Gay said “Why?” again. This time it was only a breath like a sigh, but it came from her very heart. She had both hands clasped about his arm, and he was trying to unclasp them. He said,
“You know why.”
“I don’t care,” said Gay. “I don’t care a bit what anyone thinks, and I don’t care if they arrest you.” Her hands clung to each other and to him. “I don’t care about anything unless-unless you don’t care for me.”
There was a dreadful little pause. Her clasp relaxed. She stepped back, her eyes suddenly blurred so much that she couldn’t see, and in a forlorn and faltering tone she said, “You don’t. It-it doesn’t matter if you don’t, Algy.” She felt her left hand caught, and blinked away two blinding tears. Having got her hand, Algy was holding it so tight that it felt as if all the bones were breaking. This was naturally very encouraging, but just as she managed to swallow a sob that was threatening to choke her the comforting pressure ceased. She had her hand again, rather the worse for wear, and Algy Somers had reached the door and banged it behind him. Gay dried her eyes, and presently went upstairs to Sylvia.
XXVI
Sylvia was lying on the old-fashioned couch in her room. She looked pale and depressed, but she brightened up when Gay came in.
“Are they still asking everybody questions?” she said in a plaintive voice. “They do ask a lot, don’t they? I’m sure they went on and on at me until I felt quite giddy. Will they go away soon, do you think?”
“I don’t know,” said Gay. Her heart felt like a heavy stone inside her and her throat was dry. She would have liked to put her head down in Sylvia’s lap and weep, but you couldn’t do that sort of thing.
Sylvia sighed.
“It would be nice if they would go away, wouldn’t it? I don’t mind Algy-he’s nice, but I wish the Inspector would go away, and that Mr. Brook, and Colonel Anstruther. Why did they want to ask me all those questions? It isn’t as if they could possibly think that I shot Francis.” She shivered, and her voice had a frightened sound. “They couldn’t think that-Gay, they couldn’t!” They kept wanting to know why I picked up the pistol. And I don’t know. It was all so quick and so dreadful. But they can’t think I did it. Why, you were there, and Algy. Why couldn’t it have been Algy?”
“Sylvia!”
“I mean, why don’t they think it was Algy?”
“They do,” said Gay, and felt a cold breath of terror touch her and go past.
Sylvia said, “Oh,” and then, “What a good thing.”
“Sylvia!”
A little colour had come into Sylvia’s cheeks.
“You needn’t say ‘Sylvia!’ like that. I mean, if they think it was Algy they won’t go on thinking it was me, will they, darling? And then they won’t go on asking me all those silly questions.”
Bright anger looked out of Gay’s eyes, but it faded again. What was the good of being angry? It never had been any use with Sylvia. She said,
“Sylly, don’t you truly remember how you came to have the pistol? Let’s go over it together and see if it doesn’t come back to you. What was the first thing that happened when you got to the window in the hedge?”
“I had my torch,” said Sylvia, “and the light went through the window, and Mr. Zero said, ‘Is that you?’ and I said, ‘Yes.’ And he said, ‘Have you got those letters?’ and I said I had, and he asked if I’d looked at them and I said of course I hadn’t. I mean, why should I-horrid things. But he went on about was I sure I hadn’t, and I said, ‘Don’t be silly.’ And then he said, ‘Hand them over quick and put out that torch!’ I think he said ‘that damned torch.’ And I wanted to know why, and he got angry and said, ‘Put it out at once, I tell you!’ And then Francis came running, and there was a fight, and the pistol went off and I picked it up.”
“Sylly, how could you pick it up when they were on one side of the hedge and you were on the other?”
Sylvia stared with those blue eyes of hers.
“He shot Francis, and he threw it down and I picked it up.”
“You mean he threw it in at the window? Is that what you mean?”
“I suppose so,” said Sylvia in a helpless voice. “Yes, that’s what he must have done, because something hit my shoulder and made a bruise there. I expect it was the pistol.”
“Did you tell Colonel Anstruther that?”
“Oh, no darling,” said Sylvia. “I’ve only just thought about it myself.”
“You must tell him,” said Gay. “Now, Sylly-think! What happened to the letters?”
“I don’t know, darling.”
“Just think. Did you give them to Mr. Zero? You say he told you to, but did you do it? Did you?”
“I don’t know, darling-at least-”
“Good girl-go on.”
Sylvia looked puzzled.
“If I’d given them to him I wouldn’t remember crunching them up in my hand when they were fighting, would I?”
“I shouldn’t think so. Is that what you remember?”
Sylvia’s voice had a groping sound.
“Well, I did think so-just now-when you asked me-but I don’t know really-I just had the sort of feeling of the corners running into my hand-” She gazed at her open palms as if she expected to find the mark of the stolen letter there.
“But Sylly-”
The telephone bell rang from the table beside the big four-post bed. Sylvia got up as if she were glad of the interruption. She put the receiver to her ear, and heard a voice which set her heart knocking against her side.
“You know who is speaking, Lady Colesborough.”
Sylvia said, “Do I?” And then panic took her, and she added in a choking hurry, “Yes, yes, yes-of course I do. What do you want?”
The voice said, “I want those letters. Where are they?”
“I don’t know. Everyone asks me that, and I don’t know.”
“The police haven’t got them?” Mr. Zero’s voice was smooth, but there was a sound in it as if the smoothness might break-quite suddenly, at any moment.
Sylvia said, “Oh, no. Oh, I’m sure they haven’t, because they keep asking me-everyone does.”
“And what do you say?”
“I don’t know,” said Sylvia. “I mean, that’s what I say, but I don’t know.”
“Keep right on saying it,” said Mr. Zero, and rang off.
Sylvia, turning round with an expression of relief, was met by a demanding look from Gay and a quick “What was that?” The relief faded.
“He wanted to know about the letters too. I told him I didn’t know.”
“Sylly, who was it? Who were you speaking to? Who asked you about the letters?”
“It was Mr. Zero,” said Sylvia. Her voice began confidently and then shook. It shook most on the name.
“Mr. Zero!”
Sylvia caught her breath in something like a sob.
“He oughtn’t to, ought he? Not if he shot Francis. I don’t think he ought to ring me up like that.”
Gay had a startled look.
“You ought to tell them at once. They ought to find out where the call came from.”
But Sylvia shook her head.
“Oh, no,” she said.
“Sylly!”
“He wouldn’t like it at all,” said Sylvia with conviction.
Gay looked, opened her mouth to speak, shut it again, and ran out of the room. What was the good of speaking to Sylvia?
She ran all the way downstairs and into the study. The three men who were there all turned to look at her. Inspector Boyce admired the scarlet in her cheeks and the sparkle in her eyes. Mr. Brook wondered what had brought her there in such a flying hurry. Colonel Anstruther was confirmed in his convictions that girls had no manners nowadays.
Gay stood with the open door in her hand and said, with the words tripping over each other,
“He’s just called her up! He’s been talking to her-on the telephone-Mr. Zero! So it couldn’t be Algy-you must see that it couldn’t be Algy if he’s just been talking to Sylvia on the telephone!”