"And with good reason," said the doctor grimly.
"He wanted a child of five to produce as his son, George Copplestone Winslowe—and possibly make away with in due course after the business was settled. I am quite sure that would have been my fate if nature had not come to my rescue by striking him. He knew, from his knowledge of the underworld of London, how such things could be arranged without risk. No doubt he bought me for a few pounds. I am not the first heir to an estate who has been produced by such means."
"True enough," agreed the inspector. "The heir to a million has been bought for a fiver."
"But a few years after taking possession of the fortune, he was struck down, as I have said, by the first instalment of nature's retribution, and was incapable of carrying out his plans. No one cared for me. No one thought of removing me from the sight and influence of his growing imbecility. I was brought up under the shadow of it. And so the horror was born in me—the belief that I was mad. What chance had I to resist it, in those surroundings? When I came to an age to do so, I searched out the story of my birth, of my father's excesses and my mother's madness, and my doom crashed upon me. Can you wonder that I became what I was?"
"No, indeed," said Monsieur Dupont.
"I dropped the name of Winslowe. It was loathsome to me. I used my other two names, George Copplestone. They, at least, had come from my mother's side. My old manservant and his wife stuck to me, and kept my secrets. The income devolved on me in consequence of Winslowe's incapability. And so things went on. In my morbid demoralization I saw myself growing nearer and nearer to that wretched creature day by day."
"Dreadful!" shuddered the doctor. "It must have been a living hell."
"Then, last night, Tranter came. He climbed up on the ivy, and tried to spy into Winslowe's room. But I was there, and heard him. I dragged him in through the window. I suppose it was some look, some likeness to his mother, that stirred Winslowe's memory. He recognized him, and a flash of sanity came back to him. Under that sudden mental stimulation he recovered his power of movement, and was able to confess at least a part of the truth. Tranter was taken off his guard, and I forced him to admit his madness. I compelled him to take Winslowe and myself to Miss Masters, and she, in her turn, brought us here."
"I imagined she would," Monsieur Dupont remarked.
Copplestone drew a deep breath, and laughed aloud.