loveliness that now went fully adorned. Tuppence had performed her part
faithfully. The model gown supplied by a famous dressmaker had been entitled “A
tiger lily.” It was all golds and reds and browns, and out of it rose the pure
column of the girl’s white throat, and the bronze masses of hair that crowned
her lovely head. There was admiration in every eye, as she took her seat.
Soon the supper party was in full swing, and with one accord Tommy was
called upon for a full and complete explanation.
“You’ve been too darned close about the whole business,” Julius accused
him. “You let on to me that you were off to the Argentine–though I guess you
had your reasons for that. The idea of both you and Tuppence casting me for the
part of Mr. Brown just tickles me to death!”
“The idea was not original to them,” said Mr. Carter gravely. “It was
suggested, and the poison very carefully instilled, by a past-master in the art.
The paragraph in the New York paper suggested the plan to him, and by means of
it he wove a web that nearly enmeshed you fatally.”
“I never liked him,” said Julius. “I felt from the first that there was
something wrong about him, and I always suspected that it was he who silenced
Mrs. Vandemeyer so appositely. But it wasn’t till I heard that the order for
Tommy’s execution came right on the heels of our interview with him that Sunday
that I began to tumble to the fact that he was the big bug himself.”
“I never suspected it at all,” lamented Tuppence. “I’ve always thought I
was so much cleverer than Tommy–but he’s undoubtedly scored over me
handsomely.”
Julius agreed.
“Tommy’s been the goods this trip! And, instead of sitting there as dumb
as a fish, let him banish his blushes, and tell us all about it.”
“Hear! hear!”
“There’s nothing to tell,” said Tommy, acutely uncomfortable. “I was an
awful mug–right up to the time I found that photograph of Annette, and realized
that she was Jane Finn. Then I remembered how persistently she had shouted out
that word ‘Marguerite’–and I thought of the pictures, and–well, that’s that.
Then of course I went over the whole thing to see where I’d made an ass of
myself.”
“Go on,” said Mr. Carter, as Tommy showed signs of taking refuge in silence
once more.
“That business about Mrs. Vandemeyer had worried me when Julius told me
about it. On the face of it, it seemed that he or Sir James must have done the
trick. But I didn’t know which. Finding that photograph in the drawer, after
that story of how it had been got from him by Inspector Brown, made me suspect
Julius. Then I remembered that it was Sir James who had discovered the false
Jane Finn. In the end, I couldn’t make up my mind–and just decided to take no
chances either way. I left a note for Julius, in case he was Mr. Brown, saying
I was off to the Argentine, and I dropped Sir James’s letter with the offer of
the job by the desk so that he would see it was a genuine stunt. Then I wrote
my letter to Mr. Carter and rang up Sir James. Taking him into my confidence
would be the best thing either way, so I told him everything except where I
believed the papers to be hidden. The way he helped me to get on the track of
Tuppence and Annette almost disarmed me, but not quite. I kept my mind open
between the two of them. And then I got a bogus note from Tuppence–and I knew!”
“But how?”
Tommy took the note in question from his pocket and passed it round the
table.
“It’s her handwriting all right, but I knew it wasn’t from her because of
the signature. She’d never spell her name ‘Twopence,’ but anyone who’d never
seen it written might quite easily do so. Julius HAD seen it–he showed me a
note of hers to him once–but SIR JAMES HADN’T! After that everything was plain
sailing. I sent off Albert post-haste to Mr. Carter. I pretended to go away,