Hannasyde picked it up. “The phrase, you will have cause to regret it if you drive me to take desperate action - that meant that you were seriously contemplating divorce, Mr Lupton?”
“Yes, I think I meant that. I don't know. I was terribly worried. I couldn't see my way out of the trouble. I wrote that to try and frighten him. I thought he might hesitate to push me too far if he knew I was prepared to stand by Gladys, and let everything else go to the devil. After all he wouldn't want an open scandal in the family, and it wasn't as though my wife suffered in any way through Mrs Smith.”
“I quite understand that,” said Hannasyde. “You asked him for a second interview, but he refused it, didn't he?”
Henry Lupton nodded, and gulped. “Yes, he refused it. That was the last time I spoke to him. On the morning of the day he died, just over the telephone. He rang me up from his office. I never saw him again.”
“At what time did he ring you up, Mr Lupton?”
“Oh, quite early! Not later than eleven.”
“I see. And what did you do then?”
Lupton stared at him. “Nothing. That is, I was at my office, you see. I had my work. I couldn't do anything.”
“You didn't make any attempt to see Mr Matthews—during lunch-time, for instance?”
“No. It wouldn't have been any use. I knew Gregory. I had lunch by myself. I wanted time to think.”
“Where did you lunch, Mr Lupton?”
“At my usual place. It's a quiet little restaurant called the Vine. They know me there. I'm sure they'll be able to bear me out.”
“And after lunch?”
“I went back to the office, of course. As a matter of fact, I left earlier than I generally do. Well, before tea.”
“Where did you go?”
“To Golders Green. I wanted to see Mrs Smith.”
“Ah, yes,” Hannasyde said suavely. “You naturally wished to discuss the matter with her.”
“Well, no. No, actually I didn't speak of it. I meant to, but—but I still hoped there might be some way of getting round it, and—you see, we never spoke of my—my home-life. And I didn't want to upset Gladys. I haven't told her anything about what's happened. Just that we have had a death in the family.”
“Oh!” said Hannasyde. “At what hour did you leave Mrs Smith?”
“I don't really know. I was home in time for dinner. I mean, I went straight home from Golders Green.”
“And after dinner?”
“We had some people in for Bridge. I didn't leave the house again until next day, when we came here.”
“Thank you.” Hannasyde was jotting something down in his notebook. His tone conveyed nothing.
Lupton looked anxiously at him. “I don't know if there's anything more you want to know, or if I can go? My wife will be —”
“No, there is nothing more at present,” said Hannasyde.
Henry Lupton got up. “Then—?”
“By all means,” said Hannasyde.
The little man withdrew, and Giles came away from the window, where he had been standing, and said: “Poor devil! What a mess to have got himself into! You don't like his story?”
“I don't like his alibi.”
“Which one? Oh, Gladys Smith! I should think he probably did go there. Vague idea of seeking comfort. Rather pathetic.”
“Anyway, she'll swear he was with her,” Hannasyde said.
“Probably, but I don't quite see how he could have come here at that hour without being seen by some of the household, if that's what you're driving at.”
“Easily,” said Hannasyde, with a touch of scorn. “There are more ways of getting into this house than by the front-door, Mr Carrington. There's a garden-door, for instance, which opens out of a cloakroom on to a path at the side of the house. Anyone would use that door if he wanted to be unobserved. The backstairs come down just by the cloakroom. He would only have to choose his moment. The family and the servants would all be having tea. He might reasonably bank on the coast's being clear.”
“Yes, but what would have been the use?” asked Giles. “Matthews wasn't at home then. Into what would he have dropped his poison?”
“I'm thinking of that bottle of tonic—so providentially smashed,” said Hannasyde.
Giles wrinkled his brow. “Would he have known where it was kept? And how could he have arranged to smash it?”
“He might have known. Simple enough to smash it when he came round next morning with his wife.”
“Oh!” said Giles doubtfully. “Think it's quite in keeping with his character? Such a weak little man!”
“He was feeling desperate, Mr Carrington. He admitted that himself. I should say this Gladys Smith is about the biggest thing in his life.”
“Divorce seems to me to be a solution more likely to appeal to him than murder,” said Giles.
Hannasyde shook his head decidedly. “I don't agree with you. He wouldn't face up to that sort of a scandal. Probably fond of his daughters too. If he did the murder it was because he thought he could get clean away with it. He couldn't have got clean away with a divorce—not with that wife. There'd have been the hell of a row.”
“All very well,” objected Giles, “but he couldn't have been sure that by killing Matthews he was protecting himself. Matthews might have told someone else. In fact, he did. That young sweep, Randall, wasn't drawing a bow at a venture. He knew.”
“He knew, yes, but, if you noticed, Lupton was amazed that he knew. He probably believed Matthews had so far kept the secret to himself.” He picked up Lupton's letter, and placed it in his pocket-book. Then he looked thoughtfully at the desk, and pulled open one of the drawers, and frowned. It was the odds-and-ends drawer. “I wish—I wish very much that I knew what Mr Randall Matthews found to interest him amongst this collection,” he said.
“Was he interested? I didn't notice.”
“I'm nearly sure he was. But whether it was in something which he saw, or in something which he expected to see, and didn't, I don't know. Setting aside his duties as executor—which I don't fancy would worry him much—why did he want to be here when we went through his uncle's papers? What did he think we should find?”
“Perhaps the very thing we did find. That letter of Lupton's.”
Hannasyde considered this for a moment. “It might have been that. It's quite probable, if old Matthews had taken him into his confidence. But what is there in this drawer?”
“You may be right in thinking it is something which is not in the drawer.”
“I may. There is just one thing that strikes me as unusuaclass="underline" there's practically no old correspondence, either here or at Matthews' office.”
“Some men habitually tear up letters as soon as they've answered them,” said Giles. “Are you suggesting that someone's been at work amongst Matthews papers?”
“I'm suggesting nothing,” replied Hannasyde. “But it does seem to me that if Matthews destroyed all his letters himself, it must have amounted to a mania with him.”
“The fell hand of Randall,” said Giles, with an amused look.
Hannasyde smiled reluctantly. “I know you think I've got him on the brain. I ought to tell you that I can't find that he came anywhere near this place between May 12th and May 15th.” He added ruefully: “You're quite right: I am suspicious of him, and I'm suspicious of his alibis. They're so good that they might have been created on purpose. But I tell you frankly, Mr Carrington, I don't see how he can possibly have committed this murder.”
“You sound regretful,” said Giles, laughing.
“No, not that. Just plain worried. Groping about in a fog, and all the time I've got an uneasy feeling I'm on the wrong track. If I could only discover the medium through which the poison was administered! It may have been the whiskey-and-soda Guy Matthews poured out for his uncle; Matthews may have bathed his scratched hand with poisoned lotion—but all the lotion I found in this house was a brand-new bottle of Pond's Extract with the paper sealing the cork down still intact. It may have been the tonic—and the bottle was smashed. I've racked my brains to think of something else—something that might have been doctored at any time, perhaps days before Matthews' death. Well, I thought of aspirin tablets, but he didn't use drugs. Hemingway put all the servants through a hair-sieve, so to speak, but he couldn't discover that Matthews had eaten or drunk anything the rest of the family hadn't, barring that whiskey, and the tonic.” He broke off, and rose. “Well, it's no use sitting and talking to you about it, Mr Carrington. I've got to get on with the job, and I've no doubt you're itching to get back to town.”