“Nonsense,” said Alleyn very crisply. “There’s no question of betrayal. You have done the only possible thing. Tell me, please, Miss Gaynes, are you engaged to Mr. Liversidge?”

She flushed at that and for the first time showed a little honest indignation.

“You’ve no business to ask me that.”

“I can assure you I am not prompted by idle curiosity,” said Alleyn equitably. “The question is relevant. I still ask it.”

“Very well, then, I’m not actually engaged.”

“There is an understanding of some sort, perhaps?”

“I simply haven’t made up my mind.” A trace of complacency crept into her voice. Alleyn thought: “She is the type of young woman who always represents herself as a fugitive before the eager male. She would never admit lack of drawing-power in herself.”

“But now—” she was saying, “I wish we had never thought of it. I want to get away from all this. It’s all so hateful — I want to get away from it. I’m going to cable to daddy and ask him to send for me. I want to go home.”

“As a preliminary step,” said Alleyn cheerfully, “I am going to send you off to your hotel. You are tired and distressed. Things won’t seem so bad in the morning, you know. Good night.”

He shut the door after her and turned to the two New Zealanders.

“Silly young woman,” said Alleyn mildly.

But Wade was greatly excited.

“I reckon this changes the whole outfit,” he said loudly. “I reckon it does. If Liversidge stole the cash, it changes the whole show. By crikey, sir, you caught them out nicely. By crikey, it was a corker! He tells you one story about this conversation with the girl Gaynes, and you get the other tale from her and then face her up with it. By gee, it was a beauty!”

“My dear Inspector,” said Alleyn uncomfortably, “you are giving me far too much encouragement.”

“It wasn’t so much the line taken,” continued Wade, explaining Alleyn to Cass, “as the manner of taking it. I don’t say I wouldn’t have gone on the same lines myself. It was indicated, you might say, but I wouldn’t have got in the fine work like the chief inspector. The girl Gaynes would have turned dumb on us very, very easy, but the chief just trotted her along quietly and got the whole tale. You seemed to guess there was something crook about this Liversidge from the kick-off, sir. What put you on to that, if I might ask?”

“In the first instance, Miss Gaynes herself. That night in the train she was full of the theft until she began to account for the money she had spent. She mentioned Francis Liversidge, suddenly looked scared, and then shut up like an oyster. To-night Mr. Liversidge’s gallantry in defending young Broadhead seemed to me to be as bogus as the rest of his behaviour.”

“Including the queenie voice,” agreed Wade. “Sounds as if he’d swallowed the kitchen sink.”

“I fancy,” continued Alleyn, “that Miss Dacres also doubts the integrity of our Mr. Liversidge. I fancy she does. She has made one or two very cryptic remarks on the subject”

“The girl Gaynes never said just why she reckoned he looked suspicious. Was it simply because he’d been in the cabin and seen where she kept the money?”

“That, perhaps; and also, don’t you think, because of whatever Mr. Alfred Meyer said to her on the subject?”

“Cert-ain-ly,” agreed Wade, with much emphasis.

“And if the deceased knew Liversidge pinched the money and let the Gaynes woman see he knew, maybe she put in the good word to Liversidge and he thought: ‘That’s quite enough from you, Mr. Meyer,’ and fixed it accordingly.”

“In which case,” said Alleyn, offering Wade a cigarette, “we have two murderous gentlemen instead of one?”

“Uh?”

“The first attempt on his life was made in the train before the theft was discovered.”

“Aw, hell!” said Inspector Wade wearily. After a moment’s thought he brightened a little. “Suppose Liversidge had found out by some other means that the deceased knew he had taken the money. Suppose he knew the deceased was on to his little game before they left the ship?”

“By Jove, yes,” said Alleyn, “that’d do it, certainly. But look here, Wade, does one man murder another simply because he’s been found out in a theft?”

“Well, sir, when you put it like that—”

“No,” interrupted Alleyn, “you’re quite right. It’s possible. Meyer would give him the sack, of course, and make the whole thing public. That would ruin Liversidge’s career as an actor, no doubt. If he could kill Meyer before he spoke — Yes, it’s possible, but — I don’t know. We’ll have to see Miss Dacres and George Mason again, Wade. If Meyer confided in anyone, it would be his wife or his partner. But there’s one catch in your theory.”

“What’s that, sir?”

“It’s rather nebulous perhaps, but when the little man told me about the assault in the train he was obviously at a complete loss to account for it. Now, if he’d already let Liversidge see he suspected the theft, he would have thought of him as a possible enemy. But he told me he was on terms of loving-kindness and all the rest of it with his entire company, and I think he meant it.”

“It’s a fair cow, that’s what it is,” grunted Wade.

“Beg pardon, Inspector,” said the silent Cass after a pause, “but if I might make a suggestion — it’s just an idea, like.”

“Go ahead,” commanded Wade graciously.

“Well, sir, say this Mr. Liversidge knew the deceased gentleman had seen him take the money, without deceased having let on that he saw, if you understand me, sir.”

“Well done, sergeant,” said Alleyn quietly.

“Yes, but how?” objected Wade.

“Mr. Liversidge might have overheard deceased say something to his wife or somebody, sir.” Cass took a deep breath and fixed his eyes on the opposite wall. “What I mean to say,” he said doggedly, “Mr. Meyer saw Mr. Liversidge take the money. Mr. Liversidge knew Mr. Meyer saw him. Mr. Meyer thought Mr. Liversidge didn’t know he saw him.”

“And there,” concluded Alleyn, “would be the motive without Mr. Meyer realising it. He’s quite right. You’re fortunate, Inspector. An intelligent staff is not always given to us.”

Cass turned purple in the face, squared his enormous shoulders, and glared at the ceiling.

“There you are, Cass!” said Wade good-humouredly. “Now buzz off and get us another of these actors.”

Old Brandon Vernon looked a little the worse for wear. The hollows under his cheek bones and the lines round his eyes seemed to have made one of those grim encroachments to which middle-aged faces are so cruelly subject. A faint hint of a rimy stubble broke the smooth pallor of his chin; his eyes, in spite of their look of sardonic impertinence, were lack-lustre and tired. Yet when he spoke one forgot his age, for his voice was quite beautiful; deep, and exquisitely modulated. He was one of that company of old actors that are only found in the West End of London. They still believe in using their voices as instruments, they speak without affectation, and they are indeed actors.

“Well, Inspector,” he said to Alleyn, “you know how to delay an entrance. It was very effective business, coming out in your true colours like this.”

“I found it rather uncomfortable, Mr. Vernon,” answered Alleyn. “Do sit down, won’t you, and have a smoke? Cigarette?”

“I’ll have my comforter, if you don’t mind.” And Vernon pulled out a pipe and pouch. “Well,” he said, “I’m not sorry to leave the wardrobe-room. That young cub’s sulking and the other fellow has about as much conversation as a vegetable marrow. Dull.” He filled his pipe and gripped it between his teeth.

“We’re sorry to have kept you waiting so long,” said Alleyn.

“Don’t apologise. Used to it in this business. Half an actor’s life is spent waiting. Bad show this. Was Alfred murdered?”