I have been arrested as a suspect in the case of Captain Fraser-Freer's murder! I predicted last night that this was to be a red-letter day in the history of that case, and I also saw myself an unwilling actor in the drama.

But little did I suspect the series of astonishing events that was to come with the morning; little did I dream that the net I have been dreading would to-day engulf me.

I can scarcely blame Inspector Bray for holding me; what I can not understand is why Colonel Hughes-- But you want, of course, the whole story from the beginning; and I shall give it to you.

At eleven o'clock this morning a constable called on me at my rooms and informed me that I was wanted at once by the Chief Inspector at the Yard.
We climbed--the constable and I--a narrow stone stairway somewhere at the back of New Scotland Yard, and so came to the inspector's room.
Bray was waiting for us, smiling and confident.

I remember--silly as the detail is--that he wore in his buttonhole a white rose.