“Mrs. Mayhew is perfectly right. I went up to see Mr. Lessiter between half past eight and a quarter past nine.”

“You were back here at a quarter past nine?”

“Miss Bell will tell you so. She remarked when I came in that I had missed the news.”

“Miss Bell? What about Mr. Robertson?”

“He wasn’t in the room.”

“Was he in the house?”

“No-he had gone for a walk.”

The Superintendent lifted his reddish eyebrows.

“At that hour!”

Miss Cray replied, “Why not?”

He left it at that.

“Miss Cray, I must ask you about this visit of yours to Melling House. You are an old friend of Mr. Lessiter’s?”

“I haven’t seen him for more than twenty years.”

“You were engaged to him?”

“More than twenty years ago.”

“There was a breach-a quarrel?”

“I wouldn’t call it that.”

“Who broke off the engagement?”

“I did.”

“Why?”

“I think that’s my business.”

The grey eyes were angry, scornful, and very fine. He didn’t know when he had seen a finer pair of eyes. He thought a woman who could get so much angry scorn into a look might very well do murder if she was put to it. He said,

“Miss Cray, were you aware that Mr. Lessiter had made a will in your favour?”

“He showed it to me last night. I told him it was absurd.”

“He had been burning your letters, hadn’t he?”

“If Mrs. Mayhew was listening at the door she will have told you that.”

“He had been burning your letters, and then he showed you the will-it’s dated twenty-four years ago. And he threw that on to the fire too.”

She said, “No-it was I who put it on the fire.”

“Oh, it was you?”

“The whole thing was absurd-a will made during a boy-and-girl engagement. I put it on the fire, but he took it off again. If Mrs. Mayhew was listening she ought to be able to confirm that. I would like you to understand that Mr. Lessiter was-” she hesitated, and then said, “amusing himself.”

“You mean he wasn’t serious?”

“Of course he wasn’t serious. He was teasing me. He saw that I was vexed, and it amused him.”

“You were vexed?”

“I disliked the whole thing very much.”

He leaned towards her, an elbow on the table.

“Was Mr. Lessiter amusing himself when he spoke of the possibility of his being murdered by Mr. Carr Robertson?”

She could control her voice, but not her angry blood. She felt it burn her face as she said,

“Of course!”

“You mean that he was joking. But there must be some reason even for a joke. Why should he make a joke like that?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Mrs. Mayhew states that she heard him say at one time that he didn’t particularly want to be murdered. And later on, after he had shown you the will and read out from it, ‘Everything to Henrietta Cray, the White Cottage, Melling,’ she heard him say, ‘If young Carr was to murder me tonight, you’d come in for quite a tidy fortune.’ He did say that, Miss Cray?”

“Something like it. I’ve told you he wasn’t serious. People don’t say that sort of thing seriously.”

“There’s many a true word spoken in jest. Murder is serious, Miss Cray. Mr. Lessiter was murdered last night. As far as we have any evidence, you were the last person to see him alive. Why did you go and see him?”

She said with composure, “Why should I not?”

“I was asking you why you did.”

“Why does one do anything? I thought I would.”

“It was a sudden impulse?”

“You may call it that.”

“Were you wearing a coat?”

“Certainly.”

“What kind of a coat?”

“I took one that was hanging in the hall.”

“Was it a coat belonging to your nephew?”

“It may have been-I took the first one I touched.”

“You were wearing it when you went?”

“Naturally.”

“And when you came back?”

Her colour rose again. She looked at him.

“Superintendent Drake, what is all this about my coat? I wore it, and it’s back on its hook in the hall.”

“Then I should like to see it, Miss Cray.”

If she had kept a brave front it covered a bitter cramping fear. She had made up her mind to tell the truth as far as she could, and when she got past that point to hold her tongue. There was more than one old coat hanging up in the hall-she could say that she had worn one of the others… She couldn’t do it. If you have been brought up to tell the truth, it is very difficult indeed to tell a lie, and next door to impossible to make it convincing. Rietta Cray had a direct and simple nature and a truthful tongue. She couldn’t do it. In a moment she was to be glad of this, because Inspector Drake walked down the line of coats, turning each one back so as to see the inner side. When he came to a plaid lining with a yellow stripe, he stopped, unhooked the coat, and turned back to the dining-room.

She followed him with a cold drag at her heart. If he had recognized Carr’s raincoat, it was because someone at Melling House had seen it and described it to him. Mrs. Mayhew had been listening at the door. If she had opened it a little way she might have seen the coat. That wouldn’t matter, because the Superintendent already knew that she had talked with James Lessiter. But suppose Mrs. Mayhew had come back later and seen the coat as it was when Carr brought it home- the sleeve soaked with blood, the whole right side of it splashed and stained-

It was a darkish morning. He took the coat to the window and examined it by touch and eye. He exclaimed,

“It’s damp!” And then, “This coat has been washed.” He held it at arm’s length with his right hand and pointed with his left. “All this right side has been washed-you can see the watermark. Why did you wash it, Miss Cray?”

She wasn’t angry now, she was controlled and pale. She made no answer.

“Was it to wash the bloodstains out? Mrs. Mayhew saw the sleeve hanging down, and the cuff was stained with blood.”

“I scratched my wrist.”

It was the truth, but it sounded like a lie, and not even a good one. She pulled away the sleeve of the jumper, and he said what Carr had said last night,

“That little scratch!”

Those were the words, but the tone added something. It said plainly and scornfully, “Can’t you do better than that?”

She made up her mind that she wouldn’t answer any more questions. She was perfectly plain about it, standing up straight and looking him in the face.

“I’ve told you the truth, and I have no more to say… Yes, I’ll sign a statement if you want me to, but I won’t answer any more questions.”

He folded up the raincoat, put it down on the window-seat, and asked to see Miss Frances Bell.

Fancy came into the room, her blue eyes very wide. They observed the Superintendent, and didn’t think much of him. Like Mrs. Mayhew, Miss Bell had no affection for a foxy man. The young man with the notebook at the end of the dining-table was better-quite nicelooking in fact. She wondered, as she always wondered about any new young man, whether he could dance. Such a lot of nice boys couldn’t, and the boys that could weren’t always the nice ones. With these simple thoughts in her mind she sat down in a chair which faced the window, thus affording both men an unshadowed view of her quite incredible complexion.

Constable Whitcombe was not unaffected. He gazed, at first in doubt, but later with heart-felt appreciation. If Superintendent Drake had any such feelings he concealed them perfectly, and produced his questions in the impersonal manner of a conjurer pulling rabbits out of a hat.

They began by being very small rabbits, and Fancy received them in an amiable manner. She agreed that she was Miss Frances Bell, and that she was a friend of Mr. Carr Robertson’s. She was staying at the White Cottage on a short visit. Oh, no, she wasn’t engaged to Mr. Robertson-nothing like that-they were just friends. She didn’t know Mr. Lessiter at all. She didn’t even know him by sight-not till she saw his picture in the paper.