“A cleverly contrived thing. It was originally written in vanishing ink and Barry signed it in real ink. Then, when the vanishing ink vanished, the perpetrator of the precious scheme filled in the typed letter above the signature.”
“Clever! What was the original document?”
“It was a testimonial or something of the sort to a Club servant. Head Steward, or somebody, and this testimonial was arranged for him. Barry remembers being asked to sign and remembers signing. Then he forgot all about it.”
“Weren’t others to sign?”
“Barry thought so, but the matter was never carried on.”
“H’m. Who asked Barry to sign?”
“Dean Monroe.”
“How he continues to crop up! Is he the murderer?”
“Now, look here, Zizi, we’re up against an enormously interesting case. It’s simple up to a certain point, and then it’s inexplicable. The murderer is one of the cleverest men on this planet. For, look. He arranged that letter deliberately, fixed up the Club servant scheme, to get Philip Barry’s signature on a blank sheet of paper. Having that, he later wrote in whatever he chose. His cleverness consisted, at this point, in not overdoing. Had he made the letter a threat of murder, it would have looked false on the face of it, for Barry is not like that. Well, he had this letter ready to plant in Gleason’s desk after he had committed his crime—and he did so. Next, he left no fingerprints on the telephone or on the revolver, save those of Gleason himself. Was that clever?”
“Oh, Penny, it was! And he made the prints on the telephone with Mr Gleason’s fingers after Mr Gleason was dead! And he did the telephoning himself!”