“Hence, after carefully considering this part of the newspaper report, I came to the conclusion that the mysterious occurrence at Mr. Hurst’s house had only one reasonable explanation, namely, that the visitor was not John Bellingham, but someone personating him; and that that someone was Mr. Jellicoe.

“It remains to consider the case of Godfrey Bellingham and his daughter, though I cannot understand how any sane person can have seriously suspected either” (here Inspector Badger smiled a sour smile).  “The evidence against them was negligible, for there was nothing to connect them with the affair save the finding of the scarab on their premises; and that event, which might have been highly suspicious under other circumstances, was robbed of any significance by the fact that the scarab was found on a spot which had been passed a few minutes previously by the other suspected party, Hurst.  The finding of the scarab did, however, establish two important conclusions; namely, that John Bellingham had probably met with foul play, and that of the four persons present when it was found, one at least had had possession of the body.  As to which of the four was the one, the circumstances furnished only a hint, which was this:  If the scarab had been purposely dropped, the most likely person to find it was the one who dropped it.  And the person who discovered it was Mr. Jellicoe.

“Following up this hint, if we ask ourselves what motive Mr. Jellicoe could have had for dropping it—­assuming him to be the murderer—­the answer is obvious.  It would not be his policy to fix the crime on any particular person, but rather to set up a complication of conflicting evidence which would occupy the attention of investigators and divert it from himself.

“Of course, if Hurst had been the murderer, he would have had a sufficient motive for dropping the scarab, so that the case against Mr. Jellicoe was not conclusive; but the fact that it was he who found it was highly significant.

“This completes the analysis of the evidence contained in the original newspaper report describing the circumstances of the disappearance.  The conclusions that followed from it were, as you will have seen: 

“1.  That the missing man was almost certainly dead, as proved by the finding of the scarab after his disappearance.

“2.  That he had probably been murdered by one or more of four persons, as proved by the finding of the scarab on the premises occupied by two of them and accessible to the others.

“3.  That, of those four persons, one—­Mr. Jellicoe—­was the last person who was known to have been in the company of the missing man; had had an exceptional opportunity for committing the murder; and was known to have delivered a dead body to the Museum subsequently to the disappearance.

“4.  That the supposition that Mr. Jellicoe had committed the murder rendered all the other circumstances of the disappearance clearly intelligible, whereas on any other supposition they were quite inexplicable.