"His behaviour was more damning than I dared hope it would be. When I sent him up the ladder I knew he was planning how he would play the part of the horrified discoverer of the suicide. I thought he would very likely recognise the dummy—it was simply a weighted sack—and I wanted to see how he would react. I hardly dared hope he would do what he did."

"What do you mean?"

"He didn't even look at it. He saw something that scraped the upper surface of the cloth and he thought it was the feet of the body. In his mind was the vivid picture of the swinging corpse and in the violent turbulence of his emotion he did not pause to look—did not want to look——He gave his magnificent performance of horror-struck discovery and—recognised Props! An innocent man would have looked and seen at once that a weighted sack hung from a rope."

"I wonder he consented to go up the ladder."

"He couldn't refuse. I treated the unfortunate Simpson to a display of official suspicion. The little man was scared out of his life, and Gardener was reassured. To refuse would have been impossible."

"There seems," said Nigel, "so little motive for so big a risk."

"Not when you go into the case. If Surbonadier had blown the gaff, Gardener would have been scrapped by Saint. If his authorship of the article in the Morning Express had come out, Saint could and would have done him incalculable harm. You may depend upon it that Surbonadier had been bleeding him for pretty hefty sums. A drug addict gets through lots of money. And Surbonadier could have given Stephanie Vaughan some very nasty information about Felix Gardener. I wonder how much Gardener himself had told her. Enough to make her risk that visit to the flat. She's a courageous creature."

Nigel looked curiously at him.

"She attracts you very much, doesn't she?" he ventured.

Alleyn got up and stood looking out into the yard. "When she's not being a leading lady, she does," he said coolly.

"You're a rum old fish."

"Think so? Come and have some lunch. I must get back to the Yard."

"I don't feel like eating," said Nigel.

"You'd better try."

They walked down the alley-way to the front of the theatre. The gigantic unicorn in steel and black glass glittered against its starry background. Alleyn and Nigel looked up at it for a moment.

"There's one unique feature in this case," said Alleyn.

"What's that?"

"Thanks to you I was able to watch the murder in comfort from a fifteen-and-sixpenny stall provided by the murderer."

He held up his stick to a taxi and they drove away in silence.