Payne made a small motion of his lips, as though he were blowing out tobacco smoke slowly. He shifted his position, so that the floor creaked, and you could hear it plainly in the great stillness of the room.
"What's this? What's this?" gabbled Sir Benjamin.
"Go on, said Payne, softly.
"I've heard the story a dozen times," Dr. Fell went on, nodding his head in a detached, meditative fashion. "About old Timothy's lying there writing, just before he died. Sheets upon sheets he was writing-though his body was so smashed he could scarcely hold a pen. Propped up with a writing-board, cackling and howling with glee, determined to go on.."
"Well?" demanded Sir Benjamin.
"Well, what was he writing? 'Instructions for my son,' he said, but that was a lie. That was to throw some of you off the track. His son, by the nature of the so-called 'ordeal,' didn't need any instructions — he only needed to get the keys from Payne. In any event, he didn't need page after page of closely written script. Old Timothy wasn't copying anything, because he didn't need to do that, either… this 'document' of Anthony's, Payne says, never left the safe. So what was he writing?
Nobody spoke. Rampole found himself moving out towards the edge of the chair. From where he sat he could see Dorothy Starberth's eyes, unwinking, fixed on the doctor. Sir Benjamin spoke, loudly:
"Very well, then. What was he writing?"
"The story of his own murder," said Dr. Fell.