"And why have you got it in for her?" asked Hemingway, who had been watching him closely.
"I hope I have not got it in for anyone, Chief Inspector, but I should describe Miss Birtley as a very unsatisfactory witness. What is more, I have reason to think that she was concealing part of the truth from me. She was hostile, for one thing. Very unwilling to answer my questions, and very anxious to make me believe she hadn't had time to have murdered Mr. Seaton-Carew - which it's my belief she had, only one person corroborating her story that she lingered for a minute or two in the library when Seaton-Carew had left it. And I didn't set much store by that, because it was as plain as a pikestaff he'd have corroborated anything she chose to say! The rest of the people in the library say they don't remember, that she was in and out a good many times during the evening. Also, I had occasion to ask her if she noticed whether Mr. Butterwick seemed at all agitated. She said she didn't notice anything about him that was unusual, but the butler says nobody could have failed to have noticed it, because he looked very queer and jumpy, didn't seem to pay much attention to what was said to him, and drank off a couple of doubles before you could say Jack Robinson."
"Before we come to him," said Hemingway, "what's Mrs. Haddington's evidence?"
"Mrs. Haddington states that after Miss Birtley had set off downstairs to fetch Seaton-Carew to the telephone, she was just going up to her room when she found that Mr. Butterwick had come out of the drawingroom, and was standing behind her. He said he was going down to the dining-room to get himself a drink, play having finished at his table. She then went on up to her bedroom, and cannot state whether he went straight downstairs or not. She remained in her room for a few minutes only - uncorroborated, except that one or two people in the drawing-room say she wasn't gone for long - and then returned to the drawing-room, which she did not again leave until after the murder had been discovered. Mr. Butterwick tells the same story. He says he left Mrs. Haddington going upstairs, and himself went running down to the dining-room. He did not meet either Seaton-Carew or Miss Birtley and that, Chief Inspector, is where I think he's lying. He also states that he didn't hear any of the conversation between Mrs. Haddington and Miss Birtley about this telephone-call, and that's another lie, or I'm much mistaken. He stayed in the dining-room, and came back into the drawing-room just as Sir Roderick Vickerstown was leaving it to find out what was keeping Seaton-Carew. Corroborated by Sir Roderick. The butler doesn't know when he left the dining-room, because he himself had gone down to his pantry while Mr. Butterwick was still there."
"I see. And has this Butterwick any reason for killing Seaton-Carew?"
"To my mind, he's got more reason than anyone else," said Pershore. "By what I've gathered, and from the looks of him I don't find it hard to believe, he used to be very thick with Seaton-Carew, and always flying into tantrums if ever Seaton-Carew paid too much attention to anyone else."
"Oh, a homosexual, is he? Of course, I would have to strike a case with one of them in it!"
The Inspector looked down his nose. "That is how he seems to me, and it's what I've been given to understand. But the butler, and Mrs. Haddington's personal maid, both state that Seaton-Carew was after Miss Cynthia Haddington, which was not at all what Mrs. Haddington wished, for he was as old as she was, and, what's more, he was very intimate with her. But that," he added austerely, "is uncorroborated gossip."
"Nice goings-on!" commented Hemingway. "Where are we getting to? Did Mrs. Haddington strangle Seaton-Carew because he was making up to her daughter, or did Butterwick do it for the same reason?"
"Well," said Pershore, "it's only fair to state that both the butler and the parlourmaid say that after dinner tonight Mrs. Haddington and Seaton-Carew were alone together in the library, and it sounded as if they were having some kind of a dispute — to put it no higher. And Miss Haddington says that when Butterwick arrived he found her talking to Seaton-Carew in the back drawingroom, and created a scene. She says he flew into a rage, and she was afraid he was going to do something silly, he was so upset. Lady Nest Poulton more or less agrees with that, though she didn't hear the actual words that passed between him and Seaton-Carew. She just says he seemed to be upset, but it wasn't anything out of the way with him. A Miss Cheadle, who was his partner, says that she thought he had something on his mind, but she knew nothing about the quarrel with Seaton-Carew."
"Oh!" said Hemingway. "Did Miss Birtley have a row with this Seaton-Carew as well?"
"According to the servants, Miss Birtley has always disliked him, and made no bones about showing it. He and she arrived at the house together tonight, and when the butler opened the door to them it was plain Miss Birtley was very angry with Seaton-Carew. He was laughing, and taunting her, by what the butler could make out, and she said something of a threatening nature about being determined as well as cruel, and he'd better not be too sure of something."
"Yes, that's the sort of evidence that makes me wish I'd gone in for lorry-driving, or something easy. Any more people who had a silly quarrel with this popular number?"
"No, not exactly," replied Pershore. "But it seems that Lord Guisborough couldn't stand him - in fact, he as good as told me so. He's in love with Miss Haddington too, but he's accounted for: he was playing Bridge at one of the tables in the library, and he never left the room till the murder had been discovered. None of them did, at his table."
"What a shame!" said Hemingway. "Quite my fancy, he was. I've never arrested a lord yet, and he seems to have got just as much motive as anyone else I've heard of so far. What about the rest of the gang in the library?"
"Two only left the room while Seaton-Carew was absent. Mr. Poulton, who was playing at his table, went out to get a breather - they all agree it was a bit stuffy in the room by that time. He states that he strolled along the hall to the front-door, and stood for a moment or two at the top of the steps. Then he went back to the library, visiting the cloakroom on the way. No corroboration."
"Any motive either?"
"Not," said the Inspector, "that I have been able to discover."
"That's fine: we'd better fasten on him," said Hemingway.
"Fasten on him?" repeated the Inspector, staring.
"Well, I'd rather have no motive at all than the lot I've been listening to. Who else left the library?"
"Mr. Harte. He was playing with Miss Haddington, against Mr. and Mrs. Kenelm Guisborough, who are by way of being Lord Guisborough's cousins. Some minutes after Mr. Poulton had gone out, Mr. Harte became dummy, and he too left the room. He met Mr. Poulton coming out of the cloakroom."
"And what did he do?"
"According to his story, he too went into the cloakroom. Mr. Harte has no apparent motive - so perhaps you'd prefer to fasten on him, Chief Inspector!" said Pershore, with heavy sarcasm.