he was
black!"

"All cats are gray in the dark, Carteret; and, moreover, nothing is
easier than for a white man to black his face. God alone knows how many
crimes have been done in this guise! Tom Delamere, to get the money to
pay his gambling debts, committed this foul murder, and then tried to
fasten it upon as honest and faithful a soul as ever trod the earth."

Carteret, though at first overwhelmed by this announcement, perceived
with quick intuition that it might easily be true. It was but a step
from fraud to crime, and in Delamere's need of money there lay a
palpable motive for robbery,--the murder may have been an afterthought.
Delamere knew as much about the cedar chest as the negro could have
known, and more.

But a white man must not be condemned without proof positive.

"What foundation is there, sir," he asked, "for this astounding charge?"

Mr. Delamere related all that had taken place since he had left
Belleview a couple of hours before, and as he proceeded, step by step,
every word carried conviction to Carteret. Tom Delamere's skill as a
mimic and a negro impersonator was well known; he had himself laughed at
more than one of his performances. There had been a powerful motive, and
Mr. Delamere's discoveries had made clear the means. Tom's unusual
departure, before breakfast, on a fishing expedition was a suspicious
circumstance. There was a certain devilish ingenuity about the affair
which he would hardly have expected of Tom Delamere, but for which the
reason was clear enough. One might have thought that Tom would have been
satisfied with merely blacking his face, and leaving to chance the
identification of the negro who might be apprehended. He would hardly
have implicated, out of pure malignity, his grandfather's old servant,
who had been his own care-taker for many years. Here, however, Carteret
could see where Tom's own desperate position operated to furnish a
probable motive for the crime. The surest way to head off suspicion from
himself was to direct it strongly toward some particular person, and
this he had been able to do conclusively by his access to Sandy's
clothes, his skill in making up to resemble him, and by the episode of
the silk purse. By placing himself beyond reach during the next day, he
would not be called upon to corroborate or deny any inculpating
statements which Sandy might make, and in the very probable case that
the crime should be summarily avenged, any such statements