presence of all the horse-men and fish-women that man's unnatural
fancy has begotten. A voice older than his first fathers seemed
saying in his ear: "Keep out of the monstrous garden where grows
the tree with double fruit. Avoid the evil garden where died the
man with two heads." Yet, while these shameful symbolic shapes
passed across the ancient mirror of his Irish soul, his
Frenchified intellect was quite alert, and was watching the odd
priest as closely and incredulously as all the rest.

Father Brown had turned round at last, and stood against the
window, with his face in dense shadow; but even in that shadow
they could see it was pale as ashes. Nevertheless, he spoke quite
sensibly, as if there were no Gaelic souls on earth.

"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. In face of Dr. Simon's rationalism, 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-maned head beside it. And there,
complete, unified, 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 (as he
insisted on a private inquest) you all imagined a totally new