Caught in trying to be kind, Inspector Herbert was flustered. He set the list aside and turned to look out at the reflection of London's lights against the low clouds that had been rolling in for the past hour or so. When he turned back, he was himself again.
'Miss Crawford, just what is it you want?'
'I want to tell you a story. You owe it to me to listen-I gave you considerable help in closing this inquiry.'
'I don't have time-'
'I shan't be long.' I wasn't overawed by Scotland Yard. As a nurse I'd learned to deal with patients, their families, Matron-who could be far more intimidating than Inspector Herbert-impatient doctors, and officers of every rank. Still, I would need to be brief, on the mark, or I'd lose this one chance.
'For one thing, I spoke to Captain Melton in France. He's in hospital there-or was, before I left. He admitted to being in the railway station with Mrs. Evanson, but wouldn't admit that he was her lover. I'd thought he was. And for a time, so did you. In fact, you had decided not to pursue questioning him, as his statement was irrelevant to Mrs. Evanson's murder. His alibi was the train to Portsmouth.'
He was wary now. 'And that's it?'
'He was very smug during our conversation. He finally told me that he had not left the train before Portsmouth. I realized later he could have telephoned someone before boarding his ship. Remember, I couldn't understand why he left her there, without even seeing that she had a cup of tea in the canteen or someone to take her home. Why he was so distant.'
'Very callous of him, I agree. But get to the point, if you please.'
'That is my point. If he wasn't the child's father, why was he there that day? Because Melton knew the man who actually was her lover. And he had been sent there to deal with Marjorie, if he could. Somehow I wasn't surprised-Raymond Melton was hardly the sort of man to attract someone like Marjorie Evanson. What's more, I also realized he was too much like her father.'
'You're concluding that we still don't know the name of her lover. Does it matter?'
'If you had seduced a married woman and suspected she was carrying your child, how many people would you tell? And if you needed a friend to help by meeting a weeping woman in a very public place, where would you turn?'
Inspector Herbert hesitated. Then against his will he said, 'I doubt I'd have told anyone. I'd have dealt with it myself.'
I smiled. 'Because you're an honorable man. You wouldn't have enticed Marjorie Evanson into doing something that was going to ruin her life.' Then I asked, 'Do you have a brother, Inspector Herbert? If you dared not be seen in a compromising situation because you were often in London and your face was known because you were at the Admiralty, would you have asked your brother to meet this nuisance of a woman for you? After all, he was passing through on the train and in the short stopover here, he could give her a message for you. And the message was, since the affair had been over for months now, you couldn't be sure the child she was carrying was yours. And that you were sorry, but there it was.'
'I don't have a brother.' He paused, watching me. 'But Melton does.'
'Of course if your brother had agreed to do this for you, you'd want to know-before he sailed for France- whether he'd been successful in putting this distraught woman off. You'd ask him to find a telephone before he took ship.'
'Miss Crawford, you told me that you'd not come here to stop Hart's execution.'
'I haven't,' I said. 'I thought perhaps you'd like to hear what went on after that conversation I witnessed at the railway station. I've tried to piece it together from actual facts. It isn't all my imagination.'
'Yes, I understand. And it's just as well to have this matter closed.' He cleared his throat.
'And there are telephones to be found in Portsmouth, are there not? It would be possible to put in a call. Perhaps only three words: I got nowhere. Then report to your transport in good time and arrive in France in good time.'
'Yes, all right.'
'Of course, allowing for the time to travel from London to Portsmouth-several hours-you'd probably await your brother's call in London. Not at home. At the Marlborough Hotel, for instance. Or a quieter place where you weren't readily recognized. There was always the possibility that it would take more than three words. That there was a problem that the brother couldn't handle in your place.'
Inspector Herbert said nothing.
'You would have had to know where to find Marjorie, of course. And your brother would have been instructed-in the event something didn't go as planned-to ask her to meet you at a time and place where you could deal with the unpleasant situation.' I paused. ''I'll have to call Jack when I reach Portsmouth. Meet him at nine o'clock at this park or that small restaurant where neither of you is known, or by the river, where you'd have a little privacy.' And Marjorie would have walked for a while, to get her emotions under control, then hurried to make sure she wasn't late at the designated place, just in case it was a trick of some kind. You might say you hadn't seen her and left, or that you were early and couldn't wait. Which meant she would have to see Michael afterward, when she knew for certain what she wanted to tell him. She would have met you and walked a little way with you, along the river, talking about what was to be done. She wouldn't have been afraid. And so you could have stabbed her at any time. It was raining, there weren't many people strolling by the river on such a night, and you'd take your chance when it was offered, whatever you had to promise in the meantime. It was too dark to see if she was dead, so for good measure you shoved her into the river. To drown.'
'A very neat reconstruction, Miss Crawford. I doubt that it's more than that.'
'Yes, well, Jack Melton had a better reason for murdering Marjorie than Michael Hart had. What's more, he gave himself away when I spoke to him outside the Marlborough Hotel weeks ago. I told you about that encounter, because I'd lost my temper and confessed to him I'd seen the man with Marjorie at the railway station. He lost his temper as well, accused me of blackmail and then told me that Michael Hart had been in London the night she was killed. If Jack Melton was spending a quiet evening at home, how would he know that? No one did. Except for the physician who treated Michael, and possibly Marjorie Evanson, if she knew about his eye. She might well have told Jack Melton what she was planning to do, a threat to hold over him, to make him keep his promise. She'd had time to think about it. Four hours at the very least.'
I'd finished. Before he could reply, I stood up and added, 'My reconstruction is as valid as yours, I think. Who knows which is actually right? Probably only Jack Melton and Michael Hart. Although I think Jack's wife is beginning to wonder. What will happen to her if she works it out as well? Thank you for your time, Inspector. I am sorry that I ever led you to Michael Hart, but that's water over the dam, I'm afraid.'
As I reached the door, he said to me, 'We would have found him in time.'
'Or would you have interviewed Raymond Melton, as I did, and seen that brief flicker of satisfaction when he told me he never left the train before Portsmouth? Of course he never left it. He needn't have. Good-bye.'
And I closed the door before he could say anything else.
A constable was waiting to escort me to the street, and I stepped out into the night air, feeling it cool and fresh on my face, and found myself thinking that Michael would see the light of day for the last time when he went to the gallows.
One more day gone.
But not quite.
I went to see Helen Calder. To my surprise, she was at home. But I was informed that she wasn't receiving visitors.
'Tell her that it's Bess Crawford. Ask her if she'll see me for just a few minutes.'
And she did.
I was taken back to the sitting room, which had been transformed with a bed and chair and the other accoutrements of a sickroom.
Mrs. Calder was already in bed, her hair brushed and hanging to her shoulders, wearing a very becoming nightgown in a pale lavender covered by a darker lavender shawl.
'Miss Crawford,' she said, and I could hear the wariness in her voice.
'I haven't come to worry you,' I told her straightaway. 'I'm here to ask how you are. I haven't been back in England for very long or I'd have come sooner. Are you recovering on schedule?' For she seemed pale, her hands
