This I learnt afterwards when I went to see Inspector Swanage. All I knew when I had finished reading up the case in the newspapers was that the husband of Mrs Hannaford was in Broadmoor, practically condemned for the murder of his wife, and that Dorcas Dene had left home to try and prove his innocence.
The history of the Hannafords as given in the public Press was as follows: Mrs Hannaford was a widow when Mr Hannaford, a man of six-and-thirty, married her. Her first husband was a Mr Charles Drayson, a financier, who had been among the victims of the disastrous fire in Paris. His wife was with him in the Rue Jean Goujon that fatal night. When the fire broke out they both tried to escape together. They became separated in the crush. She was only slightly injured, and succeeded in getting out; he was less fortunate. His gold watch, a presentation one, with an inscription, was found among a mass of charred unrecognisable remains when the ruins were searched.
Three years after this tragedy the widow married Mr Hannaford. The death of her first husband did not leave her well off. It was found that he was heavily in debt, and had he lived a serious charge of fraud would undoubtedly have been preferred against him. As it was, his partner, a Mr Thomas Holmes, was arrested and sentenced to five years penal servitude in connection with a joint fraudulent transaction.
The estate of Mr Drayson went to satisfy the creditors, but Mrs Drayson, the widow, retained the house at Haverstock Hill, which he had purchased and settled on her, with all the furniture and contents, some years previously. She wished to continue living in the house when she married again, and Mr Hannaford consented, and they made it their home. Hannaford himself, though not a wealthy man, was a fairly successful stock-jobber, and until the crisis, which had brought on great anxiety and helped to break down his health, had had no financial worries. But the marriage, so it was alleged, had not been a very happy one and quarrels had been frequent. Old Mrs Hannaford was against it from the first, and to her her son always turned in his later matrimonial troubles. Now that his life had probably been spared by this mental breakdown, and he had been sent to Broadmoor, she had but one object in life – to see her son free, some day restored to reason, and with his innocence proved to the world.
* * * * * *
It was about a fortnight after my interview with Inspector Swanage, and my study of the details of the Haverstock Hill murder, that one morning I opened a telegram and to my intense delight found that it was from Dorcas Dene. It was from London, and informed me that in the evening they would be very pleased to see me at Elm Tree Road.
In the evening I presented myself about eight o’clock. Paul was alone in the drawing-room when I entered, and his face and his voice when he greeted me showed me plainly that he had benefitted greatly by the change.
‘Where have you been, to look so well?’ I asked. ‘The South of Europe, I suppose – Nice or Monte Carlo?’
‘No,’ said Paul smiling, ‘we haven’t been nearly so far as that. But I mustn’t tell tales out of school. You must ask Dorcas.’
At that moment Dorcas came in and gave me a cordial greeting.
‘Well,’ I said, after the first conversational preliminaries, ‘who committed the Haverstock Hill murder?’
‘Oh, so you know that I have taken that up, do you? I imagined it would get about through the Yard people. You see, Paul dear, how wise I was to give out that I had gone away.’
‘Give out!’ I exclaimed. ‘Haven’t you been away then?’
‘No, Paul and mother have been staying at Hastings, and I have been down whenever I have been able to spare a day, but as a matter of fact I have been in London the greater part of the time.’
‘But I don’t see the use of your pretending you were going away.’
‘I did it on purpose. I knew the fact that old Mrs Hannaford had engaged me would get about in certain circles, and I wanted certain people to think that I had gone away to investigate some clue which I thought I had discovered. In order to baulk all possible inquirers I didn’t even let the servants forward my letters. They went to Jackson, who sent them on to me.’
‘Then you were really investigating in London?’
‘Now shall I tell you where you heard that I was on this case?’
‘Yes.’
‘You heard it at Kempton Park Steeplechases, and your informant was Inspector Swanage.’
‘You have seen him and he has told you.’
‘No; I saw you there talking to him.’
‘You saw me? You were at Kempton Park? I never saw you.’
‘Yes, you did, for I caught you looking full at me. I was trying to sell some racecards just before the second race, and was holding them between the railings of the enclosure.’
‘What! You were that old gipsy woman? I’m certain Swanage didn’t know you.’
‘I didn’t want him to, or anybody else.’
‘It was an astonishing disguise. But come, aren’t you going to tell me anything about the Hannaford case? I’ve been reading it up, but I fail entirely to see the slightest suspicion against anyone but the husband. Everything points to his having committed the crime in a moment of madness. The fact that he has since gone completely out of his mind seems to me to show that conclusively.’
‘It is a good job
