"Y'know, that made my head reel. I wasn't far from bein' physically dizzy, and now you understand why. It wasn't merely that Serpos (by Charters's own story) had worked in a bank. But here was Serpos, who lived in the house, worked in the house, and next to Charters himself was closest to the case: and Serpos stole the fake money. Was he away at the time?' How is that goin' to prevent him from knowin' about it? If a big criminal case has spouted up like a geyser right in your back garden, if a man's been shot on your door-step and a sackful of counterfeit money is shoved away in a safe in your own livin'-room, then the mere fact that you were takin' a holiday at Eastbourne when it happened won't prevent you from hearin' something about it.
"Oh no. I said to myself: `Here! Is it possible —‘
"And then I observed how Charters was carryin' on when he discovered this theft. He was pretty cut up. He wasn't concerned with Hogenauer's 'spy-plots' now; he was dead set on nabbin' Serpos straightaway. Nabbin' him, you understand — but bein' careful not to charge him with theft. You see now, Ken, why you were arrested and shoved in clink at Moreton Abbot? Because there was a mix-up, and nobody was certain which car Serpos had stolen when he did a bunk. And Charters couldn't afford to risk Serpos gettin' away. So he simply issued orders to arrest the drivers of both cars.
"On top of that came your telephone-call informin' us that Hogenauer was poisoned, and the circumstances of it. That was interestin' enough, but a more interestin' circumstance preceded it. It happened before you had said one word of what happened in Hogenauer's house, or described anything there. Remember? Charters answered the telephone. You started off with a wrangle: you told him how you'd busted out of prison, without even mentionin' Hogenauer's name, and Charters took you up sharp. Think, nowl Do you remember what he said?"
We were nearing the Great West Road, which would take us straight into London traffic, and I kept my eyes ahead.
"His exact words, so far as I can remember," I said, "were, `You won't have a chance now to have a look at Hogenauer's house, or in the big desk, or'”
"Or in the big desk. Uh-huh. That's it. He was pretty upset, son, but he shouldn't 'a' made that slip. What desk? He'd sworn to us that he was never in Hogenauer's house at all; that he'd never even spoken to Hogenauer at all except on the occasion when Hogenauer came to him with the proposition. He even made a pretence of tryin' to remember what the address of Hogenauer's house was. But — how did he know about the big desk? That's the speech of a man who's been in Hogenauer's back parlour. Is it possible (says I to myself) that Charters may merely have learned about the big desk from Sergeant Davis, who'd looked through the back parlour window: who may have seen it, and reported it to Charters? But you looked through both windows, Ken, and you couldn't see anything. Neither, I learned from askin' while you were present, had the sergeant.
"But at the moment — when you first reported over the 'phone — I was bothered as hell. Here was a direct connection: Charters visitin' Hogenauer secretly, and Hogenauer is a tolerably sound authority on the subject o' counterfeit money. It all seemed to come back to that. Were the two ends convergin'? Had Charters discovered a good part of the Willoughby stuff was real, neatly sandwiched between bogus money; and had he gone to Hogenauer to make sure it was real? Whereupon (thinks I) Hogenauer's conscience makes him squawk out and say Charters had better not try any games; because at the inquest Hobenauer is goin' to go in and tell the truth. And so he's got to be silenced.
"And here enters the cussedness of the business. What threw me off, what set my head buzzin', was that whole weird hocus-pocus of lights and missin' books and changed furniture. It was the setting. It was the Topsy-Turvy House, and for about half an hour it threw me off altogether. If Hogenauer had been found dead of poison, sittin' in his chair in an ordinary fashion, I'd 'a' been sure. But what I ran smack up against was the one set o' clues that didn't mean anything at all — Y'see I had to be careful. Because still the strong possibility was that there might have been international games, there might have been dirty work with Hogenauer mixed up in it, and the few blotted lines of the letter in Hogenauer's study didn't soothe my feelings any. It was just possible I was altogether mistaken in my suspicion of Charters. I hadda be sure. And consequently, Ken, in spite of damnation and foul weather, I had to send you to Bristol."
At this point H.M. made a somewhat fiendish face under the gay hat.