§4
The Old Man in the Corner ceased talking, and became once more absorbed in his favourite task of making knots in a bit of string.
"I see in the papers," I now put in thoughtfully, "that Miss Louisa Smithson has overcome her grief for the loss of her aristocratic lover by returning to the plebeian one."
"Yes," the funny creature replied dryly, "she is marrying Henry Carter. Funny, isn't it? But women are queer fish! One moment she looked on the man as a murderer, now, by marrying him, she actually proclaims her belief in his innocence."
"It certainly was abundantly proved," I rejoined, "that Henry Carter could not possibly have murdered Prince Orsoff."
"It was also abundantly proved," he retorted, "that no one else murdered the so-called Prince."
"You think, of course, that he was an ordinary impostor?" I asked.
"An impostor, yes," he replied, "but not an ordinary one. In fact I take off my hat to as clever a pair of scamps as I have ever come across."
"A pair?"
"Why, yes! It could not have been done alone!"
"But the police..."
"The police," the spook-like creature broke in with a sharp cackle, "know more in this case than you give them credit for. They know well enough the solution of the puzzle which appears so baffling to the public, but they have not sufficient proof to effect an arrest. At one time they hoped that the scoundrels would presently make a false move and give themselves away, in which case they could be prosecuted for defrauding the Smithsons of ten thousand pounds, but this eventuality has become complicated through the master-stroke of genius which made Henry Carter marry Louisa Smithson."
"Henry Carter?" I exclaimed. "Then you do think the Carters had something to do with the case?"
"They had everything to do with the case. In fact, they planned the whole thing in a masterly manner."
"But the Russian Prince at Monte Carlo?" I argued. "Who was he? If he was a confederate, where has he disappeared to?"
"He is still engaged in free-lance journalism," the Old Man in the Corner replied drily, "and in his spare moments changes parcels of French currency back into English notes."
"You mean the brother!" I ejaculated with a gasp.
"Of course I mean the brother," he retorted dryly, "who else could have been so efficient a collaborator in the plot? John Carter was comparatively his own master. He lived with Henry in the small house in Chelsea, waited on by a charwoman who came by the day. It was generally given out that his reporting work took him frequently and for lengthened stays out of London. The brothers, remember, had inherited a few hundreds from their father, while the Smithsons had inherited a few thousands. We must suppose that the idea of relieving the ladies of those thousands occurred to them as soon as they realised that Louisa, egged on by her mother, would cold-shoulder her fiancé.
"John Carter, mind you, must be a very clever man, else he could not have carried out all the details of the plot with so much sang-froid. We have been told, if you remember, that he had early in life cut his stick and gone to seek fortune in London, therefore the Smithsons, who had never been out of Folkestone, did not know him intimately. His make-up as the Prince must have been very good, and his histrionic powers not to be despised: his profession and life in London no doubt helped him in these matters. Then, remember also that he took very good care not to be a great deal in the Smithsons' company—even in Monte Carlo he only let them see him less than half a dozen times, and as soon as he came to England he hurried on the wedding as much as he could.
"Another fine stroke was Henry's apparent despair at being cut out of Louisa's affections, and his threats against his successful rival: it helped to draw suspicion on himself—suspicion which the scoundrels took good care could easily be disproved. Then take a pair of vain, credulous, unintelligent women and a smart rascal who knows how to flatter them, and you will see how easily the whole plot could be worked. Finally, when John Carter had obtained possession of the money, he and Henry arranged the supposed tragedy in the train and the Russian Prince's disappearance from the world as suddenly as he had entered it."
I thought the matter over for a moment or two. The solution of the mystery certainly appealed to my dramatic sense.
"But," I said at last, "one wonders why the Carters took the trouble to arrange a scene of a supposed murder in the train: they might quite well have been caught in the act, and in any case it was an additional unnecessary risk. John Carter might quite well have been content to shed his role of Russian Prince, without such an elaborate setting."
"Well," he admitted, "in some ways you are right there, but it is always difficult to gauge accurately the mentality of a clever scoundrel. In this case I don't suppose that the Carters had quite made up their minds about what they would do when they left London, but that the plan was in their heads is proved by the hat, pince-nez, and railway ticket which they took with them when they started, and which, if you remember, were found on the line: but it was probably only because the train was comparatively empty, and they had both time and opportunity in the non-stop train, that they decided to carry their clever comedy through.
"Then think what an immense advantage in their future plans would be the Smithsons' belief in the death of their Prince. Probably Louisa would never have dreamed of marrying if she thought her aristocratic lover was an impostor and still alive: she would never have let the matter rest; her mind would for ever have been busy with trying to trace him, and bring him back, repentant, to her feet. You know what women are when they are in love with that type of scoundrel, they cling to them with the tenacity of a leech. But once she believed the man to be dead, Louisa Smithson gradually got over her grief and Henry Carter wooed and won her on the rebound. She was poor now, and her friends had quickly enough deserted her: she was touched by the fidelity of her simple lover, and he thus consolidated his position and made the future secure.
"Anyway," the Old Man in the Corner concluded, "I believe that it was with a view to making a future marriage possible between Louisa and Henry that the two brothers organised the supposed murder. Probably if the train had been full and they had seen danger in the undertaking they would not have done it. But the mise en scène was easily enough set and it certainly was an additional safeguard. Now in another week or so Louisa Smithson will be Henry Carter's wife, and presently you will find that John in London, and Henry and his wife, will be quite comfortably off. And after that, whatever suspicions Mrs. Smithson may have of the truth, her lips would have to remain sealed. She could not very well prosecute her only child's husband.
"And so the matter will always remain a mystery to the public: but the police know more than they are able to admit because they have no proof.
"And now they never will have. But as to the murder in the train, well!—the murdered man never existed."