Then, unfortunately, she was seized with the burning desire of seeing the famous scene from the wings. She thought that the place was quite safe, and that George Finch was as usual at his post.

“‘I was going along the short passage that leads to the wings,’ she exclaimed to the detectives, ‘when I became aware of someone moving some distance behind me. I turned and saw a blue domino about to enter Miss Morgan’s dressing-room.

“‘I thought nothing of that,’ continued the girl, ‘as we all know that Mr Dennis is engaged to Miss Morgan. He is very fond of “walking on” in the ballroom scene, and he always wears a blue domino when he does; so I was not at all alarmed. He had his mask on as usual, and he was carrying a bunch of roses. When he saw me at the other end of the passage, he waved his hand to me and pointed to the flowers. I nodded to him, and then he went into the room.’

“These statements, as you may imagine, created a great deal of sensation; so much so, in fact, that Mr Kidd, with his £10,000 and his reputation in mind, moved heaven and earth to bring about the prosecution of Mr Dennis for theft and fraud.

“The papers were full of it, for Mr Howard Dennis was well known in fashionable London society. His answer to these curious statements was looked forward to eagerly; when it came it satisfied no one and puzzled everybody.

“‘Miss Knight was mistaken,’ he said most emphatically, ‘I did not bring any roses for Miss Morgan that night. It was not I that she saw in a blue domino by the door, as I was on the stage before the curtain was rung up for the second act, and never left it until the close.’

“This part of Howard Dennis’ statement was a little difficult to substantiate. No one on the stage could swear positively whether he was ‘on’ early in the act or not, although, mind you, Macpherson had ascertained that in the whole crowd of supers on the stage, he was the only one who wore a blue domino.

“Mr Kidd was very active in the matter, but Miss Morgan flatly refused to believe in her fiancée’s guilt. The worthy jeweller maintained that Mr Howard Dennis was the only person who knew the celebrated pearls and their quaint clasp well enough to have a facsimile made of them, and that when Miss Knight saw him enter the dressing-room, he actually substituted the false necklace for the real one; while the loafer who drugged George Finch’s beer was – as everyone supposed – only a dupe.

“Things had reached a very acute and painful stage, when one more detail found its way into the papers, which, whilst entirely clearing Mr Howard Dennis’ character, has helped to make the whole affair a hopeless mystery.

“Whilst questioning George Finch, Macpherson had ascertained that the stage door-keeper had seen Mr Dennis enter the theatre some time before the beginning of the celebrated second act. He stopped to speak to George Finch for a moment or two, and the latter could swear positively that Mr Dennis was not carrying any roses then.

“On the other hand a flower-girl, who was selling roses in the neighbourhood of the Novelty Theatre late that memorable night, remembers selling some roses to a shabbily dressed man, who looked like a labourer out of work. When Mr Dennis was pointed out to her she swore positively that it was not he.

“‘The man looked like a labourer,’ she explained. ‘I took particular note of him, as I remember thinking that he didn’t look much as if he could afford to buy roses.’

“Now you see,” concluded the man in the corner excitedly, “where the hitch lies. There is absolutely no doubt, judging from the evidence of George Finch and of the flower-girl, that the loafer had provided himself with the roses, and had somehow or other managed to get hold of a blue domino, for the purpose of committing the theft. His giving drugged beer to Finch, moreover, proved his guilt beyond a doubt.

“But here the mystery becomes hopeless,” he added with a chuckle, “for the loafer dropped the booty which he had stolen – that booty was the false necklace, and it has remained an impenetrable mystery to this day as to who made the substitution and when.

“A whole year has elapsed since then, but the real necklace has never been traced or found; so Mr Kidd has paid, with absolute quixotic chivalry, the sum of £10,000 to Miss Morgan, and thus he has completely cleared the firm of Kidd and Co. of any suspicion as to its integrity.”

3

“But then, what in the world is the explanation of it all?” I asked bewildered, as the funny creature paused in his narrative and seemed absorbed in the contemplation of a beautiful knot he had just completed in his bit of string.

“The explanation is so simple,” he replied, “for it is obvious, is it not? that only four people could possibly have committed the fraud.”

“Who are they?” I asked.

“Well,” he said, whilst his bony fingers began to fidget with that eternal piece of string, “there is, of course, old Mr Kidd; but as the worthy jeweller has paid £10,000 to prove that he did not steal the real necklace and substitute a false one in its stead, we must assume that he was guiltless. Then, secondly, there is Mr Howard Dennis.”

“Well, yes,” I said, “what about him?”

“There were several points in his favour,” he rejoined, marking each point with a fresh and most complicated knot; “it was not he who bought the roses, therefore it was not he who, clad in a blue domino, entered Miss Morgan’s dressing-room directly after Knight left it.

“And mark the force of this point,” he added excitedly.

“Just before the curtain rang up for the second act, Miss Morgan had been in her room, and had then undone the packet, which, in her own words, was just as she had received it from Mr Kidd’s hands.

“After that Miss Knight remained in charge, and a mere ten seconds after she left the room she saw the blue domino carrying the roses at the door.

“The flower-girl’s story and that of George Finch have proved that the blue domino could not have been Mr Dennis, but it was the loafer who eventually stole the false necklace.

“If you bear all this in mind you will realize that there was no time in those ten seconds for Mr Dennis to have made the substitution before the theft was committed. It stands to reason that he could not have done it afterwards.

“Then, again, many people suspected Miss Knight, the dresser; but this supposition we may easily dismiss. An uneducated, stupid girl, not three-and-twenty, could not possibly have planned so clever a substitution. An imitation necklace of that particular calibre and made to order would cost far more money than a poor theatrical dresser could ever afford; let alone the risks of ordering such an ornament to be made.

“No,” said the funny creature, with comic emphasis, “there is but one theory possible, which is my own.”

“And that is?” I asked eagerly.

“The workman, Rumford, of course,” he responded triumphantly. “Why! it jumps to the eyes, as our French friends would tell us. Who other than he, could have the opportunity of making an exact copy of the necklace which had been entrusted to his firm?

“Being in the trade he could easily obtain the false stones without exciting any undue suspicion; being a skilled craftsman, he could easily make the clasp, and string the pearls in exact imitation of the original; he could do this secretly in his own home and without the slightest risk.

“Then the plan, though extremely simple, was very cleverly thought out. Disguised as the loafer –”

“The loafer!” I exclaimed.

“Why, yes! the loafer,” he replied quietly; “disguised as the loafer, he hung round the stage door of the Novelty after business hours, until he had collected the bits of gossip and information he wanted; thus he learnt that Mr Howard Dennis was Miss Morgan’s accredited fiancée; that he, like everybody else who was available, ‘walked on’ in the second act; and that during that time the back of the stage was practically deserted.

“No doubt he knew all along that Mr Kidd meant to take the pearls down to the theatre himself that night, and it was quite easy to ascertain that Miss Morgan – as the hapless heroine – wore no jewellery in the second act, and that Mr Howard Dennis invariably wore a blue domino.

“Some people might incline to the belief that Miss Knight was a paid accomplice, that she left the dressing-room unprotected on purpose, and that her story of the blue domino and the roses was prearranged between herself and Rumford, but that is not my opinion.

“I think that the scoundrel was far too clever to need any accomplice, and too shrewd to put himself thereby at the mercy of a girl like Knight.

“Rumford, I find, is a married man: this to me explains the blue domino, which the police were never able to trace to any business place, where it might have been bought or hired. Like the necklace itself, it was ‘home-made’.

“Having got his properties and his plans ready, Rumford then set to work. You must remember that a stage doorkeeper is never above accepting a glass of beer from a friendly acquaintance; and, no doubt, if George Finch had not asked the loafer to bring him a glass, the latter would have offered him one. To drug the beer was simple enough; then Rumford went to buy the roses, and, I should say, met his wife somewhere round the corner, who handed him the blue domino and the mask; all this was done in order to completely puzzle the police subsequently, and also in order to throw suspicion, if possible, upon young Dennis.

“As soon as the drug took effect upon George Finch, Rumford slipped into the theatre. To slip a mask and domino on and off is, as you know, a matter of a few seconds. Probably his intention had been – if he found Knight in the room – to knock her down if she attempted to raise an alarm; but here fortune favoured him.