On the floor lay the body of Klein, headless and fearful to behold. It was dressed in the well-known grey suit, but the clothes, for some mysterious reason, were slashed, as if with a knife. The coat was open and the waistcoat, but there were no wounds on the trunk that the constable could see. No knife or weapon of any sort was to be seen. The room was furnished plainly, with a deal table, kitchen chairs and an old horsehair sofa. Neither chairs or table were overset; there was no mark at all of a struggle, nothing to hint of a tragedy enacted there, nothing, that is to say, but the headless body lying upon the floor. The constable, a man of great intelligence, closed the door on the murmuring throng outside, and made a minute examination of the room. He searched the floor carefully; there were no marks of footsteps, but in a corner lay something white; he picked it up, it was a silk handkerchief, marked with the initials “A.G.” On the mantel, beside a tin candlestick, lay a letter, an envelope containing the envelope and letter which Sir Anthony had received that morning, and a sheet of paper on which was written: “Paris, Feb. 8th. ”You will not escape me; neither you or the secret you carry, which is also mine. If necessary, I will follow you to the ends of the earth—and beyond, “KLEIN.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XIII “SO,” said Freyberger, when this detailed description of the affair had been given to him by his Chief, “it is briefly this: Gyde was being blackmailed by this man; he called on him, murdered him, and cut off his head, put it in a bag, came to London with the bag and slipped out of his London house, carrying with him his jewels. It is an extraordinarily strange case.” “It seems clear enough.” “Not to me, sir—excuse me for saying so.” The Chief of the Criminal Investigation Department had long had his eye on Freyberger. He recognized genius in the man. He knew his temperament also, and that, if given a full rein and let speak and act as he liked he blossomed; but, if snubbed or kept in check he wilted, and became just an ordinary detective. “Just explain yourself,” he said. “Give me the points in your mind that strike you.” “Well, sir,” said the other, “why did this man leave those utterly damning letters behind him on the mantelpiece?” “You know as well as I do,” replied the Chief, “that in every criminal’s brain there is a black spot, a vacant point that betrays him, and leads him to do some act, some extraordinarily stupid act, which in turn leads him—here.” “Quite so. Why did he cut off his victim’s head—what in the name of heaven did he want to burden himself with a human head for? The man was known in the neighbourhood, his body was there to be identified; taking the head away would seem to serve no known purpose, unless he intended to keep it as a curiosity or memento.”