"You can't stop my knowing the truth," answered Foyle equably. "Sooner or later I shall be able to prove it. And if you persist it will make things much more unpleasant for you."

The other said nothing for a while. A struggle was taking place in his mind that was indicated with a nervous twitching of the fingers. His shoulders were bent and his head bowed. Foyle waited patiently. Outside a bird started a "jig-jig-jig--br-brr" that set the teeth on edge. The trees, stirred by a newly sprung up breeze, rustled uneasily.

"No, it's no good," said Grell at last. "I know nothing."

The detective rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Will you tell me if you had any visitors on the evening of the murder?" he inquired, blandly ignoring the other's refusal. He noticed a quick flash of surprise pa.s.s over Grell's countenance and drew his own conclusions. Swiftly a new thought came to him. "Did Goldenburg come to you alone?"

The prisoner remained silent, and Foyle knew that he was considering the advisability of answering. "I don't see why you shouldn't know that, if you want to. He came with a friend of mine. She left shortly afterwards."

"She?" Foyle seized on the word. "It was a woman, then?"

Grell bit his lip. He had said more than he meant to. The superintendent frowned thoughtfully, and his active brain was beginning to see things more clearly. It was a full five minutes before he spoke again as one making an a.s.sertion rather than asking a question.

"That would be Lola, of course." His blue eyes met Grell's frown with an ingenuous stare. "This is beginning to get clearer, Mr. Grell.

Goldenburg was blackmailing you, eh? Maybe he had letters which you wouldn't have liked Lady Eileen to see--what?"

An e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n came from Grell. The detective directed his gaze to a picture opposite him, and continued, as though thinking aloud--

"Now I come to think of it, was Goldenburg a relative of yours? The likeness is amazing. Well, suppose, for the sake of argument, he was.

And Lola--where does Lola stand? Was it to her, by any chance, that the letters were directed? Was she merely a friend, or did she stand in closer relationship to either of you?"

Grell yawned ostentatiously, but although Foyle had been apparently looking away from him he had followed the effect on the other's face of every one of the seemingly casual questions he had put.

"I am afraid I am boring you. It's a bad habit, thinking aloud."

"It does seem futile," agreed Grell. "You surely have little need to exercise yourself about these things."

"Ah, you think so? I am beginning to think that something more is necessary. It may be--of course, this is only for the sake of ill.u.s.tration--that the dagger was handled by some one after the murder had occurred. However, let the subject drop. Perhaps your housekeeper will get us some breakfast while one of the girls runs into Dalehurst."

While waiting for a reply, he rang the bell and gave some directions, with a note to the housekeeper. The breakfast that she ultimately served up was a credit to her skill as a cook. Both men ate with an appet.i.te that the unusual nature of the situation did not destroy, though Grell found the handcuffs troublesome.

The superintendent laid down his knife with a sigh of content.

The sound of a motor-car horn was borne faintly in upon them. In a few minutes the housekeeper ushered Green and Malley into the room. The chief inspector returned Foyle's greetings and flung his heavy overcoat on to a chair. His eyes wandered over the prisoner with a little pardonable curiosity. Grell bore the inspection with a smile.

"I congratulate you, sir," said Green. "We'll have the thing fairly straightened out in a day or two now."

"I hope so," said Foyle. "Mr. Malley, will you stay with this gentleman for five minutes? I want to speak to you in another room, Green."

He led the way to the little sitting-room, through the window of which he had effected an entrance. A look of comprehension spread over Green's face as he noticed the missing diamond pane. "Malley told me he pa.s.sed you in the village yesterday. You got our man quicker than I should have thought possible in the circ.u.mstances. How did he take it?"

The superintendent gave a brief recapitulation of the steps he had taken since he left London. Green rubbed his grizzled head and followed the recital with keen appreciation. It did not occur to him to feel hurt that Foyle had acted independently.

"As a matter of fact," he said, "I've got a search-warrant in my pocket, and we were coming over this house to-day. I didn't antic.i.p.ate much profit, because he could have easily slipped away into the woods. I got the county constabulary to put a cordon of patrols round about, and hoped to drive him into their hands. But it was a slim chance. However, we've got him now."

"Yes, we've got him now," agreed Foyle. "There only remains the Petrovska woman, and we'll have her to-day. Listen."

He told of what he had learned from the housekeeper, and they discussed the probabilities of the woman reaching Dalehurst Grange. If she managed to escape Blake and the other detectives who were hot-foot on her trail there was little doubt but that she would walk blindly into a trap. That she had not already reached the Grange and departed Foyle was satisfied, although she had had ample time to travel from Liverpool. As Green phrased it, "she might almost have walked it." But the exigencies of the pursuit might have brought about delay if she attempted to confuse her track. If Foyle had been able to get in touch with Blake he would have called him off in order to let her proceed unfettered. That could not be done.

"She'll not dream anything's wrong here if we're careful," said Green.

"Will you wait for her, or shall I?"

"This is up to you, Green. I'll leave you. You might have had Malley, but I can't drive the car myself, and I want to get back to town. Do you think you'll be able to manage alone?"

"I think so," said the chief inspector confidently.

"I'll get the local superintendent to send up a couple of plain-clothes men as we pa.s.s. You'll bring her straight back to town."

"Ay!"

In a quarter of an hour all preparations were finished. Malley was in the driving-seat of the car. Foyle and Grell sat in the tonneau, and it was no coincidence that the right hand of the prisoner and the left hand of the detective were hidden beneath the rug which covered their knees.

For Foyle had handcuffed his man to himself. It was merely a matter of travelling precaution. The superintendent did not believe that Grell would attempt to escape, but there was no excuse for giving him any temptation. Anyway, it did no harm.

"You'll charge him with the murder directly you reach town, I suppose?"

whispered Green, standing by the step of the car.

"Murder?" repeated Foyle. "Grell did not commit the murder. I shall detain him a day before making any charge against him at all. Drive on, Malley. See you later, Green."

The car whizzed away. Chief Inspector Green stood bare-headed in front of the house, scratching his head, and with a look of bewilderment on his face.

CHAPTER XLIX

It is permissible in certain circ.u.mstances for the police to detain a suspect, without making any charge, for a period of not more than twenty-four hours. Heldon Foyle had taken advantage of this to hold Grell while he tried to draw further together the tangled threads of the investigation.

He had changed out of his tweeds and, once more the spick-and-span man about town, he sat down in his office with an order that he was to be informed the moment that Sir Hilary Thornton returned. Meanwhile, he occupied himself with a work of composition. It was necessary to break gently to the public the fact that Robert Grell was not dead. But it had to be done in the right way. He could not altogether see what evidence might have to be offered at the inquest, but he was sure the newspapers would label it "sensational." He wanted to prepare, at any rate, for the revelation of the dead man's ident.i.ty. That there was no possibility of avoiding, but it could be rendered less startling if it did not come suddenly. And beyond the public interest in the case Foyle had another reason for the publication of his effort. He worked steadily and made three drafts before he had completed his task. Two of them he tore up, and the third he read over carefully, making one or two alterations.

"When the inquest in reference to the Grosvenor Gardens murder is resumed it is understood that evidence of a remarkable nature will be brought forward by the police. Inquiries made by the C.I.D. have placed it beyond all doubt that the crime was not a planned one, and evidence is still being collected against a suspected person.

"A man for whom a rigorous search has been made by the police has been found in a Suss.e.x village by Scotland Yard officers, acting in conjunction with the county constabulary. He was taken to Malchester Row police station, where he has been detained. It is understood that he refuses to give any account of the circ.u.mstances in which he took to flight.

"On inquiry at Scotland Yard yesterday, a representative of this journal was informed that the officers engaged on the case expect to be in a position to clear up the mystery in the course of the next few days."

"That ought to do," he muttered as he blew down a speaking-tube. To the detective-inspector who came in response to his summons he handed the paper. "Have fifty copies of that made, and bring me one. Put some one to 'phone through to all the journalists on the list, asking 'em to call here at half-past six to-night. They're each to have a copy of that."

There was guile in Foyle's fixing of the time. He knew that the paragraph would be a bombsh.e.l.l in Fleet Street, and did not want it to explode prematurely. At half-past six all the evening papers would have ceased publication for the day. At half-past six, too, he would take good care to be far away from the hordes of Press men, hungry for details, who would strive to find more information from the hints given.

At that time they were likely to find any person wiser than themselves, and he had seen to it that there should be no indiscretion at Malchester Row.

"Sir Hilary just come in, sir," said some one, opening the door just wide enough to permit a head to be thrust within; but before Foyle could move the a.s.sistant Commissioner himself walked in.

"One moment, Sir Hilary," said the superintendent, and dashed out, to return again almost immediately. "I just wanted to make certain that we shouldn't be disturbed. There's a lot to tell you. Things have been happening."

"So I gather," said the other, settling himself in the arm-chair.

"You've got Grell, I hear. What's the next move? Do his finger-prints agree?"

"They do not. He is not the murderer, but he won't say who is. The next move is, that I intend that to go in all the morning papers."