"You affirm all this in face of the recent inquiry?"
"I do—and strongly! The accounts shown at the recent inquiry were all carefully manipulated, arranged, cooked by the Town Trustees. I had nothing to do with them. They were prepared by the Town Trustees, chiefly, I imagine, by Mallett and Coppinger, with Crood's approval and consent. They were never shown to me. In short, my position has been this, simply, I have had certain accounts placed before me by the Town Trustees with the curt intimation that my sole duty was to see that the merely arithmetical features were correct and to sign them as accountant."
"Could you not have made a statement to this effect at the inquiry?"
"I could not!"
"Why, now?"
"Because I could not have produced the books and papers. All the books and papers to which I have ever had access are merely such things as rate books and so on—the sort of things that can't be concealed. But the really important books and papers, showing the real state of things, are in the possession of Mallett and Coppinger, who, with Crood, have never allowed anybody to see them. If I could have had those things brought before the inspector, I could have proved something. But I couldn't bring them before a court of inquiry like that. You can bring them before this!"
"How?" demanded Meeking.
"Because, I take it, they bear a very sinister relation to the murder of the late Mayor," replied the witness. "He was as well aware as I am that things were all wrong."
"You know that?"
"I know that he did his best, from such material as he could get at, to find out what the true state of things was. He worked hard at examining such accounts as were available. To my knowledge he did his best to get at the secret accounts kept by the Town Trustees. He failed utterly—they defied him. Yet, just before his murder, he was getting at facts in a fashion which was not only unpleasant but highly dangerous to them, and they were aware of it."