He shook his head, but I insisted; and in the end we compromised. I was to have ten thousand outright, and the other half if my mission were successful.

I took October to my solicitors and had the rather unusual appointment shaped into a dryly-worded legal contract, to which, with a wry smile, he put his signature alongside mine.

His amusement, however, disappeared abruptly when, as we left, I asked him to insure my life.

"I don't think I can," he said, frowning.

"Because I would be… uninsurable?" I asked.

He didn't answer.

"I have signed a contract," I pointed out.

"Do you think I did it with my eyes shut?"

"It was your idea." He looked troubled.

"I won't hold you to it."

"What really happened to the journalist?" I asked.

He shook his head and didn't meet my eyes.

"I don't know. It looked like an accident. It almost certainly was an accident. He went off the road at night on a bend on the Yorkshire moors. The car caught fire as it rolled down into the valley. He hadn't a hope. He was a nice chap…"

"It won't deter me if you have any reason for thinking it was not an accident," I said seriously, 'but you must be frank. If it was not an accident, he must have made a lot of progress. he must have found out something pretty vital. it would be important to me to know where he had gone and what he had been doing during the days before he died. "

"Did you think about all this before you agreed to accept my proposition?"

"Yes, of course."

He smiled as if a load had been lifted from him.

"By God, Mr. Roke, the more I see of you the more thankful I am I stopped for lunch in Perlooma and went to look for Arthur Simmons. Well… Tommy Stapleton the journalist was a good driver, but I suppose accidents can happen to anyone. It was a Sunday early in June. Monday, really. He died about two o'clock at night. A local man said the road was normal in appearance at one-thirty, and at two-thirty a couple going home from a party saw the broken railings on the bend and stopped to look.