It was an excellent stroke. He was overwhelmed by the fact that I knew so much; and it settled all thought of any doubts about the rest of my knowledge.
"Do as I say," I rapped back sternly; and he obeyed. Then he went on to describe the means by which he had committed the theft. He had duplicate keys of all the locks in his father’s office.
When he had finished the confession and signed it, I made him hand over those keys to me. With such a piece of evidence as they constituted in my hands, I cared comparatively little whether his statement were true or false. They would speak for themselves.
The writing of the confession with the breaks and pauses occupied nearly an hour, and I could see that he was nearly collapsing; so I told him to make the statement about Ziegler’s murder very short.
"I have enough evidence without this at all," I declared; and he believed me. But I made him give such an account of his doings on the night, and particularly about the dagger he had used, where he had obtained it, and what he had done with it, as would enable me at need to find the proofs of his guilt.
When the ordeal was over he tottered back to the couch and lay down exhausted; and I gave him a few minutes while I ran through both his statements. Then I was ready to leave.
"Now about your future. I’ll keep my word to you. The stolen paper and your keys shall be returned to your father’s office as the price of Baron von Ringheim’s pardon. I shall see your father and show him what you have written about it all; and you know well enough that no harm will come to you through him as the result. Are you listening?"
A feeble gesture of the hand was his only response.
"You’d better, for your life hangs on your understanding all I say and doing what I tell you. Your admission of the murder I shall keep a dead secret"--he started at that, raised himself on his elbow and looked across at me--"on one condition. You must be out of the country within twenty-four hours. If I find you here at the end of that time I shall hand it to the police."
With a deep breath of relief he sank back. "I’ll go; but I’ve--I’ve no money."
"I’ll find you enough to get away with"; and I laid a sum on the table; "and as soon as you are across the frontier you can communicate with your friends."