Stephen Maxie thought, "Supercilious looking devil. He's taken his time coming.
I suppose the idea is to soften us up. Or else he's been snooping round the house.
This is the end of privacy."
Felix Hearne thought, "Well, here it comes. Adam Dalgleish, I've heard of him. Ruthless, unorthodox, working always against time. I suppose he has his own private compulsions. At least they've thought us adversaries worthy of the best."
Eleaner Maxie thought, "Where have I seen that head before. Of course. That Durer. In Munich was it? Portrait of an Unknown Man. Why does one always expect police officers to wear bowlers and raincoats."
Through the exchange of introductions and courtesies Deborah Riscoe stared at him as if she saw him through a web of red-gold hair.
When he spoke it was in a curiously deep voice, relaxed and unemphatic. (‹I understand from Superintendent Manning that the small business room next door was been placed at my disposal.
I hope it won't be necessary to monopolize either it or you for a very long time. I should like to see you separately please and in this order.
"See me in my study at nine, nine-five, nine-ten…" whispered Felix to Deborah.
He was not sure whether he sought relief for himself or her, but there was no answering smile.
Dalgleish let his glance move briefly over the group. "Mr. Stephen Maxie, Miss Bowers, Mrs. Maxie, Mrs. Riscoe, Mr.
Hearne and Mrs. Bultitaft. Will those who are waiting please stay here. If any of you need to leave this room there is a woman police officer and a constable outside in the hall who can go with you. This surveillance will be relaxed as soon as everyone has been interviewed. Would you come with me please, Mr. Maxie?"
Stephen Maxie took the initiative.
"I think I had better begin by letting you know that Miss Jupp and I were engaged to be married. I proposed to her yesterday evening. There's no secret about it. It can't have anything to do with her death and I might not have bothered to mention it except that she broke the news in front of the village's prize gossip, so you'd probably find out fairly soon."
Dalgleish, who had already found out and was by no means convinced that the proposal was nothing to do with the murder, thanked Mr. Maxie gravely for his frankness and expressed formal condolences on the death of his fiancйe.
The boy looked up at him with a sudden direct glance.
"I don't feel I've any right to accept condolences. I can't even feel bereaved. I suppose I shall when the shock of this has worn off a little. We were only engaged yesterday and now she's dead. It still isn't believable."
"Your mother was aware of this engagement?"
"Yes. All the family were except my father."
"Did Mrs. Maxie approve?"
"Hadn't you better ask her that yourself?"
"Perhaps I had. What were your relations with Miss Jupp before yesterday evening. Dr. Maxie?"
"If you are asking whether we were lovers the answer is 'no'. I was sorry for her, I admired her and I was attracted by her. I have no idea what she thought about me."
"Yet she accepted your offer of marriage?"
"Not specifically. She told my mother and her guests that I had proposed so I naturally assumed that she intended to accept me. Otherwise there would have been no point in breaking the news."
Dalgleish could think of several reasons why the girl should have broken the news, but he was not prepared to discuss them.
Instead he invited his witness to give his own account of recent events from the time that the missing Sommeil tablets were first brought into the house.
"So you think she was drugged, Inspector? I told the Superintendent about the tablets when he arrived. They were certainly in my father's medicine chest early this morning. Miss Bowers noticed them when she went to the cupboard for aspirin. They aren't there now. The only Sommeil in the cupboard now is in a sealed packet. The bottle has gone."
"No doubt we shall find it, Dr. Maxie.
The autopsy will discover whether or not Miss Jupp was drugged, and if so, how much of the stuff was taken. There is almost certainly something other than cocoa in that mug by the bed. She may, of course, have put the stuff in it herself."
"If she didn't, Inspector, who did? The stuff might not even have been meant for Sally. That was my sister's drinking-mug by the bed. We each have our own and they are all different. If the Sommeil was meant for Sally it must have been put in the drink after she had taken it up to her room."
"If the drinking-mugs are so distinctive it is curious that Miss Jupp should have taken the wrong one. That was an unlikely mistake surely?"
"It may not have been a mistake," said Stephen shortly.
Dalgleish did not ask him to explain but listened in silence as his witness described the visit of Sally to St. Luke's on the previous Thursday, the events of the church fete, the sudden impulse which had led him to propose marriage and the finding of his fiancйe’s body. The account he gave was factual, concise and almost unemotional. When he came to describe the scene in Sally's bedroom his voice was almost clinically detached. Either he had greater control than was good for him or he had anticipated this interview and had schooled himself in advance against every betrayal of fear or remorse.
"I went with Felix Hearne to get the ladder. He was dressed but I was still in my dressing-gown. I shed one of my bedroom slippers on the way to the outhouses opposite Sally's window so he reached them first and gripped the ladder.
It's always kept there. Hearne had dragged it out by the time I caught up with him and was calling out to know which way to carry it. I pointed towards Sally's window. We carried the ladder between us although it's quite light. One person could manage it, although I'm not sure about a woman. We put it against the wall and Hearne went up first while I steadied it. I followed him at once. The window was open but the curtains were drawn across. As you saw, the bed is at right angles to the window with the head towards it. There's a wide window-ledge where the oriel window juts out and Sally apparently kept a collection of small glass animals there. I noticed that they had been scattered and most were broken. Hearne went over to the door and pulled back the lock. I stood looking at Sally. The bedclothes were pulled up as far as her chin but I could see at once that she was dead.
By this time the rest of the family were around the bed, and when I turned back the clothes we could see what had happened. She was lying on her back - we didn't disturb her - and she looked quite peaceful. But you know what she looked like. You saw her."
"I know what I saw," said Dalgleish.
"I'm asking now what you saw."
The boy looked at him curiously and then closed his eyes for a second before replying. He spoke in a flat expressionless voice as if repeating a lesson learnt by rote. "There was a trickle of blood at the corner of her mouth. Her eyes were almost closed. There was a fairly distinct thumb impression under the right lower jaw over the cornu of the thyroid and a less clear indication of finger marks on the left side of the neck lying along the thyroid cartilage. It was an obvious case of manual strangulation with the right hand and from the front. Considerable force must have been used, but I thought that death was possibly due to vagal inhibition and may have 'been very sudden. There were few of the classic signs of asphyxia. But no doubt you will get the facts from the autopsy."
"I expect them to be in line with your own views. Did you form any idea of the time of death?"
"There were some rigor mortis in the jaw and neck muscles. I don't know whether it had spread any farther. I'm describing the signs that I noticed almost subconsciously. You will hardly expect a full post-mortem account in the circumstances."
Sergeant Martin, his head bent over his notebook, detected unerringly the first note of near hysteria and thought "Poor devil.