present, on his own evidence, and that of Lady Denton, he was in an impregnable position; and this was supported by that of the gardener’s boy, which eliminated the possibility that he might have left by the window, and returned to the library round the outside of the house. But could the Inspector accept this as final, and dismiss him from consideration? He was less inclined to do this owing to an idea which had come to him in explanation of the marks on the pistol, during the conversation at the police station, but which he had kept to his own mind. Suppose that Gerard Denton had used the weapon with a handkerchief or a gloved hand; or suppose, during the first moments of Lady Denton’s agitation, that he had found an opportunity to wipe it, unseen by her; and had then suggested that it should be picked up, so that her finger marks should show upon it?
It was an improbable, but not impossible, explanation, and eliminated any question of the time necessary to clean it before the very hurried escape which he must have made.
It suggested that he was willing to throw the blame upon her, which his conversation did not confirm; but that might be no more than evidence of his own cunning. He might see that suspicion must ultimately settle upon her without any support from him, and the evidence that he would be prepared to give would be more damning if it seemed to come from reluctant lips. Or he might wish her no evil at all, providing only that there were enough suspicion against her to divert the lightning from his own head.
Ruminating over these possibilities, he was led to observe that it did not logically follow that, if Lady Denton had picked up the revolver, her brother-in-law had suggested the act; nor that, if it had been previously used in a covered hand, it was he who had worn the glove. He reminded himself of what an older officer had once said to him when he was busy with his first important case, and he had made report of various ingenious theories which he had constructed to explain a somewhat mysterious crime. “Son,” he had said, “I can see you’re a smart lad; but what I want to know is who killed Ben Jacobson, and one fact’s worth a hundred theories for that.”
One fact, as he had often observed since, was worth a hundred theories. And if facts should seem inconsistent or incomplete, the only remedy was to go on searching for more. So far, they all pointed one way.
But there remained the question of Gerard’s character. That was not theory but fact, though it might be a fact which he did not completely know. Now he had seen the man, could he definitely eliminate him from the list of possible suspects?
He remembered Superintendent Trackfield’s judgment that he was not a man who would risk his own life or liberty—and particularly not in a crime which must, if he committed it, have been deliberately and coldly planned—without a far more urgent motive than could be suggested against him.
“Well,” he thought, “I should say that Trackfield was right about that.” He even went further, to doubt whether any stress of difficulty would stimulate him to such a crime. He was rather, he thought, of the type of those who, in the extremity of disaster, will find courage to destroy themselves rather than to commit violence against those they may hate or fear. “And that,” he thought, “would be his way out now, if he had done it, and thought discovery near.”
All of which might be true, but it did not appear to approach the facts he already had. There was no evidence that Gerard had been threatened by any extremity of disaster, or had any reason to hate or fear his half-brother, adequate to stir him to the commission of such a crime.
“Well,” he thought at last, “I must see Lady Denton. There may be no more in it than the reluctance which we frequently find among the local police of country districts to arrest those of good social position, unless they’ve got about ten times as much evidence as they’d think necessary to convict a shopman. I dare say, when I’ve talk to her for five minutes, I shan’t need to look further away.”
And with this thought in his mind he succumbed to the oblivion of a particularly comfortable bed.
CHAPTER IV.
Inspector Pinkey sat at breakfast with Lady Denton. They were alone. Mr. Gerard was understood to be having his breakfast in bed.
Lady Denton, after some preliminary courtesies, referred at once to the subject of her husband’s death. “It is not,” she said, “as you will suppose, a pleasant subject for me. It is one I would very gladly forget. But I understand why you are here, and if there’s anything you would like to ask me, I hope you won’t hesitate, whatever it is, if you think it might help to clear up the mystery.”
“May I ask your own opinion, if you have formed one, Lady Denton?”
She paused before she replied, and then said: “I can’t say that I’ve got one definitely. I didn’t think he’d have done such a thing, and then I heard Sir Lionel’s evidence that it wouldn’t have been easy to do; and yet it seems the only solution.”
She looked straightly at the Inspector as she said this. She had very beautiful eyes. She was a woman of fragile appearance, but with small firm lips and a rounded but resolute chin. Not one, he thought, who would have been bullied very easily, even by such as the dead man was said to have been. She added: “I know everyone’s discussing whether I did it myself, and I half thought Inspector Trackfield meant to have me arrested before I heard you were coming. But you see, I happen to know that I didn’t. So in that way I’m in a better position to judge than anyone else, and if I’m more inclined to think it was suicide, it may be a natural consequence.”
Inspector Pinkey felt an awkwardness to which he was unaccustomed as his hostess expressed so plainly the suspicion which she knew to be directed upon her. He said: “Well, you see, in these cases we have to begin by suspecting everybody. You can’t really blame him for that. There was one other question I thought I should like to ask you. Did you know—I mean, was it generally known that the revolver was kept in the desk drawer?”
“Yes, I knew that. Others may have done. I can’t say for sure. I expect Mr. Redwin did, as he had charge of Sir Daniel’s correspondence, and kept his drawers straight.”
“Mr. Gerard?”
“Yes. I expect he would. You see, they both had revolvers of the same pattern, but of course you know that. I mean, he knew that Sir Daniel had it, but I can’t say whether he knew where it was kept.”
“Yes, so I had been told. Do you know whether Sir Daniel was in the habit of keeping it loaded? In an unlocked drawer?”
“I don’t really know. I shouldn’t have thought it was loaded. I don’t think he’d have been so careless. He might leave any of his drawers unlocked. He was very careless about that.”
“And there was a box of cartridges in the same drawer?”
“There was a box of something at the back of the drawer. I don’t really know more than that. I never thought about it particularly. No doubt that’s what it was.”
Inspector Pinkey had an interval of silence. He gave some attention to his breakfast. It was really excellent bacon. He also considered the answers that he had just received. If they were true—and they appeared to be readily and frankly given—he could eliminate her from the enquiry. What remained? Suicide or Gerard Denton? Neither proposition could easily be reconciled with the facts as he knew them. He said: “In accepting a theory of suicide in a doubtful case such as this, it may be of great assistance if we can discover a motive—even one which may seem inadequate to a normal person. It is one of our difficulties that we can discover none here. Sir Daniel was in good health. We have the evidence of the post-mortem and of his own doctor, which you can probably confirm.”
“Yes,”
