The warm colour came up into Randal March’s face. He nodded and said,

“Go on.”

Miss Silver measured the pale blue cuff which she was knitting. It wanted half an inch of the right length. She pulled a fresh strand of wool from the ball and continued.

“With regard to her nephew Mr. Carr Robertson, my impressions came to me almost entirely through other people. He was in no mood to allow me to question him, and I did not expect him to do so. But when Miss Cray with obvious sincerity declared that he had at first been quite certain that it was she who had killed Mr. Lessiter, and that even now he was not quite sure that she had not done so, I was inclined to accept her statement, and to consider that the murderer must be looked for elsewhere. The third suspect, Cyril Mayhew, I dismissed after hearing what Allan Grover had to say. Everything else apart, if he had wished to steal, there must have been many things which might have been taken and either not missed for months or never missed at all. The extreme improbability of his removing these noticeable ornaments from the room most constantly occupied by Mr. Lessiter, and the certainty that such a theft would immediately be discovered, occurred to me with considerable force. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed clear that the figures had been stolen, not only by someone who knew their value, but by someone who intended that value to suggest a motive for Mr. Lessiter’s murder which would disguise the real motive.”

March said, “That might have involved Carr Robertson.”

Miss Silver shook her head.

“Superficially, yes-but actually, no. Consider the evidence. He has suddenly discovered that it is James Lessiter who has seduced and deserted his wife-he rushes out of the house. But he does not go up to Melling House-he walks over to Lenton and spends quite a long time with Miss Elizabeth Moore. They were at one time engaged, they had been separated, they now become reconciled. It is just possible that a man in those circumstances might commit a murder, but I think it extremely improbable, and I certainly do not think that if he had done so he would have brought that bloodstained raincoat home and introduced it to Miss Cray with the accusing remark, ‘Why did you do it?’ ”

“He did that-”

“Yes, Randal. It convinced Miss Cray of his innocence, and it convinced me. Though I had not seen much of him, I had received a very definite impression of his character. He might have been worked up to the point of violence, but he was incapable of duplicity or theft. And if he had killed Mr. Lessiter, it was inconceivable that he should have tried to shift the blame on to Miss Cray.”

“Yes, that’s true enough. And where did you go from there?”

She coughed gently.

“I considered Mrs. Welby, but I could not arrive at any conclusion. Both from my own observation and from what I had heard about her I judged her to be of a cold and self-centered disposition. I was sure that she was untruthful, and I suspected that she was dishonest.”

He raised his eyebrows.

“How devastating! All that, but not murder?”

She shook her head reprovingly.

“I could not believe that she could have brought herself to hit a man over the head with a poker. If she had been going to murder anyone she would, I am sure, have employed poison. A woman of her fastidious refinement would have to be carried quite outside herself with passion before she could kill a man in so brutal a manner. And Mrs. Welby was, I am convinced, incapable of being carried out of herself by passion. All the same, I was sure she knew something that she was keeping back, which was of course the case.”

Leaning back in his chair, March looked at her with a half-quizzical admiration.

“And now we come to Mr. Holderness. You know, I really would like to know how you got there.”

“In the simplest manner in the world.” She paused to measure the pale blue cuff, and finding it long enough, began to cast off. “The whole thing really turns on those gold figures. They were not taken by accident, but for a definite purpose. I believed that purpose to be two-fold. The value of the figures entered into it, and the question of making the whole affair appear to be the result of a burglary. I had to consider who would have the necessary special knowledge about the figures. I had already discarded Miss Cray, Mr. Carr Robertson, and Mrs. Welby. The latter might have taken them so far as any moral scruples were concerned, but she was already under suspicion owing to her previous misappropriations, and I was sure she was much too clear-headed to have added to her danger by so compromising a theft.”

“Did you never consider the Mayhews? They could hardly have helped knowing all about the figures.”

“I think they probably took them for granted. When a thing has always been there, you do not think about it. I was naturally struck by Mrs. Mayhew’s extreme distress and prostration, but this was explained by her anxiety on account of her son. As soon as this was relieved, she made a remarkable recovery. As regards Mr. Mayhew, I found that he enjoyed the respect of everyone in Melling. I think in a village it would be very difficult for him to bear the kind of character he bears without deserving it. Also, on comparison of the time of his arrival by bus from Lenton with the time of Mr. Carr Robertson’s visit, it did not seem possible that he could have committed the murder. Mr. Robertson must have reached Melling House about ten-thirty. Mr. Lessiter was dead and the raincoat heavily stained. Mr. Mayhew, I believe, came out from Lenton on the last bus, which does not arrive until eleven. I had, therefore, to consider who else would be likely to know about the figures. It was at this point that the name of Mr. Holderness presented itself.”

“But my dear Miss Silver-”

She gave him a look faintly tinged with reproof.

“I did not say that I suspected him. His name presented itself as that of a person who must surely have known the value of the figures.”

“They were entered in the inventory and for probate merely as four gilt figures.”

She coughed.

“I found that a suspicious circumstance. It was common knowledge that Mrs. Lessiter was on very confidential terms with her solicitor, and according to Miss Cray she was both proud of the figures, which were a legacy from her side of the family, and fond of talking about them to her intimates. I thought it impossible that Mr. Holderness should not have known their history.”

March said drily, “He evidently did.”

“I was sure of it. The next thing that attracted my attention was Mr. Holderness’s advice to Mr. Carr Robertson, who had consulted him professionally. He advised him to make a full statement to the police.”

“Very correct.”

With some half dozen stitches left on her last needle, Miss Silver paused in her task of casting off.

“My dear Randal, it is no part of a solicitor’s duty to advise a course which must lead to the immediate arrest of his client, at so early a stage and with an inquest pending. The reason why Mr. Carr Robertson was not arrested was, I imagine, the emergence at that time of a new suspect in Cyril Mayhew. But my attention had been once more directed to Mr. Holderness. I found myself wondering why he should have given his client such dangerous advice.”

“You are very acute.”

“We now come to the matter of the telephone conversations as reported by Gladys Luker. I was extremely anxious for this information. Miss Cray was protecting Mrs. Welby and would give me no help, but I had rather more than a suspicion that Gladys would be able to do so. Her aunt is a friend of Mrs. Voycey’s housekeeper, and I had learned from Mrs. Crook that the girl seemed to have something on her mind. When you let me see a copy of her statement I was struck by the recurrence of Mr. Holderness’s name. Consider those two calls and their implications. Mr. Lessiter has been looking for a memorandum left by his mother. He has, by all accounts, turned the house upside down to find it. When he finds it, what is the first thing he does? He asks Gladys Luker for Mr. Holderness’s private number. She only catches the first words he said, but they are quite illuminating. He says, ‘Good-evening, Mr. Holderness. I’ve found my mother’s memorandum.’ A little later, when he is ringing up Mrs. Welby, he says the same thing, ‘Well, Catherine, I’ve found the memorandum.’ After which he goes on to tax her with misappropriation of his property, and after stating his intention to prosecute he says, ‘I’ve an old score to settle, and I always settle my scores. I’ve just been ringing old Holderness up.’ Randal, those words made me think very seriously indeed. They would pass an indication that he had consulted his solicitor about Mrs. Welby’s fault, but I rather doubted if he would have rung Mr. Holderness up at that hour, and at his private address, if he had not had some more particular reason. In the light of those two telephone conversations, both beginning in the same way, and the remark about paying off old scores-not an old score, you will observe-I began to consider whether the memorandum referred to might not contain something which would embarrass Mr. Holderness as well as Mrs. Welby. Mrs. Lessiter’s circumstances would have made a fraudulent manipulation of funds comparatively easy. She was not businesslike. She trusted her solicitor, and treated him as an intimate friend. Her son had been absent for so many years that no one expected him to return, or to take any great interest in his mother’s dispositions.”