‘I know what you’re going to say,’ Legge interrupted, again with that gesture of admonishment. ‘You’re going to remind me that he opened it to get the iodine for my face. Do you suppose that I can ever forget that? I was doubly the instrument. That’s what upsets me so dreadfully. He must have done something then, and accidentally got it on his fingers. I don’t know. I don’t pretend it’s not a mystery.’ His face twitched dolorously. ‘I’m wretchedly unhappy,’ he whispered. ‘Miserable!’

People with no personal charm possess one weapon, an occasional appeal to our sense of pathos. There was something intolerably pitiable in Legge; in his furtiveness, his threadbare respectability, his obvious terror, and his little spurts of confidence. Alleyn had a violent desire to get rid of him, to thrust him away as something indecent and painful. But he said, ‘Mr Legge, have you any objections to our taking your fingerprints?’

The chair fell over as Legge got to his feet. He backed towards the door, turning his head from side to side and wringing his hands. Fox moved to the door but Legge seemed unaware of him. He gazed like a trapped animal at Alleyn.

‘O God!’ he said. ‘O dear! O dear me! O God, I knew you’d say that!’ and broke into tears.

II

‘Come now, Mr Legge,’ said Alleyn at last, ‘you mustn’t let the affair get on your nerves like this. If, as you think, Mr Watchman’s death was purely accidental, you have nothing to fear. There’s nothing very terrible in having your fingerprints taken.’

‘Yes, there is,’ contradicted Legge in a sort of fury. ‘It’s a perfectly horrible suggestion. I resent it. I deeply resent it. I most strongly object.’

‘Very well, then,’ said Alleyn placidly, ‘we won’t take them.’

Mr Legge blew his nose violently and looked over the top of his handkerchief at Alleyn.

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘that’s all very well, but I know what tricks you’ll get up to. You’ll get them by stealth, I know. I’ve heard of the practices that go in the police. I’ve studied the matter. It’s like everything else in a state governed by capitalism. Trickery and intimidation. You’ll give me photographs to identify and take my fingerprints from them.’

‘Not now you’ve warned us,’ said Alleyn.

‘You’ll get them against my will and then you’ll draw false conclusions from them. That’s what you’ll do.’

‘What sort of false conclusions?’

‘About me,’ cried Legge passionately, ‘about me.’

‘You know that’s all nonsense,’ said Alleyn quietly. ‘You will do yourself no good by talking like this.’

‘I won’t talk at all. I will not be trapped into making incriminating statements. I will not be kept in here against my will!’

‘You may go whenever you wish,’ said Alleyn. ‘Fox, will you open the door?’