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“We certainly did meet a Carleton Barker at Keswick on Tuesday, August 16th,” returned Parton; “and he was wounded in the shoulder, and his appearance was what might have been expected of one who had been through just such a frightful murder as we understand this to have been; but this was explained to us as due to a fall over rocks in the vicinity of the Scales Tarn–which was plausible enough to satisfy my friend here.”

“And not yourself?” queried the attorney.

“Well, I don’t see what that has to do with it,” returned Parton. “As to the locality there is no question. He was there. We saw him, and others saw him, and we have taken the trouble to come down here to state the fact, and have brought with us the call-boy from the hotel, who can support our testimony if it is not regarded as sufficient. I advise you, however, as attorney for Barker, not to inquire too deeply into that matter, because I am convinced that if he isn’t guilty of this crime–as of course he is not–he hasn’t the cleanest record in the world. He has bad written on every line of his face, and there were one or two things connected with our meeting with him that mightn’t be to his taste to have mentioned in court.”

“I don’t need advice, thank you,” said the attorney, dryly. “I wish simply to establish the fact of his presence at Keswick at the hour of 5 P.M. on Tuesday, August 16th. That was the hour at which the murder is supposed–in fact, is proved–to have been committed. At 5.30, according to witnesses, my client was seen in the neighborhood, faint with loss of blood from a knife-wound in the shoulder. Barker has the knife-wound, but he might have a dozen of them and be acquitted if he wasn’t in Frewenton on the day in question.”

“You may rely upon us to prove that,” said I. “We will swear to it. We can produce tangible objects presented to us on that afternoon by Barker–“

“I can’t produce mine,” said Parton. “I threw it into the lake.”

“Well, I can produce the stone he gave me,” said I, “and I’ll do it if you wish.”

“That will be sufficient, I think,” returned the attorney. “Barker spoke especially about that stone, for it was a half of an odd souvenir of the East, where he was born, and he fortunately has the other half. The two will fit together at the point where the break was made, and our case will be complete.”

The attorney then left us. The following day we appeared at the preliminary examination, which proved to be the whole examination as well, since, despite the damning circumstantial evidence against Barker, evidence which shook my belief almost in the veracity of my own eyes, our plain statements, substantiated by the evidence of the call-boy and the two halves of the oriental pebble, one in my possession and the other in Barker’s, brought about the discharge of the prisoner from custody; and the “Frewenton Atrocity” became one of many horrible murders, the mystery of which time alone, if anything, could unravel.

After Barker was released he came to me and thanked me most effusively for the service rendered him, and in many ways made himself agreeable during the balance of our stay in London. Parton, however, would have nothing to do with him, and to me most of his attentions were paid. He always had a singularly uneasy way about him, as though he were afraid of some impending trouble, and finally after a day spent with him slumming about London–and a more perfect slummer no one ever saw, for he was apparently familiar with every one of the worst and lowest resorts in all of London as well as on intimate terms with leaders in the criminal world–I put a few questions to him impertinently pertinent to himself. He was surprisingly frank in his answers. I was quite prepared for a more or less indignant refusal when I asked him to account for his intimacy with these dregs of civilization.