“No doubt we can establish this fellow’s identity in time—­sooner than we think, perhaps, for most of the morning papers will run his picture, and if he is known here in New York at all, it will be recognised by some one.  When we find out who he is, we can probably guess at the nature of his business with Vantine.  We can find out who the woman was who called to see Vantine to-night—­that is just a case of grilling Rogers; then we can run her down and get her secret out of her.  We can find why Rogers is trying to shield her.  All that is comparatively simple.  But when we have done it all, when we have all these facts in hand, I am afraid we shall find that they are utterly unimportant.”

“Unimportant?” I echoed.  “But surely—­”

“Unimportant because we don’t want to know these things.  What we want to know is how Philip Vantine and this unknown Frenchman were killed.  And that is just the one thing which, I am convinced, neither the man nor the woman nor Rogers nor anybody else we have come across in this case can tell us.  There’s a personality behind all this that we haven’t even suspected yet, and which, I am free to confess, I don’t know how to get at.  It puzzles me; it rather frightens me; it’s like a threatening shadow which one can’t get hold of.”

There was a moment’s silence; then, I decided, the time had come for me to speak.

“Godfrey,” I said, “what I am about to tell you is told in confidence, and must be held in confidence until I give you permission to use it.  Do you agree?”

“Go on,” he said, his eyes on my face.

“Well, I believe I know how these two men were killed.  Listen.”

And I told him in detail the story of the Boule cabinet; I repeated Vantine’s theory of its first ownership; I named the price which he was ready to pay for it; I described the difference between an original and a counterpart, and dwelt upon Vantine’s assertion that this was an original of unique and unquestionable artistry.  Long before I had finished, Godfrey was out of his chair and pacing up and down the room, his face flushed, his eyes glowing.

“Beautiful!” he murmured from time to time.  “Immense!  What a case it will make, Lester!” he cried, stopping before my chair and beaming down upon me, as I finished the story.  “Unique, too; that’s the beauty of it!  As unique as this adorable Boule cabinet!”

“Then you see it, too?” I questioned, a little disappointed that my theory should seem so evident.

“See it?” and he dropped into his chair again.  “A man would be blind not to see it.  But all the same, Lester, I give you credit for putting the facts together.  So many of us—­Grady, for instance! —­aren’t able to do that, or to see which facts are essential and which are negligible.  Now the fact that Vantine had accidentally come into possession of a Boule cabinet would probably seem negligible to Grady, whereas it is the one big essential fact in this whole case.  And it was you who saw it.”