a low voice. "At least, the part about me is."
"You ran away tonight because you thought we were after you?"
The other nodded without speaking; and Teal turned back to Irelock.
"Have you got any answer to make?"
Irelock stood silent, looking from face to face. His mouth tightened, making his Kewpie face seem even more grotesquely grown up, but he did not open it to reply. The detective waited; then he shrugged.
"Very well. I shall have to take you into custody, of course. I have to warn you that anything you say may be taken down and used in evidence against you."
For the first time since he had come into the room, Ire-lock met his eyes. He even smiled slightly.
"That's hardly necessary, Inspector," he said. "You seem to have plenty of evidence already. I think I can flatter myself that it took a clever man to catch me." His gaze wandered significantly over to the Saint. "When did you first -suspect me?"
"When you saw a face at the window," Simon told him, "and the party broke up at a very psychological moment. I hadn't anything definite even then; but I began to wonder."
Irelock nodded.
"That was bad luck, of course," he said matter-of-factly. "But I had to do something to stop Kenneth finding out that Ellshaw had been seen alive. Then, after I'd started a scare, I thought I might as well go on with it. If I'd been lucky, I might have got you and Ripwell in the garden-as it was, you nearly got me." He touched his forearm, where the bullet had grazed him. "But it made my story more circumstantial. It was only afterwards that I realised that Kenneth might be suspected, and I had to try and manufacture some evidence in his favour."
"Why did you drink your own poison?"
"Partly because Teal wouldn't drink, and by that time I knew I'd got to get rid of both of you together. Partly because you'd just been saying things which showed me that you were fairly hot on my trail-I didn't know what you might have said to Teal already. It was the only time I lost my nerve. I tried to turn the idea into a way of throwing you off the scent again."
"Do you realise the meaning of all you're saying?" asked Teal grimly.
Irelock sighed.
"Oh, yes. Quite well. But there doesn't seem to be much point in giving you any more trouble. After all, you've got other witnesses. You ought not to have Ellshaw; but that's another piece of bad luck. I told him that if he saw a red light in my window he was to keep away, but apparently he didn't keep away far enough."
"One more question," said the Saint. "Why didn't you kill me in Duchess Place?"
"Because I hadn't got a gun," answered Irelock simply. "I never set out to go in for that sort of crime-not till it was thrust on me. I notice that murderers in books always have guns, but they aren't really easy for the amateur to get hold of. I should have got rid of you like I got rid of Mrs. Ellshaw -knocked you out and sunk you in the river while you were unconscious. It was only when things began to happen down here that I got hold of Ripwell's old revolver. And of course he did have some ammunition; but he'd forgotten it."
"Have you still got this gun?" Teal asked quickly.
Irelock's lips moved in a wan smile, and he put his right hand into the breast of his dressing-gown. Three of them at least caught the sudden cunning shift of his eyes, and realised too late what was coming-it was queer, Simon reflected afterwards, how completely they had been taken in by his implied surrender, when every one of them should have known that the murderers who make a full and calm confession at the moment when they are unmasked are as rare as fresh pineapples in Lapland.
What Ellshaw knew, or what he guessed, none of them ever discovered. It is only on record that he was the first of them to move, the only one to get up and go straight for Ire-lock. Twice the room rocked to the crash of the heavy gun, and Ellshaw staggered at the impact of each shot; but he held on his course. He must have been dead on his feet; but in some uncanny way he caught Irelock at the door and fell on his arm dragging the revolver down so that it could only aim at the floor. It took two men to unlock the clutch of his fingers on Irelock's wrist; and the bruises of that dying grip were still stamped on the other's flesh a fortnight later, when he stepped down from the dock to wait for the answer to the greatest mystery of all.