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We can't keep this quiet any longer. I shall be writing in my study if there is any more news.”

      “Is there any more news, Ivan?” asked Dr. Simon, as the chief of police strode out of the room.

      “Only one more thing, I think, sir,” said Ivan, wrinkling up his grey old face, “but that's important, too, in its way. There's that old man you found on the lawn,” and he pointed at the big black body with the yellow head. “We've found out who he is, anyhow.”

      “Indeed!” cried the astonished doctor, “and who is he?”

      “His name was Arnold Becker,” said the under-detective, “though he went by many aliases. He was a wandering sort of scamp, and is known to have been in America; so that was where Brayne got his knife into him. We didn't have much to do with him ourselves, for he worked mostly in Germany. We've communicated, of course, with the German police.

      But, oddly enough, there was a twin brother of his, named Louis Becker, whom we had a great deal to do with. In fact, we found it necessary to guillotine him only yesterday. Well, it's a strange thing, gentlemen, but when I saw that fellow flat on the lawn I had the greatest jump of my life. If I hadn't seen Louis Becker guillotined with my own eyes, I'd have sworn it was Louis Becker lying there in the grass. Then, of course, I remembered his twin brother in Germany, and following up the clue – ”

      Ivan stopped, for nobody was listening to him. The Commandant and the doctor were both staring at Father Brown, who had sprung to his feet, and was holding his temples tight like a man in sudden and violent pain.

      “Stop, stop, stop!” he cried; “stop talking a minute. Will God give me strength? Will Heaven help me! I used to be fairly good at thinking. Will my head split – or will it see? I see half – I only see half.”

      He buried his head in his hands, while the other three could only go on staring at him.

      When Father Brown's hands fell they showed a face quite fresh and serious, like a child's. He heaved a huge sigh[50], and said: “Let us get this said and done with as quickly as possible[51]. Look here, this will be the quickest way to convince you all of the truth.” He turned to the doctor. “Dr. Simon,” he said, “you have a strong head-piece, and I heard you this morning asking the five hardest questions about this business. Well, if you will ask them again, I will answer them.”

      Simon's pince-nez dropped from his nose in his doubt and wonder, but he answered at once. “Well, the first question, you know, is why a man should kill another with a sabre at all when a man can kill with a bodkin?”

      “A man cannot behead with a bodkin,” said Brown calmly, “and for this murder beheading was absolutely necessary.”

      “Why?” asked O'Brien, with interest.

      “And the next question?” asked Father Brown.

      “Well, why didn't the man cry out or anything?” asked the doctor; “sabres in gardens are certainly unusual.”

      “ Twigs,” said the priest gloomily, and turned to the window which looked on the scene of death. “No one saw the point of the twigs. Why should they lie on that lawn (look at it) so far from any tree? They were not snapped off; they were chopped off. The murderer occupied his enemy with some tricks with the sabre, showing how he could cut a branch in mid-air, or what-not[52]. Then, while his enemy bent down to see the result, a silent slash, and the head fell.”

      “Well,” said the doctor slowly, “that seems possible enough. But my next two questions will confuse anyone.”

      The priest still stood looking critically out of the window and waited.

      “You know how all the garden was sealed up like an airtight chamber,” went on the doctor. “Well, how did the strange man get into the garden?”

      Without turning round, the little priest answered: “There never was any strange man in the garden.”

      There was a silence, and then a sudden laughter diminished the strain. The absurdity of Brown's remark made Ivan tease him.

      “Oh!” he cried; “then we didn't lug a great fat corpse on to a sofa last night? He hadn't got into the garden, I suppose?”

      “Got into the garden?” repeated Brown reflectively. “No, not entirely.”

      “Just tell us all,” cried Simon, “a man gets into a garden, or he doesn't.”

      “Not necessarily,” said the priest, with a faint smile. “What is the nest question, doctor?”

      “I fancy you're ill,” exclaimed Dr. Simon sharply; “but I'll ask the next question if you like. How did Brayne get out of the garden?”

      “He didn't get out of the garden,” said the priest, still looking out of the window.

      “Didn't get out of the garden?” exploded Simon.

      “Not completely,” said Father Brown.

      “A man gets out of a garden, or he doesn't,” cried Simon.

      “Not always,” said Father Brown.

      Dr. Simon sprang to his feet impatiently. “I have no time to spare on such senseless talk,” he cried angrily.

      “Doctor,” said the cleric very gently, “we have always got on very pleasantly together. For the sake of old friendship[53], stop and tell me your fifth question.”

      The impatient Simon sank into a chair by the door and said briefly: “The head and shoulders were cut about in a queer way. It seemed to be done after death.”

      “Yes,” said the motionless priest, “it was done to make you believe that the head belonged to the body.”

      Father Brown had turned round at last, and stood against the window, with his face in shadow; but even in that shadow they could see it was pale as ashes. Nevertheless, he spoke quite sensibly.

      “Gentlemen,” he said, “you did not find the strange body of Becker in the garden. You did not find any strange body in the garden. I still affirm that Becker was only partly present. Look here!” (pointing to the black bulk of the mysterious corpse) “you never saw that man in your lives. Did you ever see this man?”

      He rapidly rolled away the bald, yellow head of the unknown, and put in its place the white-haired head beside it. And there, complete, unmistakable, lay Julius K. Brayne.

      “The murderer,” went on Brown quietly, “hacked off his enemy's head and flung the sword far over the wall. But he was too clever to fling the sword only. He flung the head over the wall also. Then he had only to clap on another head to the corpse, and you all imagined a totally new man.”

      “Clap on another head!” said O'Brien staring. “What other head? Heads don't grow on garden bushes, do they?”

      “No,” said Father Brown, looking at his boots; “there is only one place where they grow. They grow in the basket of the guillotine, beside which the chief of police, Aristide Valentin, was standing not an hour before the murder. Oh, my friends, hear me a minute more before you tear me in pieces. Valentin is an honest man, if being mad for an arguable cause is honesty[54]. But did you never see in that cold, grey eye of his that he is mad! He would do anything, to break what he calls the superstition of the Cross[55]. He has fought for it and starved for it, and now he has murdered for it. Valentin heard a whisper that the millionaire Brayne was drifting to us; and that was quite a different thing. Brayne would give money to the impoverished Church of France; he would support six Nationalist newspapers like The Guillotine. He resolved to destroy the millionaire, and he did it as the greatest of detectives would commit his own crime. He abstracted the severed head[56] of Becker on some criminological excuse, and took it home in his official box. He had that last argument with Brayne, then led him out

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