oceeding to examine the fireplace. It was immediately apparent to him
that the pistol had not been placed in the grate or beneath it. Either
place would have meant discovery when the room was searched. It was a
careful examination of the upper portion of the grate which suggested
the hiding-place. The weapon could have been safely hidden within the
broad iron flange running round the open damper of the grate.

The complete revelation of this portion of the murderer's design came to
Colwyn as he was passing his hand over the inner surface of this ledge.
It was a register grate, and the space at the back had not been filled
in. The murderer, when concealing the pistol at the top of the grate,
had only to balance it carefully on the flange, with the muzzle pointing
into the room, to ensure that the recoil from the report would cause the
weapon to fall into the deep hole between the back of the grate and the
chimney.

This additional proof of the murderer's perverted intelligence impressed
Colwyn as much as the mechanism for the false report. The pistol,
blindly recoiling and jumping behind the grate after the explosion of
the blank charge, was almost as effectually concealed as at the bottom
of the sea, and might have remained there for years without discovery.
Colwyn plunged his arm into the hole, but could not reach the bottom.

But the murderer had more in his mind than the effectual concealment of
the pistol, important though that was to him. The grate was an excellent
choice for two other reasons. It carried the slight vapour from the
tinder wick up the chimney, and the convex iron interior formed an
excellent sounding board which would enhance the sound of the report.
Truly the dark being who had planned it all had left nothing to chance.
He had foreseen everything. His handiwork bore the stamp of unholy
genius.

Who had done this thing? Who had sought, with such patient cunning, to
upset those evidential principles by which blind Justice gropes her
hesitating way to Truth? In concocting his masterpiece of malignant
ingenuity the murderer had worked alone. His only accomplice--apart from
the after-hand of Fate--was a piece of automatic mechanism which had
done his bidding secretly, and would never have betrayed him. It was
this ability to work alone, scheming and brooding in solitary
concentration until the whole of the horrible conception had been
perfected in every degree, which stamped the designer as a ferocio