Once more Ganns struck before I expected him to do so and
I was, too late, confronted with the shattering truth. He had in
fact found me out. He returned to England, worked like a mole, dug
up my history, no doubt, and so came to the logical conclusion that
it appeared more reasonable Michael Pendean should murder Robert
Redmayne than the opposite. Having reached this conviction, his
reconstruction of each event threw added light; but even so it must
have been a spark of prodigious inspiration that identified in Doria
the vanished Cornishman.
Ganns is a great man on his own plane. But, though he is a greedy
creature who digs his grave with his knife and fork, though his
habit of drenching himself with powdered tobacco, instead of smoking
like a gentleman, is disgusting, yet I have nothing but admiration
for him. His little plot--to treat me to a dose of my own physic and
present a forgery of "Robert Redmayne" in the evening dusk--was
altogether admirable. The thing came in a manner so sudden and
unexpected that I failed of a perfect riposte.
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