He resisted, but it was only to bow to Gelia. "Au revoir, my dear Mrs. Malcolm," he said. He turned to Margaret, who had been standing like a statue, listening. "As for you, Miss Fortescue, I am sure that you will be relieved to know that in spite of your damnably annoying behaviour, I had very little intention of leaving you to starve as you so palpably feared. And may I give you a word of advice? When next you escape from prison, and return to it with the idea of bluffing your captor, drink some of the water you have been supplied with. Had you thought of that you would have given your clever Mr. Strange less trouble, for I might then have been in the printing-room when he surprised my staff."
She did not answer him; he laughed shortly, and turned to Mrs. Bosanquet. "I was amused at your efforts to conjure up my wraith, madam," he said. "I was behind the panel at the time, and really I was almost tempted to appear. I always hate to disoblige the ladies." He bowed again, and without so much as glancing at the men of the party, went out under escort.
There was a long silence. Then Charles sat down weakly. "Let no one speak to me," he said. "I shall no doubt recover in time."
"But Ackerley!" Peter stammered. "Draycott, how the devil did you arrive at it?"
"Well, you heard some of my reasons," Michael said. "But the first clue I had was Time. You see these forgeries have been going on for five years, and it seemed probable that they were from the beginning carried out from this place. That ruled out Titmarsh: he only came here three years ago. Roote has been here an even shorter time; various other inhabitants round about have been here too long a time. It was only Ackerley who came to live at the White House five years ago, and I thought it significant that his arrival was shortly followed by the arrival not only of Duval, but of Wilkes also to take over the Bell Inn. Now Wilkes paid a very large sum for the Bell: too large a sum for an inn so little frequented. And by lying up in odd corners I found that a pretty close intimacy seemed to exist between the two men. Wilkes was the only one who knew who the Monk was; you might call him the Monk's chief of staff. That set me on to Ackerley, and that's where Fripp came in handy. After the murder of Duval I let Fripp break into the Colonel's house one night when the servants had gone to bed. You know that they slept over the garage. And of course the Colonel was out on his secret business. I told you Fripp was clever with locks. And he's not burdened with any scruples. He found a bottle of chloroform, which is now in my possession…"
"But didn't the Colonel miss it?" Charles demanded.
"No; for the very good reason that Fripp exchanged it for one almost identical. He also found the missing book. I'll let you have that when the trial's over; those two pages cut from the copy at the British Museum are most interesting."
"House-breaking!" Charles said, casting up his eyes. "Our incorruptible police!"
"Oh no!" Michael grinned. Jimmy's not a policeman. He would be insulted to hear you say so."
Peter struck in: "But an officer in the army - I suppose he wasn't, though?"