MacGregor smirked. ‘I must say, sir, you’re very observant,’ he twitted Dover. ‘It wasn’t her face I was looking at!’
‘You dirty-minded young pup!’ Dover’s tone dripped with masculine indulgence. ‘And her a Dame of the British Empire, too!’
This set them both off laughing.
‘Come to think of it, sir,’ said MacGregor, sniggering like a smutty-minded schoolboy, ‘she hasn’t got a bad figure, not considering she’s a bit past her prime. Quite – er – full, she was. In parts!’
‘Oh, do you think so?’ said Dover, now thoroughly relaxed and enjoying himself hugely. ‘I thought . . . ’ – he broke off for a guffaw and a cough – ‘I thought things had slipped a bit here and there!’
MacGregor sniggered again and made some vulgar remark to which Dover responded with equal coarseness. They were both laughing almost uncontrollably as the conversation grew bawdier.
‘What she should have done,’ said Dover, mopping the tears of mirth from his eyes, ‘was use that little plastic hat she was wearing. Properly placed it would have covered a lot of her embarrassment!’
‘Yes,’ agreed MacGregor, ‘her hands were far too small – from her point of view, of course, not ours. I thought that purple stuff on her fingers provided the final kinky touch, didn’t you, sir? It clashed so gloriously with the blush which, if I remember correctly, reached right down to her . . .’
‘What purple stuff?’ asked Dover sharply, his face sinking back with relief into its usual sullenness as he wiped the smile off.
‘Oh, I suppose she’d burnt her finger or something, sir. She’d dabbed some of that gentian violet stuff on it. I remember it quite distinctly. I’m surprised you didn’t notice it, sir. It was on her . . . ’ – MacGregor jiggled about with his hands as he repeated Dame Alice’s modest gesture – ‘right hand.’
‘My God!’ Dover stared with fascination at his sergeant. ‘My God!’ he repeated fervently. ‘Are you calmly sitting there, you great nincompoop, telling me that Dame Alice had gentian violet daubed all over her hands!’ His voice cracked on an outraged bellow.
‘Well, yes, sir,’ said MacGregor.
‘Gentian violet!’ roared Dover. ‘You damned fool, it wasn’t gentian violet! It was purple ink!’
‘Oh, no, sir!’
‘Purple ink from a kids’ printing-set, you blithering half-wit! The stuff the second batch of poison-pen letters was written with. We’ve got her! By all that’s holy, we’ve got her!’ Dover gave a whoop of triumph and slapped his hand down painfully on the table to emphasize his point.
‘Oh, no!’ said MacGregor.
‘Don’t you say “oh, no” to me!’ yelped Dover. ‘Gall yourself a detective! You couldn’t see a frying-pan if it was held right under your nose. I told you she was responsible for those poison- pen letters. I told you so right from the beginning. Of course you didn’t believe me. You had to go haring off after a lot of red herrings all over the place. Black-market babies, my Aunt Fanny! Well, thanks to me we’re home and dry now. It’s a good thing one of us has got some brains.’
‘It might really be gentian violet, sir,’ muttered MacGregor unhappily. ‘People do burn their fingers.’
‘Only when they play with fire!’ retorted Dover. ‘And that’s what your Dame Alice has been doing. Cheek of the woman, getting me sent down here. I suppose she thought she was being very clever. Well,’ – Dover smirked complacently – ‘he who laughs last, laughs longest!’
‘What are we going to do now, sir? asked MacGregor timidly. ‘We’ll have to get her along to the police lab. and get the stuff on her fingers analysed. If we can prove it’s the same ink as was used in the letters, well, she’ll have some explaining to do, won’t she?’ Dover scowled. Time was getting on. He was going to be out of Thornwich on that six o’clock bus if it was the last thing he did, Dame Alice or no Dame Alice.
‘If,’ he said cautiously, ‘the old cow knows it was us in her bathroom, she’ll know that we spotted the purple ink on her fingers. And, if she knows I’ve seen it, she’ll know I’m going to do something about it. Right?’
‘Er – yes, sir,’ agreed MacGregor doubtfully.
‘So, what’ll she do? She’ll wash it off, won’t she?’
‘Er – yes, I suppose so, sir.’
‘There’s no suppose about it!’ snarled Dover. ‘The woman’s not a complete fool. She’ll have that stuff off in two shakes of a lamb’s tail if she’s got to amputate every finger she’s got to do it. And then where shall we be? Right back where we started!’ Dover’s jowls dropped sulkily and his lower lip stuck out like a bad-tempered child’s. ‘We know who it is and we haven’t an ounce of proof, nothing that’d stand up in court for five lousy seconds.’ Dover’s voice dropped pathetically. ‘It’s too bad, really it is.’ MacGregor maintained a tactful silence. It was difficult and possibly dangerous to find anything to say.
‘No.’ Dover shook his head sorrowfully as he got into his stride. ‘It’s no good kicking against fate. We’re never going to be able to bring Dame Alice before the Bar of Justice. These things happen, laddie, even to the best of detectives. In our profession you’ve just got to learn to take the rough with the smooth.’
‘Oh, I don’t know, sir,’ said MacGregor with the selfish optimism of youth, ‘I dare say if we poked around a bit’
‘No!’ said Dover categorically. ‘I know when I’m beaten and I hope I’m big enough to accept it gracefully. Further investigation would be an unjustified waste of the taxpayers’ money.’
‘It still may not be Dame Alice, sir,’ ventured MacGregor. ‘I mean, everything’s very circumstantial, sir, isn’t it?’
‘It’s Dame Alice,’ said Dover crossly. ‘Don’t start up another argument about that!’
‘But if you abandon the case now, sir,’
