For quite two minutes Gebb sat in silence, looking at his chief in blended wonder and amazement Try as he might he could not guess how the fat man had come by this knowledge. What he, with the use of his limbs, and the power of the law, had failed to discover, this invalid--as he might be called--had found out without moving from his armchair. In a darker age Gebb might have judged Parge to be gifted with necromantic power, or divination by second sight.
"Are you certain of this?" he asked in a hesitating voice.
"Quite certain!" cried Parge, furiously. "Quite certain. I'm not a fool."
"But how did you find out?"
"By exercising my memory and joining the past with the present."
"In what way?" asked Gebb, still perplexed "What clue had you?"
"The clue of the Yellow Boudoir."
"The Yellow Boudoir!" repeated Gebb, recalling his own fancy.
"Yes!" said Parge, gravely "Twenty years ago, in a room furnished in the same fashion, in a room under the roof of Kirkstone Hall, there was a murder committed. In this book," Parge here laid his hand on the large volume, "there is a full account of the trial of one, Marmaduke Dean, for the murder of John Kirkstone; and the crime was committed in the Yellow Boudoir."
"But what has a crime committed twenty years ago to do with the assassination of Miss Lig--I mean, of Miss Gilmar?"