He continued his story. 'And I should like to say, Mr. Coroner,' he said unctuously, 'that I take full responsibility for the cutting down of the body before the police arrived.'
'Of course. Quite so. Yes. You had naturally to make certain that life was extinct. Of course. Yes, Mr. Sheringham. And then?' Roger went on. Not a word was said about chairs.
'Quite so. Your experience, of which we have all of course heard, was of great service. We can be sure that everything was done in a perfectly regular and proper manner. Yes. Now, Mr. Sheringham, you have heard the evidence that has been given regarding the state of Mrs. Stratton's mind. Did you yourself notice anything unusual in her behaviour?'
'Yes. My attention had been called to Mrs. Stratton earlier in the evening, in consequence of overhearing a remark made by Mr. Williamson to Mr. Ronald Stratton.' Roger paused, provocatively.
'I think you may tell us what the remark was, Mr. Sheringham. We are not bound by the strict laws of evidence here, you know.'
'Mr. Williamson said: 'Is your sister - in - law mad, Ronald?''
Laughter in court. 'Ah!' said the coroner, not without a smile himself. 'Indeed. That is very interesting. We will hear from Mr. Williamson himself about that. And that caused you to observe Mrs. Stratton closely, Mr. Sheringham?'
'It did. With the result that I considered that Mr. Williamson's question, though put in a somewhat exaggerated form, was not without foundation.'
'What did you see that led you to that conclusion?'
'I noticed then that Mrs. Stratton was evidently suffering from a mild form of exhibitionism. She wished to be attracting notice all the time.' Roger cited the climbing on the beam and the Apache dance, a reference to which he had been anxious to make, and added a reference to his conversation with Mrs. Stratton on the roof, in the course of which she had threatened suicide.
'I'm afraid, however, that I attached no importance to this threat. I put it down as being part of her general desire to impress.'
'Are you still of this opinion?'
'No, I think now that I was mistaken. Not so much from what did actually happen later, as that I believe now that Mrs. Stratton was actually more unbalanced than I suspected, and so was ready to carry her mania of being important to still greater lengths.'
'You think, then, that she would even carry it to the length of suicide?'
'In sufficiently picturesque circumstances,' said Roger grimly, 'yes, I do.'
He was allowed to stand down. Still not a word about chairs. Roger was really surprised. He had expected without fail a question or two regarding the position of the chair when the body was being cut down, or at the very least its presence, but the questions had not come. His uneasiness began to return. Were the police keeping something up their sleeves, after all, concerning that chair?
Mr. Williamson was the next witness, and Roger regarded him with an apprehensive eye. He had had no time that morning to rehearse Mr. Williamson again in his part, and beyond a hurried injunction to refer to Mrs. Lefroy if his memory failed him in any detail of the chair - wiping, had spoken no more to him about it since the previous evening. And it was quite too much to expect that Mr. Williamson also would be allowed to get away with it in silence.
Roger remembered now that Mr. Williamson's reply to this injunction had been a little curious. What had he said? Something about it being all right, he had had it out with Lilian. Roger felt still more apprehensive. What on earth had Mr. Williamson meant by that? Roger had been careless in not finding out at once. Perhaps devastatingly careless. Had Mrs. Williamson got hold of her husband and undone all the good work by informing him that he had never wiped a chair for Mrs. Lefroy at all? But how, for that matter, could Mrs. Williamson possibly know that he had not?
In the meantime Mr. Williamson's evidence had been proceeding. 'How did I find the body, eh? Well, you see, we were all looking, and I wondered if anyone had looked on the roof, so I went up there. And then I found her, you see.'
'But what called your attention to her? I understand that other people had already searched on the roof.'
'Oh, well, I don't suppose they'd bumped into her. That's what I did, you see. I bumped into her. Eh? Yes. And she seemed a bit heavy for a straw figure - and that,' said Mr. Williamson, also achieving the correct phraseology, 'aroused my suspicions.'
The coroner took him briefly through the resulting alarm and the attempt to render first aid, and then, reverting to the question to Ronald Stratton which Mr. Sheringham had overheard, asked Mr. Williamson what had prompted it.
'Well, I'd just been talking to her, you see,' said Mr. Williamson uneasily. 'I mean, she'd just been talking to me.'
'And what had been the nature of the conversation?'
'Why, she'd been talking about her soul,' explained Mr. Williamson, his slight diffidence giving place to indignation. 'Eh? Popping down double whiskies nineteen to the dozen, and talking about her soul, and whether it wouldn't be better to put her head in a gas oven and finish it all off, What? Well!'
Under cover of the resulting laughter Roger, who was sitting between Ronald Stratton and Colin, whispered to the latter:
'That was a good touch. He couldn't have done that better if we'd rehearsed him. Carried conviction.'
'Let's hope he says his real lesson as well,' Colin whispered back.
The coroner, quelling the laughter indulgently, questioned Mr. Williamson further about the conversation and gently underlined the undoubted fact that Mrs. Stratton had been contemplating suicide even before the scene in the ballroom.
'He's made up his mind all right,' Ronald Stratton whispered happily to Roger. 'I thought he had, last night.'
Then at last came the series of questions which Roger had been awaiting.
'Now tell me, Mr. Williamson. When you went back to guard the roof after the body had been taken downstairs, did anyone join you up there?'
'Yes, that's right,' said Mr. Williamson affably. 'Mrs. Lefroy did.'
'Yes. And what happened?'
'What happened? Well, I told her, you know, and showed her the gallows, and the end of the rope, and all that.'
'Yes. And then?'
'Eh? Oh, she came over queer. Is that what you mean? She felt a bit faint, I suppose. Women do sometimes,' explained Mr. Williamson with kindness.
'Yes. Quite understandable. And when Mrs. Lefroy felt faint?'
'Well, she pulled up a chair or something, and I wiped it for her with my handkerchief,' said Mr. Williamson bravely.
'Yes. Why did you do that?'
'Because she asked me to. Hadn't any idea I oughtn't to have done it,' mumbled Mr. Williamson contritely. 'Very sorry, and all that.'
'It didn't occur to you that it was the chair on which Mrs. Stratton might have stood?'
'No, I'm afraid it didn't. Eh? Never occurred to me, I'm afraid. No.'
'Well, perhaps you mustn't be blamed very much for that, in the circumstances, though it's a safe rule not to touch anything at all in the vicinity of any sudden death.'
'Eh? Oh, I see. No. Yes, I mean.'
'In any case, where was this chair when you saw Mrs. Lefroy pick it up?'
'Where was it?' repeated Mr. Williamson vaguely. 'Oh, somewhere in the middle of the roof, you know.'
Roger did not alter his position. Only a slight tightening of the muscles all over his body evidenced the emotion that was filling him. He felt as if the eyes of everyone in court were staring at him, and not by look or movement must he give himself away.
