“No, please come in,” said Hannasyde, rising from his chair by the table. “I needn't keep you any longer now, doctor.”
Mrs Matthews waited until Fielding had left the room, and then advanced towards Hannasyde, and sat down in a chair on the opposite side of the table, indicating to him with a graceful wave of her hand that he might resume his seat. Stella, admiring her exquisite poise, perched on the arm of her chair, and gravely regarded the Superintendent.
“You wanted to see my daughter too, didn't you?” said Mrs Matthews. She laid her hand on one of Stella's, and added with a laugh that seemed to take the Superintendent into her confidence: “I know you won't mind my being here while you talk to her. I'm afraid she has a very guilty conscience, and is terrified lest you should ask her awkward questions about such things as driving without a rear light!”
Stella wriggled uncomfortably, and muttered: “Mother, really!”
“That isn't my department, Miss Matthews,” said Hannasyde.
“I know,” replied Stella indignantly.
The pressure of her mother's fingers silenced her. “Please ask me anything you like, Superintendent!” Mrs Matthews said kindly. “One shrinks from discussing it, but I know that it is necessary, and one must try and overcome one's instinctive distaste. I was very much attached to my poor brother-in-law, and this has all been terribly upsetting to me. I ought to tell you that my nerves are not my strong point. But I'm quite ready to answer anything I can.”
“Thank you,” said Hannasyde. “Naturally I understand how you must feel. You have lived under Mr Gregory Matthews' roof for some years, I believe?”
She bowed her head. “I have lived here for five years. My brother-in-law was very good to me at a time of deep sorrow, and I shall always think kindly of him for that reason alone.”
“My father died five years ago,” interrupted Stella. “My uncle was joint guardian and trustee with my mother for my brother and me.”
“I see,” said Hannasyde. “It was in the capacity of guardian that Mr Matthews proposed to send your son to South America, Mrs Matthews?”
Mrs Matthews raised her brows. “That absurd scheme! I'm afraid I didn't take that very seriously, Superintendent. You have been listening to my sister-in-law, haven't you? She is a very dear soul, but, as I daresay you've realised, she is rather apt to exaggerate. Naturally I should not say so in her hearing, but she didn't understand her brother. I think that is so often the way when two people don't get on together. There is just that lack of sympathy which gives one insight into another person's character. I sometimes think that no one understood my brother-in-law as well as I did.”
Inspector Davis caught the Superintendent's eye for an instant. His own glance spoke volumes. It seemed to him that the Matthews household consisted entirely of voluble females.
“But was there not a serious plan to send your son to Brazil, Mrs Matthews?” asked Hannasyde.
“My brother-in-law certainly thought it might be a good opening for him, but—”
“And you? Did you agree?” interrupted Hannasyde ruthlessly.
Mrs Matthews threw him an indulgent little smile. “You would not ask me that question if you were a woman, Superintendent,” she said. “I am Guy's mother. I could never agree to be parted from my boy unless it were for some very, very good reason.”
“In fact, you opposed it, Mrs Matthews?”
She gave a wise laugh. “Well, yes, I suppose you may say that I opposed it. But I have told you that I understood my brother-in-law, and I knew that his plan wouldn't come to anything.”
Hannasyde glanced at Stella. She was sitting perfectly still with her eyes cast down and her mouth set rather sternly. His gaze returned to Mrs Matthews' face. “Was there any bad feeling between you over the affair?”
“Thank God, no!” she replied. “When he died we were on the same affectionate terms as ever.”
“There had been no quarrel between you?”
She sank her voice a tone. “There had been—not a quarrel, but a feeling of—of—how shall I put it?—of hurt on my side, and I'm sorry to say a little bitterness. I did allow myself to be cross with him when he first broached the question of Brazil. It was mother-instinct, but very foolish of me, and I am thankful to say that I got it under. I knew all the time that my brother-in-law would never insist on doing anything against my wishes. One just had to be tactful. You do not know what a comfort it is to me to be able to say that at the time of Gregory's death there was no shadow of coolness between us.”
“I can well imagine that it must be,” replied Hannasyde.
It was over an hour later when he and Inspector Davis left the Poplars, and the Inspector was frankly exasperated. As he walked beside Hannasyde down the drive he said: “Well, I always heard that the old lady was a caution, but if you ask me Mrs Matthews is the worst of the two! I'm darned if I know what to make of her, and that's a fact!”
“Yes, she's difficult,” agreed Hannasyde. “It's always hard when dealing with that type of woman to know when they're speaking the truth as it was, and when they're speaking of it as they think it was… Hullo, Hemingway!”
Sergeant Hemingway, a brisk person with a pair of bright eyes and an engaging smile, who had been waiting for his chief outside the gate, fell into step beside him, and said cheerfully: “I'll tell you something, Super. We aren't going to like this case, not by a long chalk. You know what it smelt like in the servants' quarters? Pea-soup!”
The Inspector, who was not acquainted with Hemingway, looked a little puzzled, and said: “Eh?”
“Figure of speech,” explained the Sergeant “Get anything your end, Super?”
“Not much,” replied Hannasyde. “It's early yet.”
“Early or late I don't like poisoning cases,” said the Sergeant. “Give me a nice clean bullet-wound where I've got something to go on, and not too many doctors to mess the case up disagreeing with one another! Ever handled a case of nicotine-poisoning before, Inspector?”
“No, I can't say I have,” admitted the Inspector.
“If I know anything about it you won't want to handle another by the time we're through with this,” prophesied the Sergeant. “Nor me either. The Superintendent here doesn't believe in premonitions, but I've got one right now.”
“You've had them before,” remarked Hannasyde unkindly.
“I won't say I haven't,” replied the Sergeant, quite unabashed. “This case remind you of anything, Super?”
“No,” said Hannasyde. “But you'd better tell me, and get it off your chest. What does it remind you of?”
The Sergeant cocked an eye at him. “The Vereker Case,” he said.
“The Vereker Case! That was a stabbing affair!”
“I'm not saying it wasn't, but when I got the hang of the decor here, and a squint at some of the dramatic persome that's what flashed across my mind.”
“What I don't like about it,” said the Inspector slowly, “is this nicotine. It seems to me the doctors don't properly understand it, judging from that report you showed me, Superintendent. I mean, if there wasn't no more than a slight trace of it in the stomach, so as to make them think he can't have swallowed much, and yet they find by the state of the blood—and the mouth, wasn't it?—that —”
“Mucous membrane and tongue,” interjected the Sergeant knowledgeably. “They tell me you always look for nicotine in the mouth. Liver and kidneys too. It's a mystery to me why anyone wants to be a doctor.”
“Well, what I'm getting at is how did he have all that poison in his innards?” said the Inspector.
“It is quite possible,” said Hannasyde, “that he didn't swallow any poison at all.”
“What?” demanded the Inspector.