son swung the porch door shut. The two policemen stood back of
Bristow of chair. Greenleaf, still bewildered, laid a calming hand on
Fulton's shoulder. The old man was shaking like a leaf.

"All right," agreed Braceway. "I can give you the important points in a
very few minutes; the high lights."

CHAPTER XXVIII

CONFESSION VOLUNTARY

Braceway leaned against the mantel, relaxed, swinging his cane slowly in
his right hand, a careless, easy grace in his attitude. He addressed
himself to Fulton and Greenleaf, an occasional glance including
Abrahamson in the circle of those for whose benefit he spoke.

Bristow listened now in unfeigned absorption, estimating every statement,
weighing each detail. The tenseness of his pale face showed how he forced
his brain to concentration.

"Having decided that the bearded man and the murderer were the same,"
Braceway began, "I asked myself this question: 'Who, of all those in
Furmville, is so connected with the case now that I am warranted in
thinking he did the previous blackmailing and this murder?' And I
eliminated in my own mind everybody but Lawrence Bristow. He was the one,
the only one, who could have annoyed Mrs. Withers one and four years ago,
respectively, and also could have murdered her.

"Morley was at once out of the reckoning; he had known the Fultons for
only the past three years. To consider the negro, Perry Carpenter, would
have been absurd. Withers, of course, was beyond suspicion. Everything
pointed to Bristow.

"With that decision last Wednesday afternoon, I went to Number Five and
got all the finger-prints visible on the polished surfaces of the chair
which was handled, overturned, in the living room the night of the
murder. Fortunately, this polish was inferior enough to have been made
gummy by the rain and dampness that night; and, in the stress of the few
days following, had been neither dusted nor wiped off.

"Bristow did not touch this chair the morning the murder was discovered.
In fact, he cautioned everybody not to touch it.

"Reliable witnesses say he didn't touch it between then and the time I
got the finger-prints. He declares he was never in the bungalow before he
entered it in response to Miss Fulton's cry for help.

"I found on the chair the finger-prints of five different persons, four
afterwards identified: Miss Fulton, the coroner, Miss Kelly and Lucy
Thomas. The fifth I was unable to check up then.

"I did so later, in Washing