stonished Assistant Commissioner, "and what do you
mean by 'in it'?"

"In the concrete sense I wish you had not been present when I returned,"
said the other moodily, "I wanted to be finished with the whole sordid
business without in any way involving my friends."

"I think you are too sensitive," laughed the other, clapping him on the
shoulder. "I want you to unburden yourself to me, my dear chap, and tell
me anything you can that will help me to clear up this mystery."

John Lexman looked straight ahead with a worried frown.

"I would do almost anything for you, T. X.," he said quietly, "the more
so since I know how good you were to Grace, but I can't help you in this
matter. I hated Kara living, I hate him dead," he cried, and there was
a passion in his voice which was unmistakable; "he was the vilest thing
that ever drew the breath of life. There was no villainy too despicable,
no cruelty so horrid but that he gloried in it. If ever the devil were
incarnate on earth he took the shape and the form of Remington Kara. He
died too merciful a death by all accounts. But if there is a God, this
man will suffer for his crimes in hell through all eternity."

T. X. looked at him in astonishment. The hate in the man's face took
his breath away. Never before had he experienced or witnessed such a
vehemence of loathing.

"What did Kara do to you?" he demanded.

The other looked out of the window.

"I am sorry," he said in a milder tone; "that is my weakness. Some day I
will tell you the whole story but for the moment it were better that
it were not told. I will tell you this," he turned round and faced the
detective squarely, "Kara tortured and killed my wife."

T. X. said no more.

Half way through lunch he returned indirectly to the subject.

"Do you know Gathercole?" he asked.

T. X. nodded.

"I think you asked me that question once before, or perhaps it was
somebody else. Yes, I know him, rather an eccentric man with an
artificial arm."

"That's the cove," said T. X. with a little sigh; "he's one of the few
men I want to meet just now."

"Why?"

"Because he was apparently the last man to see Kara alive."

John Lexman looked at the other with an impatient jerk of his shoulders.

"You don't suspect Gathercole, do you?" he asked.

"Hardly," said the other drily; "in the first place the man that
committed this murder had two hands and needed them both. No, I only
want to ask that gentleman the subject of