"You have a beautiful plainness, Mathilda. Your eyes laugh, too. Did you know?"
"No, I didn't know. Tell me more!"
He laughed, and, pulling her hand through his arm, held it, and strolled on with her across the spongy turf. "I shan't be able to offer you this for your home."
"It's all right with me. But you love it. You ought to have it."
"Don't think I could keep it up as things are. It will be sold, anyway, and the proceeds split between the three Of us."
"You couldn't buy it in?"
He shook his head. "Couldn't run it on what was left if I did. I don't mind. I've got you."
They walked on. "If Paula and Joe didn't want it sold - if they were willing to forgo their share of the price, you could keep it. Nat meant you to have it. I always thought that was why he bought it."
"It was, originally. It's all right, Mathilda. I shan't mind - much. The only thing I couldn't bear would be to see Joe here."
"Well, you won't: he doesn't like the place."
The saturnine look came back into his lace. "You know nothing of what Joe likes or dislikes. None of us does."
"He's never made any secret of the fact that historic houses don't appeal to him."
"Reason enough to assume they do. I fancy Joe would like enormously to be Lord of the Manor. But he shan't be. Not unless he chooses to buy it. I'll stand out for a sale - and run the bidding up, too!"
"Why do you hate Joe so bitterly, Stephen?" she asked quietly.
He glanced down at her, a derisive expression in his hard eyes. "I hate Joe for his hypocrisy."
"Do you think he can help acting? It's second nature, I believe."
"My God, Mathilda, can't you see the truth? Are you fooled too?" he asked incredulously.
"I don't like Joe," she confessed. "He means well, but he's an ass."
"He is not an ass, and he doesn't mean well. You think he likes me, don't you? Well, I tell you that Joe hates me as much as I hate him!"
"Stephen!" she exclaimed.
He laughed. "Think I'm brutal to Joe, don't you, Mathilda? When he tries to paw me about, and mouths his sickening platitudes, and drips affection all over me! You don't see that Joe's out to do me down. He nearly managed it, too."
"But he's always trying to convince everyone that you couldn't have killed Nat!"
"Oh no, Mathilda! Oh no, my love! That's only the facade. Think it over! Think of all that Joseph's said in my defence, and ask yourself if it was helpful, or if it only served to make the police think that he was desperately trying to shield a man whom he knew to be guilty. Who do you think planted my cigarette-case in Uncle Nat's room? Have you any doubt? I haven't."
Her fingers tightened on his. "Stephen, are you sure you're not letting your dislike of Joe run away with you?"
"I'm quite sure. Joe was my enemy from the moment he set foot in this house, and discovered that I was Uncle Nat's blue-eyed boy. I was, you know."
"But you quarrelled with Nat! Always, Stephen!"
"Sure I did, but without prejudice, until Joe came."
She was silent for a moment, not doubting his sincerity, yet unable to believe that he was not regarding Joseph with a distorted vision. "He got Nat to make a will in your favour."
"Do you always believe what Joe tells you?" asked Stephen. "He worried him into making a will. I don't know what happened: I wasn't there. Joe saw to that. But I can imagine Uncle Nat giving in to Joe, and then making the will out in my favour. That would have been a joke he'd have appreciated. Only Joe was clever, and he saw to it that the will should be invalid."
"You've never spoken a word of this!"
His lips curled. "No. Only to you, and you think I'm unhinged, don't you? What do you suppose everyone else would think? I can tell you, if you don't know."
She looked up at him, dawning horror in her eyes. "Yes, of course I know. If you're right, it puts a hideous complexion on so much that has happened! I haven't stayed here often enough to be able to judge. I always ascribed the trouble that Joe has such a knack of starting to incurable tactlessness. But I see that your explanation might be correct."
"You can take it from me that it is. If anyone but you had provided Joe with his alibi, I would, moreover, have been ready to swear that it was he who murdered Uncle Nat."
"It isn't possible, Stephen. When he wasn't chatting to me he was humming snatches of song."
He lifted her hand to his lips, and fleetingly kissed it. "All right, my sweet. Yours is the only word I would take for that."
They had come in sight of the house again by this time, and in a few minutes they entered it, through the front door, just as Inspector Hemingway was seeing a finger-print expert and a photographer off the premises.
The Inspector was looking more bird-like than ever, and there was a satisfied gleam in his eye, for under a dusting of powder the panel above the billiard-room mantelpiece had revealed the imprints of four fingers and a thumb. He cocked an intelligent eyebrow at Stephen and Mathilda, and drew his own conclusions.
"You are quite right, of course," said Stephen, correctly interpreting the look in the Inspector's eye. "But we feel - at least, Miss Clare does - that an announcement at present would not be in the best of good taste. Why the camera-man?"
"Just a bit of work I wanted done, sir. If I may say so, you don't waste your time, do you?"
Stephen laughed. "As a matter of fact, I've wasted too much time, Inspector. How are you doing?"
"Not so badly, sir," replied Hemingway. He turned to Mathilda. "I want to have a talk with you, miss, if you please."
"Very well," she replied, rather surprised. "I'll join you in the morning-room as soon as I've changed my shoes."
This did not take her long, and she presently walked into the morning-room to find not only the Inspector there, but Stephen also, looking dangerous. She said at once: "Take that scowl off your face, Stephen: you're frightening the Inspector."
"That's right, miss," said Hemingway. "I'm all over goose-flesh."
"I can see you are. No one is going to convict me of murder, Stephen, so relax! What is it, Inspector?"
"Well, miss, in checking over the details of this case, I find that I omitted to take your evidence. That won't do at alclass="underline" in fact, it's a wonder to me how I came to leave you out. So, if you don't mind, I'd like you to tell me, please, just what you did when you went upstairs to change for dinner on Christmas Eve."
"She gave her evidence to Inspector Colwall," Stephen said.
"Ah, but that won't do for the Department, sir!" said Hemingway mendaciously. "Very strict we are, at Scotland Yard."
"I'll tell you what I did with pleasure," Mathilda said. "But I'm afraid it isn't helpful. First I had a bath, then I dressed, and lastly I came down to the drawing-room."
"And I think Mr. Joseph Herriard was able to corroborate that, wasn't he, miss?"
"Yes. We went upstairs together, and while I had my bath he continued to talk to me from his dressing-room. In fact, I don't recall that he ever stopped talking, except now and then, when he hummed instead."
"Even when you had gone back into your bedroom? Did you go on talking to each other?"
"He went on talking to me," corrected Mathilda.
"Do you mean that you didn't answer him?"
"I said Oh! at intervals. Occasionally I said Yes, when he asked me if I was listening."
"Were you in the habit of talking to Mr. Joseph while you were in your room, miss?"
"I didn't do it the night before, and I haven't done it since, but three days isn't really long enough for one to contract a habit, do you think?"
"I see. And you came downstairs together on Christmas Eve?"
"Arm in arm."
"Thank you, miss; that's all I wanted to know," said Hemingway.
Stephen, who had been frowningly regarding him, said: Just what are you driving at, Inspector?"