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There was one, a M. Felix, who waited after the others. He was differently situated to them, being a friend of the family. The others were merely acquaintances.
Astonished as Burnley was himself at this unexpected development, he did not forget to keep a keen watch on Felix. That the latter was genuinely amazed and dumbfounded he could not doubt. Not only was his surprise too obviously real to be questioned, but his anger and annoyance at losing his money were clearly heartfelt.
We have a cask coming along. It will be here presently. Could you identify it?
He was delighted at his success. The more he thought of it, the more certain he felt that Boiracs fault-finding was merely an excuse to get rid of the typewriter. And the manufacturer had dismissed Mlle. Lambert simply because she knew too much. If inquiries were made in the office, he would be safer with her out of the way.
I should think he must be. He travels a lot. London, Brussels, Berlin, Viennahe had been at them all to my knowledge in the last two years.
And did you leave it during that time?
It is not quite complete, M. Boirac resumed. There are two more points of which I wish to speak. Read that.
That night, he discussed the matter with the two porters, whom he found intelligent men and keenly interested in the inquiry. He made them describe the kind of cart the cask was brought in, then with a directory he marked off the trades in which the employment of such a vehicle was likely. When he had finished, though some thousands of names were included, he did not think the number overwhelming.
After further ages the clock struck againone. A second dog began barking. The breeze freshened, and Broughton wished he had brought a heavier coat. He longed to stamp up and down and ease his cramped limbs. And then the latch of the road gate clicked and footsteps sounded on the gravel.
The sergeant saluted and withdrew.
With regard to the Le Gautier letter, Boirac could simply deny knowledge, and La Touche did not see how he could be contradicted. It could even be argued that Felix might have bribed a clerk to copy the letter for him on that machine so as to throw suspicion on Boirac. If Felix were guilty, it would be a likely enough move.
INSPECTOR BURNLEY UP AGAINST IT
Then, said Clifford, if so, and Im inclined to agree with you, who carried out the trick? Some one must have had access to your study, either to write the letter there, or to abstract your blotter or a page of it which could afterwards be replaced. Who could that have been?
In the evening, La Touche gave Hill a good dinner, paid him well, and saw him off by the night train to London. Then he returned to his hotel, lit a cigar, and lay down on his bed to wrestle again with the problem of the alibi.
Martin, you put new life into me! God bless you for all youre doing! Will you arrange it with him? But, wait a minute, can I afford it? Are his fees very high?
It appeared that about 7.30 on the Tuesday evening of that week a dark, foreign-looking man with a pointed black beard had called at the office of Messrs. Johnson, the large carting agents in Waterloo Road, and had hired a dray and man for the two following days, as well as the use of an empty shed for the same period. He had instructed the carter to meet him at Waterloo Station at 10.00 next morning, Wednesday. There, on the arrival of the Southampton boat train, he had claimed the cask and had it loaded up on the dray, as was already known. The vehicle had been taken to the shed, where it had been left, the horse having been sent back to the stable. The black-bearded man had told the driver he might take the remainder of the day as a holiday, but that he wanted him to return on the following morning, Thursday, take the cask to Charing Cross, and there book it to Paris. He had handed him the amount of the freight as well as ten shillings for himself. Upon the man asking where in Paris the cask was to be sent, the other had told him he would leave it properly addressed. This he had done, for next morning the cask had a new label, bearing the name of Jaques de Belleville, Cloakroom, Gare du Nord. The carter had then left the black-bearded man in the shed with the cart and cask. Next morning he had booked the latter to Paris.
The detective then turned his thoughts to Cliffords theory of Boiracs guilt. And immediately he saw how the news crystallised the issue of the alibi. Up to the present the alibi had been considered as a whole, the portions which had been tested and those which had not, alike included. Generally speaking, it had been argued that if Boirac were in Paris and in Belgium during the fateful days, he could not have been in London. But now here was a direct issue between definite hours. At 7.30 on the Tuesday evening the bearded man was at Johnsons in the Waterloo Road. At 2.30 that same day Boirac was at Charenton. La Touche looked up his Continental Bradshaw. A train arrived at Victoria at 7.10, which would just enable a traveller from Paris to reach the carting contractors at the hour named. But that train left Paris at 12.00 noon. Therefore it was utterly and absolutely out of the question that Boirac could be the man. But then there was the typewriter. . . .
Well, gentlemen, said their friend of the previous afternoon, motioning them to be seated, I think Ive got the information you want. He took up some papers. I have here the receipt of the Southampton boat people for what we may call number one cask, which was handed them on the arrival of the 7.47 from this station on the night of the 30th ult. Here, he took up a similar paper, I have the receipt of the I. and C. Steam Navigation Co. at Rouen for cask number two, which left here by goods train on the 1st inst., and was got on board on the 3rd. Finally, our agent at the Goods Station at the rue Cardinet informs me he has found the porters who assisted to unload this number two cask when it arrived. You can see them by going down there now.
Necessary to tell this? thought the lawyer, to whom the fact that Felix had had knowledge of the dead woman came as an ugly discovery. Why, my good fellow, no other point in the whole case is likely to be more important for you. But aloud he only said:
And then La Touche saw that the whole business of the second cask must have been arranged simply to meet this difficulty. Boirac must have ordered it, forging Felixs handwriting. La Touche recollected that order was written on the same paper as the Le Gautier letter, suggesting a common origin for both. Boirac met it in London, took it to the shed, there removed and destroyed the statue, and had the cask returned to Paris. At the Gare du Nord he doubtless changed the labels, so that when it reached Dupierres it bore that with the address of his own house. The other label he must have altered from the Waterloo route to that of long sea. This would account for Duboiss statement that Boirac had changed the labels when he met him in the rue de La Fayette, as well as for the curious faking of that described by the clerk Broughton.
Let us see, then, just what we do know about the writer of the letter. Firstly, he must have known of the conversation about the lottery, and of the arrangement made by Felix and Le Gautier to enter for it. That is to say, he must either have been present in the Toisson dOr when it took place, or some one who was there must have repeated it to him. Secondly, he must have known all the circumstances of the sending out of the cask, at least as far as the false address and description were concerned. Thirdly, he must have had access to a rather worn typewriter, which we believe could be identified, and fourthly, he must have possessed, or been able to procure French note paper. So much is certain. We may also assume, though it has neither been proved, nor is it very important, that he could use the typewriter himself, as it is unlikely that such a letter would be done by a typist from dictation.