"I can only hope so. But what made you think it a possible one? Had you ever seen the man before that night?"
"No." She paused, then said slowly: "Mr. Craig, if he wanted your uncle's diamonds that night, it is likely that he wanted them long before then, and it must have occurred to him that your life stood in his way of ever getting them as a gift or legacy." She halted, and then asked: "Well?"
"This is for your ears alone, Miss Handyside," he said on an impulse. "When I wanted very much to go to the Arctic and could not find the necessary money, Mr. Bullard and—and another man advanced it, and I made a will in their favour."
"Oh, how horrible!"
"And yet all that proves nothing with regard to the man Flitch."
"No more does this," she quickly rejoined. "But when I saw that Bullard man's face as he laid the Green Box on the table, I felt that there was a being who would stick at nothing. I'll never forget his expression. It was as if the humanness had fallen from a face. It was—devilish…. That was what made me write down his name last night." She held up her hand. "Hush!"
Dr. Handyside hobbled in, looking far from happy. "Has Caw told you how he came to be absent from his charge last night, Mr. Craig?" he asked.
"In the same circumstances I'd have been absent myself," said Alan.
Marjorie gave him a grateful glance. "Poor father feels as if he owed you over half a million," she said.
The guest laughed. "Well, he can easily feel that he has paid the debt—by taking the Green Box as seriously as I do!"