disappeared. Brake, when he came out of
prison, went abroad--possibly with the idea of tracking them. Meanwhile,
as is quite evident, he engaged in business and did well. He came back
to England as John Braden, and, for the reason of which you're aware,
he paid a visit to Wrychester, utterly unaware that any one known to him
lived here. Now, try to reconstruct what happened. He looks round the
Close that morning. He sees the name of Dr. Mark Ransford on the brass
plate of a surgery door. He goes to the surgery, asks a question, makes
a remark, goes away. What is the probable sequence of events? He
meets Ransford near the Cathedral--where Ransford certainly was. They
recognize each other--most likely they turn aside, go up to that gallery
as a quiet place, to talk--there is an altercation--blows--somehow
or other, probably from accident, Braden is thrown through that open
doorway, to his death. And--Collishaw saw what happened!"

Bryce was watching his listeners, turning alternately from one to the
other. But it needed little attention on his part to see that theirs
was already closely strained; each man was eagerly taking in all that
he said and suggested. And he went on emphasizing every point as he made
it.

"Collishaw saw what happened?" he repeated. "That, of course, is
theory--supposition. But now we pass from theory back to actual fact.
I'll tell you something now, Mitchington, which you've never heard of,
I'm certain. I made it in my way, after Collishaw's death, to get
some information, secretly, from his widow, who's a fairly shrewd,
intelligent woman for her class. Now, the widow, in looking over her
husband's effects, in a certain drawer in which he kept various personal
matters, came across the deposit book of a Friendly Society of which
Collishaw had been a member for some years. It appears that he,
Collishaw, was something of a saving man, and every year he managed to
put by a bit of money out of his wages, and twice or thrice in the year
he took these savings--never very much; merely a pound or two--to this
Friendly Society, which, it seems, takes deposits in that way from its
members. Now, in this book is an entry--I saw it--which shows that only
two days before his death, Collishaw paid fifty pounds--fifty pounds,
mark you!--into the Friendly Society. Where should Collishaw get fifty
pounds, all of a sudden! He was a mason's labourer, earning at the very
outside twenty-six or eight shillings a week. Ac