Gerda Christow pulled the black dress up over her head and let it fall on a chair.

Her eyes were piteous with uncertainty.

She said, "I don't know… I really don't know… Nothing seems to matter." «I know, dear, I know." Mrs. Patterson was kind but firm. She knew exactly how to treat people who had had a bereavement.

"Elsie is wonderful in a crisis," her family said of her.

At the present moment she was sitting in her sister Gerda's bedroom in Harley Street, being wonderful. Elsie Patterson was tall and spare with an energetic manner. She was looking now at Gerda with a mixture of irritation and compassion.

Poor dear Gerda-tragic for her to lose her husband in such an awful way-and really, even now, she didn't seem to take in the-well, the implications properly! Of course, Mrs. Patterson reflected, Gerda always was terribly slow. And there was shock, too, to take into account.

She said in a brisk voice, "I think I should decide on that black marocain at twelve guineas."^ One always did have to make up Gerda's mind for her.

Gerda stood motionless, her brow puckered.

She said hesitantly:

"I don't really know if John liked mourning.

I think I once heard him say he didn't…"

John, she thought. If only John were here to tell me what to do.

But John would never be there again.

Never-never-never… Mutton getting cold-congealing on the table… the bang of the consulting room door, John running up two steps at a time, always in a hurry, so vital, so alive…

Alive…

Lying on his back by the swimming pool … the slow drip of blood over the edge… the feel of the revolver in her hand…

A nightmare, a bad dream, presently she would wake up and none of it would be true…

Her sister's crisp voice came cutting through her nebulous thoughts.

"You must have something black for the inquest. It would look most odd if you turned up in bright blue."

Gerda said, "That awful inquest!" and half shut her eyes.

"Terrible for you, darling," said Elsie Patterson quickly. "But after it is all over you will come straight down to us and we shall take great care of you."

The nebulous blur of Gerda Christow's thoughts hardened. She said, and her voice was frightened, almost panic-stricken:

"What am I going to do without John?"

Elsie Patterson knew the answer to that one. "You've got your children. You've got to live for them."

Zena, sobbing and crying… "My Daddy's dead!" Throwing herself on her bed.

Terry, pale, inquiring, shedding no tears…

An accident with a revolver, she had told them-poor Daddy has had an accident.

Beryl Collins (so thoughtful of her) had confiscated the morning papers so that the children should not see them. She had warned the servants, too. Really, Beryl had been most kind and thoughtful…

Terence coming to his mother in the dim drawing-room. His lips pursed close together, his face almost greenish in its odd pallor.

"Why was Father shot?"

"An accident, dear. I-I can't talk about it."

"It wasn't an accident. Why do you say what isn't true? Father was killed. It was murder. The paper says so."

"Terry, how did you get hold of a paper?

I told Miss Collins-"

He had nodded-queer repeated nods like a very old man.

"I went out and bought one, of course. I knew there must be something in them that you weren't telling us, or else why did Miss Collins hide them?"

It was never any good hiding truth from Terence. That queer, detached, scientific curiosity of his had always to be satisfied.

"Why was he killed. Mother?"

She had broken down then, becoming hysterical.

"Don't ask me about it-don't talk about it-I can't talk about it… it's all too dreadful."

"But they'll find out, won't they? I mean they have to find out. It's necessary."

So reasonable, so detached… It made

Gerda want to scream and laugh and cry.

She thought. He doesn't care-he can't care-he just goes on asking questions.

Why, he hasn't cried, even.

Terence had gone away, evading his Aunt Elsie's ministrations, a lonely little boy with a stiff pinched face. He had always felt alone.

But it hadn't mattered until today.

Today, he thought, was different. If only there was someone who would answer questions reasonably and intelligently.

Tomorrow, Tuesday, he and Nicholson Minor were going to make nitroglycerine.

He had been looking forward to it with a thrill. The thrill had gone. He didn't care if he never made nitroglycerine.

Terence felt almost shocked at himself.

Not to care any more about scientific experiment!

But when a chap's father had been murdered… He thought. My father-murdered…

And something stirred-took root- grew … a slow anger.

Beryl Collier tapped on the bedroom door and came in. She was pale, composed, efficient.

She said:

"Inspector Grange is here." And as Gerda gasped and looked at her piteously. Beryl went on quickly, "He said/there was no need for him to worry you. He'll have a word with you before he goes, but it is just routine questions about Dr. Christow's practice and I can tell him everything he wants to know."

"Oh, thank you. Collie."

Beryl made a rapid exit and Gerda sighed out:

"Collie is such a help. She's so practical."

"Yes, indeed," said Mrs. Patterson. "An excellent secretary, I'm sure. Very plain, poor girl, isn't she? Oh, well, I always think that's just as well. Especially with an attractive man like John was."

Gerda flamed out at her:

"What do you mean, Elsie? John would never-he never-you talk as though John would have flirted or something horrid if he had had a pretty secretary. John wasn't like that at all."

"Of course not, darling," said Mrs. Patterson.

"But after all, one knows what men are like!"

In the consulting room Inspector Grange faced the cool, belligerent glance of Beryl Collier. It was belligerent, he noted that.

Well, perhaps that was only natural.

Plain bit of goods, he thought. Nothing between her and the doctor, I shouldn't think. She may have been sweet on him, though. It works that way sometimes.

But not this time, he came to the conclusion, when he leaned back in his chair a quarter of an hour later. Beryl Collier's answers to his questions had been models of clearness. She replied promptly, and obviously had every detail of the doctor's practice at her fingertips. He shifted his ground and began to probe gently into the relations existing between John Christow and his wife.

They had been. Beryl said, on excellent terms.

"I suppose they quarrelled every now and then like most married couples?" The Inspector sounded easy and confidential.

"I do not remember any quarrels. Mrs.

Christow was quite devoted to her husband-really quite slavishly so."

There was a faint edge of contempt in her voice. Inspector Grange heard it.

Bit of a feminist, this girl, he thought.

Aloud he said:

"Didn't stand up for herself at all?"

"No. Everything revolved round Dr.

Christow."

"Tyrannical, eh?"

Beryl considered.

"No, I wouldn't say that… But he was what I should call a very selfish man. He took it for granted that Mrs. Christow would always fall in with his ideas."

"Any difficulties with patients-women,

I mean? You needn't mind about being frank. Miss Collier. One knows doctors have their difficulties in that line."

"Oh, that sort of thing!" Beryl's voice was scornful. "Dr. Christow was quite equal to dealing with any difficulties in that line. He had an excellent manner with patients." She added, "He was really a wonderful doctor."

There was an almost grudging admiration in her voice.

Grange said, "Was he tangled up with any woman? Don't be loyal. Miss Collier, it's important that we should know."

"Yes, I can appreciate that. Not to my knowledge."

A little too brusque, he thought. She doesn't know, but perhaps she guesses…

He said sharply, "What about Miss Henrietta Savernake?"

Beryl's lips closed tightly.

"She was a close friend of the family's."

"No-trouble between Dr. and Mrs.

Christow on her account?"

"Certainly not."

The answer was emphatic. (Overemphatic?) The Inspector shifted his ground.

"What about Miss Veronica Cray?"

"Veronica Cray?"

There was pure astonishment in Beryl's voice.

"She was a friend of Dr. Christow's, was she not?"

"I never heard of her. At least, I seem to know the name-"

"The motion picture actress."

Beryl's brow cleared.

"Of course! I wondered why the name was familiar. But I didn't even know that Dr.

Christow knew her."

She seemed so positive on the point that the Inspector abandoned it at once. He went on to question her about Dr. Christow's manner on the preceding Saturday. And here, for the first time, the confidence of Beryl's replies wavered. She said, slowly:

"His manner wasn't quite as usual."

"What was the difference?"

"He seemed distrait. There was quite a long gap before he rang for his last patient -and yet normally he was always in a hurry to get through when he was going away. I thought-yes, I definitely thought he had something on his mind."

But she could not be more definite.

Inspector Grange was not very satisfied with his investigations. He'd come nowhere near establishing motive-and motive had to be established before there was a case to go to the Public Prosecutor.

He was quite certain in his own mind that Gerda Christow had shot her husband. He suspected jealousy as the motive-but so far he had found nothing to go on. Sergeant Coombes had been working on the maids but they all told the same story. Mrs. Christow worshipped the ground her husband walked on.

Whatever happened, he thought, must have happened down at The Hollow. And remembering The Hollow, he felt a vague disquietude. They were an odd lot down there.

The telephone on the desk rang and Miss

Collier picked up the receiver.

She said, "It's for you. Inspector," and passed the instrument to him.

"Hullo, Grange here… What's that?…" Beryl heard the alteration in his tone and looked at him curiously. The wooden-looking face was impassive as ever.