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"I see," said Grant, and raised his eye-brows at his chief. The superintendent summoned a man, and said, "Mrs. Wallis will wait in the next room for the moment, and you will keep her company. If there is anything you want, just ask Simpson for it, Mrs. Wallis." And the door closed behind her tight black satin figure.
18 — Conclusion
"Well," said Barker, after a moment's silence, "I'll never talk to you about your flair again, Grant. Do you think she's mad?"
"If logic carried to excess is madness, then she is," Grant said.
"But she seems to have no feelings on the subject at all — either for herself or for Sorrell."
"No. Perhaps she is crazy."
"There's no chance of its not being true? It's a far less believable story in my eyes than the Lamont one."
"Oh, yes, it's true," Grant said. "There's not a doubt of it. It seems strange to you only because you haven't lived with the case as I have. The whole thing falls into place now — Sorrell's suicide, the gift of the money to Lamont, the booking of the pas-sage, the brooch. I was a fool not to have seen that the initials might as well have been R. M. But I was obsessed by the Ratcliffe women at the time. Not that reading the initials the other way would have helped me too much, if Mrs. Wallis hadn't turned up with her confession. Still, I ought to have co
"Search me!" said Barker. "I don't think he was too sane either."
"No," said Grant, considering, "I don't think Sorrell was crazy. It's just what Lamont said about him — he thought for a long time about something, and then did exactly what he intended. The only thing he didn't reckon with was Mrs. Wallis — and you'll admit she isn't the kind of quantity you'd expect to find butting around in an ordinary crowd. He couldn't have been a bad sort, Sorrel. Even to the last he kept up the jape about going to America. His packing was perfect — but Lamont was packing at the same time, and probably in and out of the room all the time. He hadn't a single letter or photograph of Ray Marcable. He must have made a clean sweep when he made up his mind what he was going to do. Only, he forgot the brooch. It fell out of a pocket, as I told you."
"Do you think Ray Marcable suspected the truth?"
"No; I don't think so."
"Why not?"
"Because Ray Marcable is one of the most self-absorbed people in this era. In any case, she remembered the dagger from my description of it, but she had no reason to co
"Then there's a shock in store for her," said Barker sorrowfully.
"There is," said Grant grimly. "And at least there is a pleasant one in store for Lamont, and I'm glad of it. I have made a complete fool of myself over this case, but I'm happier just now than I have been since I hauled him into the boat from the loch."
"You're a marvel, Grant. With a case like that I should have been as pleased as Punch and all over myself. It isn't ca
"So that you can descend on me for blackmail, I suppose? 'Give us a quid or you'll have the cops in! No; there isn't anything unca
"Well, it's a queer business," said Barker, " — the queerest business I've known for ages." He hoisted himself off the desk against which he had been propped. "Let me know when Mullins comes back, will you? If he has the sheath, then we'll decide to accept the story. Lamont's being brought up again tomorrow, isn't he? We can bring her into court then." And he left Grant alone.
And Grant mechanically did what he had been going to do when Barker's entrance interrupted him. He unlocked the drawer of his desk and took out the dagger and the brooch. Only a little space between the intention and the act, and what a difference! He had been going to withdraw them as the emblems of his despair — mysteries that maddened him; and now he knew all about it. And it was so simple now that he knew. Now that he knew! But if Mrs. Wallis had not come…He turned away from the thought. But for the accident that made the woman fair-minded even in her madness he would have stifled his misgivings and gone through with the case as befitted a valued inspector of the C.I.D., and in accordance with the evidence. He had been saved from that.