“Barry isn’t anywhere near a full-blooded negro,” protested the Inspector. “He has just a drop in his veins—just a drop, but it would have been more than enough for the Ives-Popes.... To get on. When the papers had been discovered and read—we knew everything. Who—how—why the crime was committed. So we took stock of our evidence to bring about a conviction. You can’t hale a man into court on a murder charge without evidence.... Well, what do you think we had? Nothing! “Let me discuss the clues which might have been useful as evidence. The lady’s purse—that was out. Valueless, as you know.... The source of the poison—a total failure. Incidentally, Barry did procure it exactly as Dr. Jones suggested—Jones, the toxicologist. Barry bought ordinary gasoline and distilled the tetra ethyl lead from it. There was no trace left.... Another possible clue—Monte Field’s hat. It was gone.... The extra tickets for the six vacant seats—we had never seen them and there seemed little chance that we ever would.... The only other material evidence—the papers—indicated motive but proved nothing. By this token Morgan might have committed the crime, or any member of Field’s criminal organization. “Our only hope for bringing about a conviction depended upon our scheme to have Barry’s apartment burglarized in the hope that either the hat, or the tickets, or some other clue like the poison or the poison-apparatus, would be found. Velie got me a professional housebreaker and Barry’s apartment was rifled Friday night while he was acting his rôle in the theatre. Not a trace of any of these clues came to light. The hat, the tickets, the poison—everything had been destroyed. Obviously, Barry would have done that; we could only make sure. “In desperation, I called a meeting of a number of the Monday night audience, hoping that I would find someone who remembered seeing Barry that night. Sometimes, you know, people recall events later which they forgot completely in the excitement of a previous quizzing. But this too, as it happened, was a failure. The only thing of value that turned up was the orangeade boy’s testimony about seeing Field pick up an evening bag in the alley. This got us nowhere as far as Barry was concerned, however. And remember that when we questioned the cast Thursday night we got no direct evidence from them. “So there we were with a beautifully hypothetical statement of facts for a jury, but not a shred of genuine evidence. The case we had to present would have offered no difficulties to a shrewd defending attorney. It was all circumstantial evidence, based chiefly on reasoning. You know as well as I do what a chance such a case would have in court.... Then my troubles really began, for Ellery had to leave town. “I racked my brains—the few I have.” Queen scowled at his empty coffee-cup. “Things looked black enough. How could I convict a man without evidence? It was maddening. And then Ellery did me the final service of wiring me a suggestion.”