The thing to do now was to remove the body. Lifting it out, they laid it over the horse’s saddle, and, guiding the nervous animal down to the road, led it towards Beaconsfield. Here a second complication arose: the lights of Mr. Enward’s car were seen coming toward them. The body was dropped by the side of the road, and the constable took his place on the horse’s back. The animal was smothered with the blood of the murdered man, and the clerk of Mr. Enward, the lawyer, taking the bridle quite innocently, must have rubbed his sleeve along the shoulder, for it was afterwards discovered that his coat was stained. That gave me my first clue, and I was able, owing to my peculiar mind, to reconstruct the crime as it had been committed. The two men joined one another again in the vicinity of the cottage. They were not able to make any further attempt that night. One of them, however, heard that the girl knew where the money was cached. I am afraid I was responsible for this, and it was intended that she should be taken away, with the key of the safe deposit.… Machfield had already become acquainted with the straitened circumstances of young McKay, the son of his victim, and probably to hit at his father, who he must have known was still hunting for him, used an opportunity which was offered by chance, to ruin him, as he believed. Two hundred pounds, representing a portion of the money obtained from the bank by a fraudulent manager (3 years Penal Servitude; Central Criminal Court) through the instrumentality of his woman friend (5 years P.S., C.C.C.) was sent anonymously to the younger McKay by Machfield, and was traced to the young man. After this came a note, also in Mr. Reeder’s hand: “Rufus John Machfield and Antonio Lamontaine (sentence: death, C.C.C.) executed at Wandsworth Prison, April 17th. Executioner Ellis.” Mr. Reeder was a stickler for facts. KENNEDY THE CON. MAN CHAPTER I The man who stood with such an air of ease in the dock of the North-West London Police Court bore himself with a certain insolent dignity. There was a smile which was half contemptuous, half-amused, on his bearded face. If, from time to time, his long white fingers thrust through the mass of goldy-brown hair that was brushed back from his high and narrow forehead, the gesture revealed neither nervousness nor embarrassment. Rather was this a trick of habit. Though he wore no collar or tie, and his clothes and patent-leather shoes were daubed with last night’s mud, the clothes were new and well cut; the diamond ring which he wore, and which now sparkled offensively in the early morning light, hinted most certainly at an affluence which might be temporary or permanent.