“As sure as I'm a living man, gentlemen!” he suddenly burst out, “I'd no willing hand in Mr. Brake's death! I'll tell you the exact truth; I'll take my oath of it whenever you like. I'd have been thankful to tell, many a time, but for--for Wraye. He wouldn't let me at first, and afterwards it got complicated. It was this way. That morning--when Mr. Brake was found dead--I had occasion to go up into that gallery under the clerestory. I suddenly came on him face to face. He recognized me. And--I'm telling you the solemn, absolute truth, gentlemen!--he'd no sooner recognized me than he attacked me, seizing me by the arm. I hadn't recognized him at first, I did when he laid hold of me. I tried to shake him off, tried to quiet him; he struggled--I don't know what he wanted to do--he began to cry out--it was a wonder he wasn't heard in the church below, and he would have been only the organ was being played rather loudly. And in the struggle he slipped--it was just by that open doorway--and before I could do more than grasp at him, he shot through the opening and fell! It was sheer, pure accident, gentlemen! Upon my soul, I hadn't the least intention of harming him.” “And after that?” asked Mitchington, at the end of a brief silence. “I saw Mr. Folliot--Wraye,” continued Flood. “Just afterwards, that was. I told him; he bade me keep silence until we saw how things went. Later he forced me to be silent. What could I do? As things were, Wraye could have disclaimed me--I shouldn't have had a chance. So I held my tongue.” “Now, then, Collishaw?” demanded Mitchington. “Give us the truth about that. Whatever the other was, that was murder!” Flood lifted his hand and wiped away the perspiration that had gathered on his face. “Before God, gentlemen!” he answered. “I know no more--at least, little more--about that than you do! I'll tell you all I do know. Wraye and I, of course, met now and then and talked about this. It got to our ears at last that Collishaw knew something. My own impression is that he saw what occurred between me and Mr. Brake--he was working somewhere up there. I wanted to speak to Collishaw. Wraye wouldn't let me, he bade me leave it to him. A bit later, he told me he'd squared Collishaw with fifty pounds--” Mitchington and the detective exchanged looks. “Wraye--that's Folliot--paid Collishaw fifty pounds, did he?” asked the detective. “He told me so,” replied Flood. “To hold his tongue. But I'd scarcely heard that when I heard of Collishaw's sudden death. And as to how that happened, or who--who brought it about--upon my soul, gentlemen, I know nothing! Whatever I may have thought, I never mentioned it to Wraye--never! I--I daren't! You don't know what a man Wraye is! I've been under his thumb most of my life and--and what are you going to do with me, gentlemen?”