“Here is our missing man. You know, Lomax, as well as I do, that several foreign Governments are after the thing. I remember the man now perfectly⁠—tall, well-drilled fellow. Came about a fortnight before we left. A clever move. Any new servants here would be closely scrutinised, but at Chimneys, five miles away⁠—” He did not finish the sentence.

“You think the plan was laid so long beforehand?”

“Why not? There are millions in that formula, Lomax. Doubtless Bauer hoped to get access to my private papers at Chimneys, and to learn something of forthcoming arrangements from them. It seems likely that he may have had an accomplice in this house⁠—someone who put him wise to the lie of the land and who saw to the doping of O’Rourke. But Bauer was the man Miss Wade saw climbing down the ivy⁠—the big, powerful man.”

He turned to Superintendent Battle.

“Bauer was your man, Superintendent. And, somehow or other, you let him slip through your fingers.”