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"Fatality may be right," murmured the Chief Inspector, his eyes fixed upon Lord Marcus with an expression no doubt similar to that which fired the eyes of Torquemada when he rebuked a heretic. "Mysel', I would ca' it the Hand of God. His ways are strange and beyond computing. And I think, Lord Marcus, that what ye sought to know, it is not intended that man should know."

Lord Marcus smiled: It was a sweet and a wistful smile. "You may even be wiser than I, Chief Inspector. I am perhaps not sufficiently purified. Indeed, I may venture too greatly. But I sought, not for my own good, but for the good of the world. This I ask you to believe."

And in fact, despite all that they had seen, all that they suspected, despite memories of the entranced woman upon whose lips rested a smile at once voluptuous and mystic, no one of the three doubted this man's sincerity. But each, in his different degree, doubted his sanity.

Bluett had managed to recall the fact that Lord Marcus in his younger days had been a notable boxer: he remained, for all his asceticism, a physically powerful man. Furthermore, the Detective-sergeant, whose special province was the morals of Mayfair, had recognised the woman. She was none other than the once notorious Mrs. Vane, whose adventures, matrimonial and extra-matrimonial, had afforded society journalists just before the war many spicy paragraphs. In his practical way he was reconstructing what might have occurred; and in the light of this reconstruction, Lord Marcus Amberdale already as good as stood in the dock. He cast a swift glance from ingenuous eyes at his superior. But there was nothing in the way in which Firth was looking at Lord Marcus to suggest that he shared Bluett's views.