It had since become famous in many parts of the world.

On the Trophy Wall were forty-nine exhibits—representative of the forty-nine men and women who had been brought to justice by the Toff. Some had been hanged; some (the later ones) were serving their so-called life sentences. Several, reprieved during the doleful days of hanging, were now leading outwardly happy and respectable lives.

“The next,” said Rollison, “will be the fiftieth trophy.”

“I was wondering, sir,” said Jolly.

“Wonder on.”

“Need there be?”

“A number fifty?”

“That is what I ask myself from time to time, sir.”

“Jolly,” said Rollison, “don’t you believe in fate?”

“Not altogether, sir.”

“Elucidate.”

“Not if you mean you are fated to make yet another investigation, sir. I think is within your power to stop it.”

“I don’t, Jolly.”

“I cannot believe that all our actions are predestined,” Jolly protested, with notable dignity. “We are surely masters of our own fate to some degree.”

“You were born into service,” Rollison reminded him.

“And stayed because I liked it, sir.”

“Had you been born a bookmaker or a candlestick-maker, would you have spent your life with me?”

Jolly raised his hands a resigned inch or so.

“That is One of the imponderables.”

“Yes, I know. So is fate. Jolly,” went on Rollison, “do you believe in seers?”

“Seers, sir?”

“Those rare creatures supposedly gifted with second sight?”

“I don’t think so, sir. Intuition, perhaps.”

“No. Second sight.”

“If I have to give an opinion—no, sir, I don’t believe in them.” Jolly looked a little uneasy as he answered, frowning. “Is there some particular reason for these questions?”