'I know just how you are feeling, a voice said at his elbow. And there was Liz; a little heavy-eyed, he noticed, but otherwise calm and friendly.
'Good morning, he said. 'I was a little dashed this morning because I couldn't drop everything and go fishing. But I feel better now.
'It is a beauty, isn't it, she agreed. 'You don't quite believe it is there at all. You feel that no one could possibly have thought it up; it just appeared.
Her thoughts shifted from the house to his presence, and he saw the question coming.
'I am sorry to be a nuisance, but I am busy this morning getting rid of the undergrowth in this case.
'Undergrowth?
'I want to get rid of all the people who can't possibly enter into the case at all.
'I see. You are collecting alibis.
'Yes. He opened the car door, so that she might ride the short distance to the house.
'Well, I hope we have good ones. I regret to say that I haven't one at all. It was the first thing I thought of when I knew who you were. It's very odd, isn't it, how guilty an innocent person feels when he can't account for himself on the umpteenth inst. Do you want everyone's alibi? Aunt Lavinia's and mother's and all?
'And those of the staff, too. Of everyone who had any connection with Leslie Searle.
'Well, you had better start with Aunt Vin. Before she begins her morning chore. She dictates for two hours every morning, and she likes to begin punctually.
'Where were you, Miss Garrowby? he asked as they arrived at the door.
'At the material time? He thought she was being deliberately cold-blooded about it; the 'material time' was when Leslie Searle had presumably lost his life, and he did not think that she was forgetting that fact.
'Yes. On Wednesday night.
'I had what they call in detective stories "retired to my room". And don't tell me that it was "early to retire", either. I know it was. I like going upstairs early. I like being alone at the end of the day.
'Do you read?
'Don't tell, Inspector, but I write.
'You too?
Do I disappoint you?
'You interest me. What do you write-or shouldn't I ask?
'I write innocuous heroines out of my system, that's all.
'Tilda the tweeny with the hare-lip and the homicidal tendencies, as antidote to Maureen.
She looked at him for a long moment and then said: 'You are a very odd sort of policeman.
'I suspect that it is your idea of policemen that is odd, Grant said briskly. 'Will you tell your aunt that I am here?
But there was no need to announce him. Miss Fitch was in the hall as Liz ran up the steps, and she said in tones more surprised than grieved:
'Liz, you are five minutes late! Then she saw the Inspector, and said: 'Well, well, they were right. They said that no one would ever take you for a policeman. Come in, Inspector. I have wanted so much to meet you. Officially, as it were. Our last encounter could hardly be termed a meeting, could it. Come into the morning-room. That is where I work.
Grant apologised for keeping her from her morning's dictation, but she professed herself glad to postpone for at least ten minutes her business with 'the tiresome girl'. Grant took the 'tiresome girl' to be the current Fitch heroine.
Miss Fitch, too, it seemed, had retired early on Wednesday night. At half-past nine, to be exact.
'When a family are in each other's pocket all day long, as we are, she said, 'they tend to go to their rooms early at night. She had watched a radio play, and had lain awake a little, half-listening for her sister coming in, but had fallen asleep quite early after all.
'Coming in? Grant said. 'Was Mrs Garrowby out, then?
'Yes. She was at a W.R.I. meeting.
He asked her about Searle, then. What she had thought of him, and what in her opinion he was liable to do or not to do. She was surprisingly guarded about Searle, he thought; as if she were picking her steps; and he wondered why.
When he said: 'Did Searle, in your opinion, show signs of being in love with your niece? she looked startled, and said 'No, of course not! too quickly and too emphatically.
'He did not pay her attentions?
'My dear man, Miss Fitch said, any American pays a girl attentions. It is a conditioned reflex. As automatic as breathing.
'You think he was not seriously interested in her?
'I am sure that he wasn't.
'Your nephew told me last night that he and Searle had telephoned to you each night on their way down the river.
'Yes.
'Did everyone in the household know about the message on Wednesday night? I mean, know where the two men were camped?
'I expect so. The family certainly did; and the staff were always anxious to hear about their progress so I suppose everyone knew.
'Thank you very much, Miss Fitch. You have been very kind.
She called Liz in, and Liz took him to her mother and went back to the morning-room to record the doings of the latest Maureen.
Mrs Garrowby was another person without an alibi. She had been at the W.R.I. meeting at the village hall, had left there when the meeting broke up at half-past nine, had accompanied Miss Easton-Dixon part of the way home and had left her where their roads branched. She had come in about ten; or later, perhaps: she had strolled home because it was a lovely night; and had locked up the front of the house. The back door was always locked by Mrs Brett, the cook-housekeeper.
Emma Garrowby did not fool Grant for a moment. He had met her counterpart too often; that ruthless maternalism masquerading in a placid exterior. Had Searle got in the way of plans she had made for her daughter?
He asked her about Searle, and there was no step-picking at all. He had been a charming young man, she said. Quite exceptionally charming. They all liked him enormously, and were shattered by this tragedy.
Grant caught himself receiving this mentally with an expressive monosyllable.
He felt a little suffocated by Mrs Garrowby, and was glad when she went away to find Alice for him.
Alice had been walked-out on Wednesday night by the under-gardener, and had come in at a quarter past ten, whereupon the door had been locked behind her by Mrs Brett, and they had gone up together, after having a cup of cocoa, to their rooms in the back wing. Alice really was shattered by the fate that had overtaken Leslie Searle. Never, she said, had she had to do for a nicer young man. She had met dozens of young men, gentlemen and others, who considered a girl's ankles, but Mr Searle was the only one she had ever met who considered a girl's feet.
'Feet?
She had said as much to Mrs Brett, and to Edith, the parlourmaid. He would say: 'You can do this or that, and that will save you coming up again, won't it. And she could only conclude that this was an American characteristic, because no Englishman she had ever come across had ever cared two hoots whether you had to come up again or not.
Edith, too, it seemed, mourned for Leslie Searle; not because he considered her feet but because he was so good-looking. Edith proved to be very superior and refayned. Much too refayned to be walked out by an under-gardener. She had gone to her room to watch the same play that her mistress was watching. She heard Mrs Brett and Alice come up to bed, but the wing bedrooms were too far away to hear anyone come into the main block, so she did not know when Mrs Garrowby had come in.
Neither did Mrs Brett. After dinner, Mrs Brett said, the family did not worry the staff at all. Edith laid out the bed-time drinks, and after that the baize door in the hall was not normally opened again until the following morning. Mrs Brett had been nine years with Miss Fitch, and Miss Fitch could trust her to manage the staff and the staff premises.