“And I went on over, just as he said. I could guess what he wanted with me over there, but I wanted privacy for what I’d got to say to him, so it suited me, too. You’ve seen the place, I take it, you know what he’s done to it. In a few minutes he came bounding in, bursting with high spirits, with a magnum of champagne under his arm. ‘Well, what’d you think of your ideal home now, boy,’ he says. ‘Doesn’t it shake you?’ But I hadn’t come to amuse him, and it was all rather water off a duck’s back. I let fly with what I had to say, told him what I thought of his dirty tricks, and accused him of stealing the letter. He just laughed in my face and denied everything. ‘You’re crazy,’ he said, ‘why should I want to steal my own letter?’ I suppose I hadn’t expected any sort of satisfaction except just in getting the load off my own chest, so I unloaded. I told him what sort of lying, cheating devil he was, and swore I’d fight him to the last ditch, over the sign, over my career, over everything.”
“And half an hour or so later he was dead,” said George deliberately.
“I know, but I didn’t touch him.”
Jean moved her hand silently upon the table until it touched Leslie’s hand; that was all, but the spark that passed between them quivered through every mass within the room.
“I didn’t touch him,” said Leslie again, with a softer and easier intonation. “He was running about the gallery there, getting out champagne glasses from the bar, and I said was he celebrating the final break, because this was it. And he said, ‘This isn’t for you, boy, I’m expecting better company.’ So I left. I walked out and left him there fit and well. It couldn’t have been half past ten, because only one or two cars had moved out, and there was no sign of turning-out time. I walked home, and I walked fast because I was still burning. By about ten to eleven I was home.”
“Did you see anyone around when you left? Or on the way? Just to confirm your times?”
“Not that I noticed,” said Leslie, paling. “I wasn’t thinking about needing confirmation, or I’d have done something about it. I was inclined to fume off by myself, rather, the mood I was in.”
“I can confirm the time when he got in,” said Jean firmly, and the hand that had moved to touch her husband’s now closed over it and gripped it tightly. “There’s a chiming clock at the church just along the road. I heard it strike the three-quarter hour just two or three minutes before Leslie came in.”
“Yes, well, there may be others who noticed him somewhere along the way, you know. We’ll try to find them.” Evens so, Armiger could just as well have been left behind in his ballroom dead as living. According to the surgeon he might have died as early as ten-fifteen. “Mrs. Harkness didn’t have to let you in, I suppose? You have your own key?”
“Yes. And she probably wouldn’t hear me come in. She goes to bed early, and she sleeps at the back of the house.” He was going to the opposite extreme now, producing all the possible unfavourable circumstances himself before they could be unearthed by others.
“Don’t labour it,” said George with a slight smile, getting up from his chair. “Others are having to account for themselves, too, you know. If you’ve done nothing wrong then you’ve nothing to hide and nothing to worry about. And if you’ll let me advise you, hide nothing. And then stop worrying.” He buttoned his coat, stifling a yawn. The coffee had helped, but what he needed now was sleep. “Meantime, you’ll be here at our disposal, won’t you?”
“I’ll be here,” said Leslie, slightly huskily because his throat was dry with returning fright.
The last George saw of them, as he looked back from the top of the stairs, was the two pale, unwavering faces, side by side and almost on a level, with wide, wary eyes staring after him; and the two hands gripped together between their bodies, clinging to each other as though they defied the world to tear them apart.
CHAPTER VII.
“I’M INCLINED TO believe him,” said George, frowning over the litter of scribbled notes tucked under his coffee cup. “When his father told him to go across to the barn, he says the old man said: ‘Walk in, the door’s unlocked, I was going over there in any case a bit later on.’ And then about the champagne, which put me off in the first place: ‘This isn’t for you, boy, I’m expecting better company.’ That strikes me as sounding true, and fitting in with the facts. If the champagne had been all part of heaving his triumph in Leslie’s face he’d had time to open it. But it wasn’t opened. And the alternative seems much more probable. He was expecting someone, he was preparing a celebration, but it wasn’t for Leslie. Leslie was just a pleasant interlude of devilment thrown in by sheer luck, to pass the time until the other person arrived. The real business of Armiger’s evening was still to come. And if I’m right, then it was because of this other person, not because of Leslie, that he didn’t want to be disturbed. Why should he care who heard him tormenting his son? He’d have enjoyed it all the better with an audience.”
“Didn’t you say Miss Norris told you he said he’d be only a quarter of an hour or so?” asked Bunty. “That makes his time schedule rather tight, doesn’t it?”
“It does seem so. And as a matter of fact only she used that phrase. According to Miss Hamilton and Shelley he merely said he’d be back, and he hoped they’d be able to wait. Maybe her recollection isn’t quite accurate, maybe he was speaking rather loosely. And important meetings can take place in a quarter of an hour, of course.”
“Supposing Leslie did get back by ten to eleven, would he have had time to be the murderer? He has no car, there’s no bus just then, it must be true that he walked, and even walking fast it would take him fully twenty minutes. So he must have left by half past ten at latest.”
When she was admitted into conference in this way she used a level, quiet voice, careful to break no thread of George’s reasoning. Sometimes she put things into his head, sometimes she showed him things that were already there.
“Yes,” said George, “there was time, though certainly none to spare. The surgeon’s report confirms that death may have taken place any time between ten and eleven-thirty.”
“And it doesn’t take long, of course,” admitted Bunty, “to bash somebody over the head with a bottle and run for it.”
“Well, it’s not quite so simple as that. It wasn’t just one blow that killed him. Seems there were at least nine blows struck, all at the back and left side of the head. There are several fractures, and some splintering of the bone. Then there’s also a large abrasion on his right temple and cheek, apparently from his fall; when he was first struck. That wouldn’t have killed him, in any case, he’d have been stunned but nothing worse. But at least four of the other blows could have been fatal. It may not take long to batter a man’s head to pieces that way, but it takes longer than just hitting out once and running. It must have been quick work if Leslie did it.”
“Very messy work, too,” said Bunty.
“Yes, we’re not forgetting that. And Johnson’s report isn’t much help, except in establishing that somebody must have had some badly soiled gloves to dispose of after the event. No prints on bottle or glasses except Armiger’s own, nothing to be got from that broken statuette, and all the prints lying at random about the room turn out to be Armiger’s or else belonging to some of the decorators and electricians who were working on the place. Only one or two haven’t yet been matched up. Clayton’s prints are on the door handle, but nowhere else, and there are also some on the door we have to check up now with Leslie’s.” He shuffled the sheets of notes together, and reached for the toast. “Well, if the chief agrees I’m going to follow up this odd business of the inn sign. May as well see if there’s anything to it.”