"Oh, I'm practically cleared! I say, will you come to Bulgaria with me?"
Sally groped for her monocle, screwed it into her eye, and looked at him. Then she put down the typescript she was holding, and replied matter-of-factly: "Yes, rather. When?"
"Oh, as soon as possible, don't you think?"
Helen twisted round in her chair. "Sally, what on earth do you mean? You can't possibly go away with Neville like that!"
"Why not?" asked Neville interestedly.
"Don't be absurd! You know perfectly well it wouldn't be proper."
"Oh no, it probably won't. That's the charm of travel in the Balkans. But she's very broadminded, really."
"But -'
"Wake up, darling!" advised Sally. "You don't seem to realise that I've just received a proposal of marriage."
"A… ?" Helen sprang up. "You mean to tell me that was a proposal?"
"Oh, I do hate pure women: they have the filthiest minds!" said Neville.
"Sally, you're not going to marry a - a hopeless creature like Neville?"
"Yes, I am. Look at the wealth he's rolling in! I'd be a fool if I turned him down."
"Sally!"
"Besides, he's not bossy, which is more than can be said for most men."
"You don't love him!"
"Who says I don't?" retorted Sally, blushing faintly. Helen looked helplessly from one to the other. "Well, all I can say is I think you're mad."
"Oh, I am glad!" said Neville. "I was beginning to feel frightfully embarrassed. If you haven't got anything more to say it would be rather nice if you went away."
Helen walked to the door, remarking, as she opened it: "You might have waited till I'd gone before you proposed - if that extraordinary invitation was really a proposal."
"But you showed no signs of going, and it would have made me feel very self-conscious to have said: "Oh, Helen, do you mind going, because I want to propose to Sally?"'
"You're both mad!" declared Helen, and went out. Sally rose to her feet. "Neville, are you sure you won't regret this?" she asked anxiously.
He put his arms round her. "No, of course I'm not: are you?"
She gave one of her sudden smiles. "Well, yes - pretty sure!"
"Darling, that's handsome of you, but deluded. I'm only sure that I shall regret it awfully if I don't take this plunge. I think it must be your nose. Are your eyes blue or grey?"
She looked up. He kissed her promptly; she felt his arms harden round her, and emerged from this unexpectedly rough embrace gasping for breath, and considerably shaken.
"Ruse," said Neville. "Grey with yellow flecks. I knew it all along."
She put her head on his shoulder. "Gosh, Neville, I - I wasn't sure - you really meant it till now! I say, is it going to be a walking tour, or something equally uncomfortable?"
"Oh no! But I thought we might do some canal work, and we're practically bound to spend a good many nights in peasants' huts. Can you eat goat?"
"Yes," said Sally. "What's it like?"
"Rather foul. Are you busy this week, or can you spare the time to get married?"
"Oh, I should think so, but it'll mean a special licence, and you can't touch Ernie's money till you've got probate."
"Can't I? I shall have to borrow some, then."
"You'd better leave it to me," said Sally, her natural competence asserting itself. "You'd come back with a dog-licence, or something. By the way, are you certain you won't be arrested for these tiresome murders?"
"Oh yes, because Ernie's hat doesn't fit!" he replied.
"I suppose that's a good reason?"
"Yes, even the Sergeant thought so," he said happily.
The Sergeant did think so, but being unwilling to let his last suspect go, he kept his conviction to himself. On his way downstairs from Ernest Fletcher's dressingroom, he encountered Miss Fletcher, who looked surprised to see him, but accepted quite placidly his explanation that Neville had invited him. She said vaguely: "Dear boy! So thoughtless! But men very often are, aren't they? I hope you don't think he had anything to do with this dreadful tragedy, because I'm sure he would never do anything really wicked. One always knows, doesn't one?"
The Sergeant made a non-committal sound.
"Yes, exactly," said Miss Fletcher. "Now, what can have become of Neville? He ought not to have left you alone upstairs. Not that I mean - because, of course, that would be absurd."
"Well, madam," said the Sergeant. "I don't know whether I'm supposed to mention it, but I fancy Mr. Fletcher has gone off to get engaged to be married."
"Oh, I'm so glad!" she said, a beaming smile sweeping over her face. "I feel he ought to be married, don't you?"
"Well, I'm bound to say it looks to me as though he needs someone to keep him in order," replied the Sergeant.
"You're so sensible," she told him. "But how remiss of me! Would you care for some tea? Such a dusty walk from the police station!"
He declined the offer, and succeeded bit by bit in escaping from her. He walked back to the police station in a mood of profound gloom, which was not alleviated, on his arrival there, by the sight of Constable Glass, still awaiting his pleasure. He went into a small private office, and once more spread his notes on the case before him, and cudgelled his brain over them.
Glass, following him, closed the door, and regarded him in a melancholy fashion, saying presently: "Fret not thyself because of evil-doers. They shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herb."
"A fat lot of withering they'll do if I don't fret over them!" said the Sergeant crossly.
"Thou shaft grope at noonday as the blind gropeth in the darkness."
"I wish you'd shut up!" snapped the Sergeant, exasperated by the truth of this observation.
The cold blue eyes flashed. "I am full of the fury of the Lord," announced Glass. "I am weary of holding-in!"
"I haven't noticed you doing much holding-in so far, my lad. You go and spout your recitations somewhere else. If I have to see much more of you I'll end up a downright atheist."
"I will not go. I have communed with my own soul.
There is a way which seemeth right to a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death."
The Sergeant turned over a page of his typescript. "Well, there's no need to get worked up about it," he said. "If you take sin as hard as all that, you'll never do for a policeman. And if you're going to stay here, for goodness' sake sit down, and don't stand there staring at me!"
Glass moved to a chair, but still kept his stern gaze upon the Sergeant's face. "What said Neville Fletcher?" he asked.
"He talked me nearly as silly as you do."
"He is not the man."
"Well, if he isn't he may have a bit of a job proving it, that's all I can say," retorted the Sergeant. "Hat or no hat, he was in London the night Carpenter was done in, and he was the only one of the whole boiling who had motive and opportunity to kill the late Ernest. I grant you, he isn't the sort you'd expect to go around murdering people, but you've got to remember he's no fool, and is very likely taking us all in. I don't know whether he did in Carpenter, but the more I look at the evidence, the more I'm convinced he's the one man who could have done his uncle in."
"Yet he is not arrested."
"No, he's not, but it's my belief that when the Superintendent thinks it over he will be."
"The Superintendent is a just man, according to his lights. Where is he?"
"I don't know. He'll be down here soon, I daresay."
"There shall be no more persecution of those that are innocent. My soul is tossed with a tempest, but it is written, yea, and in letters of fire! Whoso sheddeth a man's blood by man shall his blood be shed!"
"That's the idea," agreed the Sergeant. "But as for persecuting the innocent -'
"Forsake the foolish and live!" Glass interrupted, a grim, mirthless smile twisting his lips. "Woe to them that are wise in their own eyes! Know that judgments are prepared for scorners, and stripes for the back of fools!"