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“I think,” he said at last, “I think you were ill-advised to mislead me at the mock trial this morning. That sort of thing creates a very bad impression. Far better to tell me where you went after your bath last night. You did not go to your room. Florence saw you returning to it from somewhere along the corridor. Miss Grant — where had you been?”
“Has it not occurred to you that — that there might be a perfectly natural and obvious explanation that it would have embarrassed me to give at our mock trial?” said Rosamund.
“Oh, nonsense,” answered Alleyn crisply. “You are not the type to recoil upon Victorian gentility with a charge of this sort under discussion. That I don’t believe. Tell me where you went, Miss Grant. I ca
Silence.
“Then tell me,” said Alleyn, “with whom you went walking in the woods, wearing your red cap, and weeping so bitterly.”
“I can’t tell you,” said Rosamund fiercely. “I can’t— I can’t.”
“As you please.” Alleyn appeared to be suddenly indifferent. “Perhaps before I go you will let me have a few more details about yourself.” He produced his note-book. “How long have you known Mr. Rankin?”
“Six years.”
“Quite a long friendship — you could have scarcely been grown up when you first met.”
“I was at Newnham; Charles was nearly twenty years older than I.”
“At Newnham?” said Alleyn, politely interested. “You must have been up with a cousin of mine — Christina Alleyn.”
Rosamund Grant waited for some seconds before she answered him.
“Yes,” she said at last, “yes — I remember her, I think.”
“She is a fully fledged chemist now,” he told her, “and lives in an ultra-modern flat in Knightsbridge. Well, I shall be flayed alive by Doctor Young if I stay here any longer.” He got up and stood over the bed. “Miss Grant,” he said, “be advised by me. Think it over. I shall come here to-morrow. Make up your mind to tell me where you went to immediately before Mr. Rankin was murdered.”
He walked to the door and opened it. “Think it over,” he repeated, and went out.
Marjorie Wilde and her husband were standing in the passage.
“How is she?” asked Mrs. Wilde quickly. “I want to go in and see her.”
“Not a hope, I’m afraid. It’s strictly against orders,” answered Alleyn cheerfully.
“There you are, Marjorie,” said Wilde. “What did I tell you? Wait till you’ve seen Doctor Young. I am sure Rosamund does not want visitors.”
“You saw her!” said Mrs. Wilde to Alleyn. “I should have thought that would be worse than any ordinary visitor.”
“Marjorie darling!” ejaculated Wilde.
“Oh, everybody loves a policeman,” remarked Alleyn. “She was thrilled to see me.”
“Marjorie!” called Angela’s voice from the stairs.
Mrs. Wilde looked from her husband to the Inspector.
“Marjorie!” called Angela again.
“Coming!” answered Mrs. Wilde suddenly. “I’m coming!” And she turned away and walked quickly towards the stairs.
“Sorry about that,” said Wilde, looking troubled. “She’s not exactly herself, and she had made up her mind to see Miss Grant. It’s a horrible experience for a woman, all this.”
“It is, indeed,” agreed Alleyn. “Are you coming down, Mr. Wilde?”
Wilde glanced at the closed door.
“Yes, certainly,” he said, and they went down together.
Alleyn had finished at Frantock for the time being, but he did not yet feel entitled to call it a day. His next move was to the police station at Little Frantock, where he put through a long-distance call to London. He waited a minute and then spoke into the receiver:
“Christina!” he said. “Is it yourself? What a bit of luck! Look here, you can help me if you will. It’s your cousin the policeman, and he’s up agin it, my dear. Drag your mind away from shattered atoms and bicarbonate of soda, cast it back six years, and tell me everything — everything you can remember about one Rosamund Grant who was up at Newnham with you.”
A miniature voice crackled in the earpiece.
“Yes,” said Alleyn, getting out his pencil and straightening the message block by the telephone, “yes.”
The voice crackled on. Alleyn extended his call. He wrote busily, and gradually a curious expression — eager, doubtful, intensely concentrated — stole over his face. It was a look with which they were very familiar at the Yard.
Chapter IX
Garden Piece
If you don’t mind,” said Nigel to old Mr. Be
“Pleasure, my dear fellow,” replied the lawyer, with hurried cordiality. He snapped the catch of his grip, took off his pince-nez, eyed them severely, gave Nigel a quick glance, and took his coat and hat from the attendant Robert.
“Come along,” he said decisively, and made for the door.
“You were always an imaginative, sensitive sort of individual,” said Mr. Be
“It’s all so beastly,” said Nigel. “I know they can’t suspect me in any way, but — I du
“Sir Hubert Handesley and Mr. Arthur Wilde are also legatees — they probably feel very much the same about it, but of course they have approached the matter in a much more sensible ma
“Very well. I’ll be jolly glad of the money in a way, of course.”
“Of course, of course. Do not suppose that I am insensible of the delicacy of your position.”
“Oh, Be
“Indeed?” said Mr. Be
They walked on in silence until Nigel asked him abruptly if he knew of anything in his cousin’s life that could throw light on the murder.
“I don’t want you to betray any secrets, of course,” he added quickly; “you wouldn’t pay much attention if I did. But had Charles an enemy or enemies?”
“I have been asking myself that question ever since this dreadful crime took place,” replied Mr. Be
“The devil he did!” ejaculated Nigel. “Who was the girl?”
“My dear boy, I don’t think—”
“Was it Rosamund Grant?”
“Really, Nigel — well, in confidence, after all, why not? Yes, Miss Grant’s name was — ah, it did arise in this co
“Has he mentioned it more recently?”
“I ventured to bring it up a fortnight ago when he consulted me about renewing the lease of his house. He replied, as I thought, rather oddly.”
“What did he say?”
Mr. Be
“He used, as far as I can recollect, these very words: ‘It’s no go, Be
“Was that all?”