went back to the table and picked up the newspaper, but had
hardly begun to read when the telephone bell rang. He picked up the
receiver and listened. To his amazement it was the voice of Cresswell,
the Assistant Commissioner of Police, who had been instrumental in
persuading Tarling to come to England.

"Can you come round to the Yard immediately, Tarling?" said the voice. "I
want to talk to you about this murder."

"Surely," said Tarling. "I'll be with you in a few minutes."

In five minutes he was at Scotland Yard and was ushered into the office
of Assistant Commissioner Cresswell. The white-haired man who came across
to meet him with a smile of pleasure in his eyes disclosed the object of
the summons.

"I'm going to bring you into this case, Tarling," he said. "It has
certain aspects which seem outside the humdrum experience of our own
people. It is not unusual, as you know," he said, as he motioned the
other to a chair, "for Scotland Yard to engage outside help, particularly
when we have a crime of this character to deal with. The facts you know,"
he went on, as he opened a thin folder. "These are the reports, which you
can read at your leisure. Thornton Lyne was, to say the least, eccentric.
His life was not a particularly wholesome one, and he had many
undesirable acquaintances, amongst whom was a criminal and ex-convict
who was only released from gaol a few days ago."

"That's rather extraordinary," said Tarling, lifting his eyebrows. "What
had he in common with the criminal?"

Commissioner Cresswell shrugged his shoulders.

"My own view is that this acquaintance was rather a pose of Lyne's. He
liked to be talked about. It gave him a certain reputation for character
amongst his friends."

"Who is the criminal?" asked Tarling.

"He is a man named Stay, a petty larcenist, and in my opinion a much more
dangerous character than the police have realised."

"Is he----" began Tarling. But the Commissioner shook his head.

"I think we can rule him out from the list of people who may be suspected
of this murder," he said. "Sam Stay has very few qualities that would
commend themselves to the average man, but there can be no doubt at all
that he was devoted to Lyne, body and soul. When the detective
temporarily in charge of the case went down to Lambeth to interview Stay,
he found him lying on his bed prostrate with grief, with a newspaper
containing the particulars of the murder by his side. The man is beside