“They didn’t trust Foss to play straight, sir. Brackley was quite open about that.”
“And it was Brackley’s idea? The parcel, I mean. It looks as if it came from his mint.”
“He said so, sir. Foss knew nothing about it, of course. It was a surprise for him. They knew he’d have to pretend he knew all about it when Marden brought it to him.”
“That finishes the parcel,” Sir Clinton continued. “But it had suggested one or two things, as you see. The most important thing, from my point of view, was that this gang was not exactly a band of brothers. Two of them suspected the third. Possibly the split was even more extensive.
“The next thing was the valet’s story. According to him, Maurice stabbed Foss, after a quarrel which Marden couldn’t overhear clearly. Unfortunately for that tale, the blow that killed Foss was a powerful one. What Marden didn’t know was that Maurice had sprained his wrist that morning. I doubt if a sprained wrist could have achieved that stab. There was no proof, of course; but it seemed just a little doubtful. Then Marden said that from the door he couldn’t catch the words of the quarrel, although the voices were angry in tone. I tried the experiment myself later; and it’s perfectly easy to overhear what’s said in the museum from the position Marden said he was in. So that was a deliberate lie. On that basis, one could eliminate most of Marden’s tale as being under suspicion.
“What really happened in the museum? Maurice is gone, Foss is dead, Marden won’t tell. One has just to reconstruct the thing as plausibly as one can. My impression—it’s only conjecture—is this. Marden was listening at the door and he could see some parts of the room, since the door was ajar. Foss had succeeded in substituting one replica for a real medallion. To get Maurice’s eye off him, he asked to see the Muramasa sword. Maurice went to get it, leaving Foss at his rubbing—visible to Maurice all the time. Foss made the exchange of the second replica at that moment. Maurice came back with the Muramasa sword—and of course in doing that, he put his fingerprints on the handle in drawing the blade from the sheath. Marden, at the door, saw him do this and made a note of it. Just as Maurice came back to Foss, he was suddenly taken ill. He had the third real medallion in one hand; and as he passed Foss he picked up the two replicas—which he believed to be the other two real medallions. He went to the safe and hurriedly put on a shelf the two replicas; but the other medallion, in his other hand, he forgot all about. He shut the safe and staggered into the secret passage.”
Inspector Armadale looked frankly incredulous.
“Do people take ill all of a sudden like that?” he demanded. “Why should he want to rush off all at once?”
Sir Clinton swung round on him.
“Ever suffered from rheumatism, Inspector? Or neuralgia? Or toothache?”
“No,” the Inspector replied with all the pride of perfect health. “I’ve never had rheumatism and I’ve never had a tooth go wrong in my life.”
“No wonder you can’t understand, then,” Sir Clinton retorted. “Wait till you have neuralgia in the fifth nerve, Inspector. Then, if you don’t know yourself that you’re unfit for human society, your friends will tell you, soon enough. If you get a bad attack, it’s maddening—nothing less. Men have suicided on account of it often enough,” he added, with a meaning glance at Armadale.
A light broke in on the Inspector’s mind.
“So that was it? No wonder I couldn’t put two and two together!” he reflected to himself; but he made no audible comment.
“Now we come to a mere leap in the dark,” Sir Clinton continued. “I believe that as soon as Maurice was out of the way, Marden went into the museum and demanded the medallions from Foss.”
He put down his cigarette and leaned back in his chair. When he spoke again, a faint tinge of pity seemed to come into his voice.
“Foss was a poor little creature, hardly better than a rabbit in the big jungle of crime. And the other two were something quite different: carnivores, beasts of prey. They’d picked him out simply on account of his one miserable talent: his little trick of legerdemain. He was only a tool, poor beggar, and he knew it. I expect that when he saw what sort of company he’d fallen into, he was terrified. That would account for the pistol he carried.
“His only chance of a fair deal from them lay in the fact that he had the real medallions in his possession; and he meant to hold on to them. And when Marden demanded them, Foss revolted. It must have been like the revolt of a rabbit against a stoat. He hadn’t a chance. He pulled out his pistol, I expect; and when that appeared, Marden saw red.
“But Marden, even in a fury, was a person with a very keen mind. Perhaps he’d thought the thing over beforehand. He was evidently one of these subhuman creatures with no respect for human life—the things they label Apaches in Paris. When the pistol came out he was ready for it. Foss, I’m sure, brandished the thing in an amateurish fashion—he wasn’t a gunman of any sort. Probably he imagined that the mere sight of the thing would bring Marden to heel.
“Marden had his handkerchief out at once. Probably he had it ready in his hand. He picked up the Muramasa sword, leaving no finger-marks of his own on it through the handkerchief. And . . . that was the end of Foss.”
Sir Clinton leaned over, selected a fresh cigarette with a certain fastidiousness, and lighted it before going on with his tale.
“That was the end of his feeble little attempt to get the better of his confederates. The money in his pocket-book didn’t give him the escape he’d hoped for. All his precautions to leave no clues to his real identity played straight into the hands of Marden and Brackley.
“Marden’s immediate problem, once he’d come out of his fury, was difficult enough. I suspect that his first move was to search Foss and get the medallions out of his pockets. Then he was faced with the blood on his hands and on his handkerchief. He had his plan made almost in a moment. He went across, deliberately slipped—he was an artist in detail, evidently—smashed against the glass of one of the cases, cut his hand, and then he felt fairly secure. He wrapped up the wounds in his handkerchief—and there was the case complete to account for any stray blood anywhere on his clothes. He tried the safe, for fear Maurice was lurking inside; and then he gave the alarm.”
Sir Clinton glanced inquiringly at the Inspector, but Armadale shook his head.
“Brackley had nothing to say about all that, sir. Marden gave him no details.”
“It’s mostly guess-work,” Sir Clinton warned his audience. “All that one can say for it is that it fits the facts fairly well.”
“And is that brute in the house now?” Una Rainhill demanded. “I shan’t go to sleep if he is.”
“Two constables were detached to arrest him,” Sir Clinton assured her. “He’s not on the premises, you may count on that.”
Inspector Armadale’s face took on a wooden expression, the result of suppressing a sardonic smile.
“Well, he does manage to tell the truth and convey a wrong impression with it,” he commented inwardly.
“Now consider the state of affairs after the Foss murder,” Sir Clinton went on. “Marden and Brackley were in a pretty pickle, it seems to me. They had three medallions which Marden had got when he rifled Foss’s body. But they didn’t know what they’d got. They weren’t in the secret of the dots on the replicas. For all they knew—knew for certain, I mean—Foss might have bungled the affair and the things they had might be merely replicas. If so, they were no good. I can’t tell the difference between a medallion and an electrotype myself; but I believe an expert can tell you whether a thing’s been struck with a die or merely plated from a mould. These two scoundrels, I take it, weren’t experts. They couldn’t tell which brand of article they had in their hands.