IV
"I have asked you to come to see me, Mr. Nape," said the Duke, "because I feel I owe you an apology."
The criminologist nodded stiffly.
He thought that under the circumstances the Duke might have very well come to him, but he was not prepared to labour the point.
"We all make mistakes," said the Duke generously, "I for instance have been mistaken in you."
Mr. Nape made another stern acknowledgment.
"I thought your methods were unconventional; I mistrusted the new type of detective; I have been trained in the old school where the man who murders the banker is never the burglar who robs the safe, but the good bishop who calls for the missionary subscription; where the villain who steals the Crown jewels is not the impecunious soldier of fortune, but the heir apparent."
Mr. Nape stood rigidly at attention and waited. It pleased him to see evidence of a great remorse upon the tanned young face before him, to observe deep shadows under his eyes, and—he had not noticed them before—a sprinkling of grey hairs at his temple. Mr. Nape drew his own conclusions.
"Now," said the Duke with a self-depreciating wave of his hand, "I know that the old method is obsolete, that from the first the guilty party is the obvious—"
"Obvious to all who employ the process of elimination," corrected Mr. Nape severely.