What did you expect to be accused of?"
Simon could no more hide his relief to-night than he could hide his fears.
"Only of what you have told me--only of course of what you say! But I can explain. In good time I can explain."
It was at that moment that the door opened sharply and the start the lawyer gave showed the state of his nerves after Mr. Cromarty"s handling. Mary MacLean stood in the doorway, her face twitching.
"What"s the matter?" snapped her master.
"Please, sir, there are men in the garden!" she cried.
The lawyer leapt to his feet.
"Men in the garden!" he cried, and there was a note in his voice which startled even tough Ned Cromarty. "What are they doing?"
"I don"t know, sir. It sounded almost as if they was digging."
Simon swayed for an instant and grasped the back of his chair. Then in a m.u.f.fled voice he muttered:
"I"m going to see!"
He had scarcely made a step towards the door when Cromarty was on his feet too.
"Steady!" he cried. "Get out there, and shut the door!"
The towering form and formidable voice sent Mary out with a shut door between them almost as the command was off his tongue. A couple of strides and he had got the lawyer by the shoulder and pulled him back.
"Sit down!" he commanded.
Simon turned on him with a new expression. The terror had pa.s.sed away and he stood there now as the sheer beast at bay.
"d.a.m.n you!" he muttered, and turned his back for a moment.
The next, his hand rose and simultaneously Ned"s arm shot out and got him by the wrist, while the shock of his onslaught drove the man back and down into his chair. Though Simon was tough and stoutly built, he was as a child in the hands of his adversary. A sharp twist of the wrist was followed by an exclamation of pain and the thud of something heavy on the floor. Ned stooped and picked up the globular gla.s.s match box that had stood on the table. For a few moments he stared at it in dead silence, balancing it in his hands. It was like a small cannon ball for concentrated weight. Then in a curious voice he asked:
"Is this the first time you have used this?"
Simon made no reply. His face was dead white now, but dogged and grim, and his mouth stayed tight as a trap. Ned replaced the match box on the table, and planted himself before the fire.
"Nothing to say?" he asked, and Simon said nothing.
They remained like this for minute after minute; not a movement in the room and the booming of the wind the only sound. And then came footsteps on the gravel and the ringing of a bell.
"We"ll probably learn something now," said Ned, but the other still said nothing, and only a quick glance towards the door gave a hint of his thoughts.
There was no announcement this time. Superintendent Sutherland entered first, then the constable, and Carrington last. The superintendent went straight up to the lawyer, his large face preternaturally solemn.
Touching him on the shoulder he said:
"I arrest you in the King"s name!"
The man in the chair half started up and then fell back again.
"What for?" he asked huskily.
"The murder of Simon Rattar."
The lawyer took it as one who had seen the sword descending, but not so Ned Cromarty.
"Of Simon Rattar!" he shouted. "What the--then who the devil is this?"
Carrington answered. He spoke with his usual easy smile, but his triumphant eye betrayed his heart.
"The superintendent has omitted part of the usual formalities," he said.
"This person should have been introduced as Mr. George Rattar."
"George!" gasped Ned. "But I thought he was dead!"
"So did I," said Carrington, "but he wasn"t."
"What proof have you of this story?" demanded the man in the chair suddenly.
"We have just dug up your brother"s body from that flower bed," said Carrington quietly. "Do you recognise his ring?"
He held up a gold signet ring, and the lawyer fell back in his chair.
"But look here!" exclaimed Ned, "what about Sir Reginald"s murder? He did that too, I suppose!"
Carrington nodded.
"We hope to add that to his account in a day or two. This is enough to be going on with, but as a matter of fact we have nearly enough evidence now to add the other charge."
"I can add one bit," said Ned, picking up the match box. "He has just tried to do me in with this little thing, and I take it, it was the third time of using."
Carrington weighed it in his hand, and then said to the prisoner:
"You put it in the end of a stocking, I suppose?"
The man looked up at him with a new expression in his eye. If it were not a trace of grim humour, it was hard to say what else it could be.
"Get me a drink," he said huskily, nodding towards the tantalus on the side table, "and I"ll tell you the whole d.a.m.ned yarn. My G.o.d, I"m dry as a d.a.m.ned bone!"
"Give me the key of the tantalus," said Carrington promptly.
But the superintendent seemed somewhat taken aback.
"Anything you say may be used against you," he reminded the prisoner.
"You know enough to swing me, anyhow," said Rattar, "but I"d like you to know that I didn"t really mean to do it. I want that drink first though!"