‘All?  Do you know what I am here to speak of?’ enquired Morris—.  ’The barrel.’

Pitman turned pale, but it was with manly indignation.  ’You are the man!’ he cried.  ‘You very wicked person.’

‘Am I to speak before him?’ asked Morris, disregarding these severe expressions.

‘He has been present throughout,’ said Pitman.  ’He opened the barrel; your guilty secret is already known to him, as well as to your Maker and myself.’

‘Well, then,’ said Morris, ‘what have you done with the money?’

‘I know nothing about any money,’ said Pitman.

‘You needn’t try that on,’ said Morris.  ’I have tracked you down; you came to the station sacrilegiously disguised as a clergyman, procured my barrel, opened it, rifled the body, and cashed the bill.  I have been to the bank, I tell you!  I have followed you step by step, and your denials are childish and absurd.’

‘Come, come, Morris, keep your temper,’ said Mr Appleby.

‘Michael!’ cried Morris, ‘Michael here too!’

‘Here too,’ echoed the lawyer; ’here and everywhere, my good fellow; every step you take is counted; trained detectives follow you like your shadow; they report to me every three-quarters of an hour; no expense is spared.’

Morris’s face took on a hue of dirty grey.  ’Well, I don’t care; I have the less reserve to keep,’ he cried.  ’That man cashed my bill; it’s a theft, and I want the money back.’

‘Do you think I would lie to you, Morris?’ asked Michael.

‘I don’t know,’ said his cousin.  ‘I want my money.’

‘It was I alone who touched the body,’ began Michael.

‘You?  Michael!’ cried Morris, starting back.  ’Then why haven’t you declared the death?’ ‘What the devil do you mean?’ asked Michael.

‘Am I mad? or are you?’ cried Morris.

‘I think it must be Pitman,’ said Michael.

The three men stared at each other, wild-eyed.

‘This is dreadful,’ said Morris, ’dreadful.  I do not understand one word that is addressed to me.’

‘I give you my word of honour, no more do I,’ said Michael.

‘And in God’s name, why whiskers?’ cried Morris, pointing in a ghastly manner at his cousin.  ‘Does my brain reel?  How whiskers?’

‘O, that’s a matter of detail,’ said Michael.

There was another silence, during which Morris appeared to himself to be shot in a trapeze as high as St Paul’s, and as low as Baker Street Station.

‘Let us recapitulate,’ said Michael, ’unless it’s really a dream, in which case I wish Teena would call me for breakfast.  My friend Pitman, here, received a barrel which, it now appears, was meant for you.  The barrel contained the body of a man.  How or why you killed him...’

‘I never laid a hand on him,’ protested Morris.  ’This is what I have dreaded all along.  But think, Michael!  I’m not that kind of man; with all my faults, I wouldn’t touch a hair of anybody’s head, and it was all dead loss to me.  He got killed in that vile accident.’