must have some strong object for his curious conduct, and it was equally clear

that the only man who really profited by the incident, as far as we could see,

was the stepfather. Then the fact that the two men were never together, but

that the one always appeared when the other was away, was suggestive. So were

the tinted spectacles and the curious voice, which both hinted at a disguise,

as did the bushy whiskers. My suspicions were all confirmed by his peculiar

action in typewriting his signature, which, of course, inferred that his

handwriting was so familiar to her that she would recognise even the smallest

sample of it. You see all these isolated facts, together with many minor ones,

all pointed in the same direction.”


“And how did you verify them?”


“Having once spotted my man, it was easy to get corroboration. I knew the

firm for which this man worked. Having taken the printed description. I

eliminated everything from it which could be the result of a disguise—the

whiskers, the glasses, the voice, and I sent it to the firm, with a request

that they would inform me whether it answered to the description of any of

their travellers. I had already noticed the peculiarities of the typewriter,

and I wrote to the man himself at his business address asking him if he would

come here. As I expected, his reply was typewritten and revealed the same

trivial but characteristic defects. The same post brought me a letter from

Westhouse & Marbank, of Fenchurch Street, to say that the description

tallied in every respect with that of their employé, James Windibank. Voilà

tout!”


“And Miss Sutherland?”


“If I tell her she will not believe me. You may remember the old Persian

saying, ‘There is danger for him who taketh the tiger cub, and danger

also for whoso snatches a delusion from a woman.’ There is as much sense

in Hafiz as in Horace, and as much knowledge of the world.”


 IV.THE BOSCOMBE VALLEY MYSTERY

We were seated at