“Well, I nearly blurted out the whole story,” the man confessed, “and then I remembered that wouldn't do me any good, so I went away. I got a job at the Ritz, but I was took ill a few days afterwards. I went to see a doctor. From him I got my death-warrant, sir.”
“Is it heart?”
“It's heart, sir,” the man acknowledged. “The doctor told me I might snuff out at any moment. I can't live, anyway, for more than a year. I've got a little girl.”
“Now just why have you come to see me?” Francis asked.
“For just this, sir,” the man replied. “Here's my account of what happened,” he went on, drawing some sheets of foolscap from his pocket. “It's written in my own hand and there are two witnesses to my signature—one a clergyman, sir, and the other a doctor, they thinking it was a will or something. I had it in my mind to send that to Scotland Yard, and then I remembered that I hadn't a penny to leave my little girl. I began to wonder—think as meanly of me as you like, sir—how I could still make some money out of this. I happened to know that you were none too friendly disposed towards Sir Timothy. This confession of mine, if it wouldn't mean hanging, would mean imprisonment for the rest of his life. You could make a better bargain with him than me, sir. Do you want to hold him in your power? If so, you can have this confession, all signed and everything, for two hundred pounds, and as I live, sir, that two hundred pounds is to pay for my funeral, and the balance for my little girl.”
Francis took the papers and glanced them through.
“Supposing I buy this document from you,” he said, “what is its actual value? You could write out another confession, get that signed, and sell it to another of Sir Timothy's enemies, or you could still go to Scotland Yard yourself.”
“I shouldn't do that, sir, I assure you,” the man declared nervously, “not on my solemn oath. I want simply to be quit of the whole matter and have a little money for the child.”
Francis considered for a moment.
“There is only one way I can see,” he said, “to make this document worth the money to me. If you will sign a confession that any statement you have made as to the death of Mr. Hilditch is entirely imaginary, that you did not see Sir Timothy in the house that night, that you went to bed at your usual time and slept until you were awakened, and that you only made this charge for the purpose of extorting money—if you will sign a confession to that effect and give it me with these papers, I will pay you the two hundred pounds and I will never use the confession unless you repeat the charge.”