“You'll be sorry if I cry all over your beautiful c—coat!” said Stella from his shoulder.
“Forget my beautiful coat!” said Randall.
Stella groped for his handkerchief. He gave it her, and she carefully dried her eyes with it. “If I do marry you it won't be because I'm in love with you, because of course I'm not!” she said.
“Very well, you can marry me for my money,” replied Randall equably.
Stella, having finished with it, savagely thrust his handkerchief back into his breast-pocket. “You have the foulest tongue of anyone I ever met in all my life!” she said with conviction. “If I didn't want to get away from this place I wouldn't think of marrying you for a moment! And if I do marry you it'll probably be as bad as living here, or even worse,” she added vindictively.
“Nothing could be as bad as living here,” said Randall reasonably. “I may be a vile beast, but at least I'm not a bore. By the way, are you going to marry me, or not?”
Stella looked for guidance at the top button of his waistcoat, and discovered that there was a smear of face powder on the lapel of his coat, and rubbed it away with one finger.
A hand came up and captured hers, and held it. “You are required to answer, you know,” said Randall.
She raised her eyes rather shyly, and blushed. “Randall, do you—truly want me to?” she asked in a very small voice.
“My dear sweet,” said Randall, and kissed her.
During the next ten minutes Stella made only two remarks, both of which were somewhat breathlessly delivered, and neither of which bore any evidence of intellect. Mr Randall Matthews said "Darling!" in answer to one, and "My little idiot!" in answer to the other. Miss Stella Matthews appeared to be perfectly satisfied with both these responses.
“I must have gone suddenly mad,” she said, a little while later. “I don't even admire your type. And how on earth am I to tell Mummy and Guy about it? They'll never believe I mean it!”
“After this morning's exhibition they are probably prepared for the worst,” replied Randall. “But I'll break the news for you, my pet.”
“Oh no, you won't!” said Stella with decision. “I can just picture that scene! You'll absolutely swear to me, darling-serpent-Randall, that you won't say one single thing to annoy either of them.”
“I can't,” said Randall. “I shall have to leave it to you.” He glanced at his wrist-watch. “I shall have to go, darling. If I don't we shall have that Superintendent arresting somebody—me in all probability.”
Stella put her hand in his. “Randall, you didn't have anything to do with it, did you?”
“No, darling, in spite of every appearance to the contrary, I didn't.”
She looked at him. “Do you know who did?”
He did not answer immediately. Then his clasp on her hand tightened, and he said: “Yes. I think so.”
“Is it going to be beastly?”
“Yes, very. Oh, not Aunt Zoë, sweetheart. But I'm afraid it may upset you.”
“Are you going to tell the police, Randall?”
“I must tell them. I did every mortal thing I could think of to stop them from finding out the truth, and I succeeded so well that we are now most of us in danger of instant arrest. All through Aunt Harriet's accidental death! It is, I suppose, rather delightfully ironic, if you happen to be looking at it from the right angle.”
“Can't you tell me, Randall? I'd rather know.”
“Not now, my sweet. I think it's better kept to myself until I've done what I've got to do.”
“Tell me just one thing,” she said. “Is it something to do with that man—the one they can't find?”
“Everything,” he answered, and kissed her, and got up from the sofa. “I'll ring you up tonight, my love. Don't worry!”
“As long as they don't arrest Mummy or Guy while you're gone,” she said doubtfully.
“They won't do that. They'll merely interrogate them in the light of the new discovery, and I don't suppose that even your little brother Guy can compromise himself sufficiently to make Hannasyde apply for a warrant for his arrest. Moreover, Hannasyde is hot on my trail now, and will in all probability put in some hours of research into my immediate past.”
It seemed as though he was right. When Superintendent Hannasyde saw Stella twenty minutes later he asked her if Randall were still in the house. When she shook her head he looked at her (or so she thought) rather intently, and inquired whether she knew where he had gone. She was glad to be able to say that she had no idea, but felt herself blushing. However, the Superintendent either did not notice this, or else he set no store by it, for he merely said that he expected he should find Randall at his flat, and went away with the Sergeant.
The Sergeant was in a thoughtful mood; and while they walked down the drive he did not speak. But at the gate he said: “Chief, I don't set myself up to know better than you, but when you let him go you could have knocked me down with a feather.”
“You know perfectly well I've no warrant for his arrest,” said Hannasyde.
“You didn't think to put a few questions to him?” ventured the Sergeant.
“Not then, or in that house. I'll see him in his own flat, where I trust we shall not be interrupted either by hysterical young men, or importunate matrons,” said Hannasyde a trifle grimly.
“Do you think he did it, Super?” inquired the Sergeant.
“No, I don't.”
The Sergeant stopped short. “You don't?” he repeated. “What about that line of talk he put over about giving away all his uncle's money?”
“He didn't say anything about that to me,” said Hannasyde, with what his subordinate could only feel to be wooden placidity.
“He seems to have said it to the girl all right,” the Sergeant pointed out, once more falling into step beside him.
“That's a very different matter.”
“It is, is it?” said the Sergeant. “I'm bound to say I don't see it myself, not immediately.”
“Ah, Skipper, that's where psychology comes in!” said Hannasyde maliciously. “Randall Matthews wasn't pleased with Miss Stella for blurting that out.”
The Sergeant eyed him sideways, and with a good deal of expression, but all he said was: “Well, bearing his antics in mind, and assuming that he didn't put that murder over, what is his little game, Super?”
“I suspect,” said Hannasyde, “to prevent us from ever finding out the truth.”
“Chief,” said the Sergeant severely, “you've got something up your sleeve!”
“I think I've got an inkling of the truth,” admitted Hannasyde. “Which is why I'd rather interview Randall Matthews where I can be sure of getting him quite alone. That young man has got to be made to talk.”
But when they arrived at Randall's flat they found only Benson, who informed them, not without satisfaction, that his master was out, and not expected back until the evening.
The Sergeant, bristling with suspicion, said: “You don't say! Taken the Merc with him, by any chance?”
“If,” said Benson, with awful dignity, “you refer to the Mercedes-Benz, no, Sergeant! The car is in the garage.”
“Mr Matthews has been here, then, within the past hour?” interposed Hannasyde.
“Certainly he has,” replied Benson. He added grudgingly: “What's more, Mr Matthews left a message in case you should call.”
“Well?”
“He will not be at home all day, but if you care to come round at nine o'clock this evening he will be happy to see you,” said Benson.
“Tell him when he comes in that I shall call at that time, then,” said Hannasyde, and moved away towards the stairs.
“And what,” demanded the Sergeant, “is my lord up to now, if I may ask?”
“You may ask,” said Hannasyde, “but I'm damned if I can tell you. Unless, for some reason or other, he wants to ward me off for a few hours.”
“We'll look clever if the next we hear of him is on the Continent somewhere,” remarked the Sergeant.
“What's gone wrong with your psychology?” asked Hannasyde solicitously.