“So I suggested a scheme to Inspector Whyland, and here my chance thought of delivering a counter to myself came in useful. I was to go to Dorchester for the week-end—I was thankful for the evidence I had already laid that the fatal period and place were the week-end and Praed Street—and he was to remain here on the watch for the assassin who threatened me. It amused me to think that the solution of the whole mystery would lie under his very eyes, for the cross-bow was on that bench, and the air-gun stands in a rack in my bedroom. But, since I had invited him, I knew that he would attach no importance to these things, even if he noticed them. I left him in possession, and went to Dorchester. But from there I took a train to Wareham, and walked across the heath to Dr. Morlandson’s cottage, where I most artistically converted Mr. Ludgrove into the Black Sailor. “You must remember that I lived on that heath for a year, during Dr. Morlandson’s lifetime. I have been there frequently since. There is a disused clay working not far from the cottage, and in this I had secreted a number of useful articles, among them a bicycle. With this I watched in the heather, feeling certain that you would not disappoint me. You did not, and our most interesting interview took place. “After you had started for home, I made my preparations for departure. It was just possible that you would set the local police on my track, and I was taking no risks. I rolled a round and heavy stone over the path, which gave the sand a level and untrodden appearance, and effectually removed all traces of my bicycle. Then I walked to a spot on the shores of Newton Bay, where I knew that a punt, which is very rarely used, was drawn up. In this I rowed across through the backwaters to a point on the Wareham channel above Lake. I left the punt here, turned myself back again into Mr. Ludgrove, and in the morning walked to Hamworthy Junction, whence I caught a train to Dorchester. I was in plenty of time to dig my colchicum bulbs and return to London. “Now, Dr. Priestley, I feel that I owe you some apology. Matters have turned out very differently from what I had expected, owing to circumstances over which I have no control. I had intended that you should survive for months, even perhaps years, in daily expectation of death leaping out at you from some unexpected corner. You are a determined man, but I think you will agree that even your iron will would have broken down at last under the strain. Every now and then, when you were most absorbed in your labours, a warning would reach you, a hint that the sands were running out, that you might not be allowed time even to finish the immediate task. I think in time you would have known something of the horror of despair which grips the innocent man condemned ruthlessly and without mercy, as you condemned Dr. Morlandson, Dr. Priestley.”