Major Jefferson nodded. “I’ll try,” he said briefly. “And I’ll send one of the maids to tell Lady Stanworth. She’s in her room.”
He rang the bell, and Roger and Alec strolled over to the door.
“And you might warn the others in the household not to leave the premises till I have seen them,” they heard the inspector say as they passed through it. “I shall have to interrogate everyone, of course.”
Roger drew Alec into the dining room and thence out into the garden. They reached the middle of the lawn before he spoke.
“Alec,” he said seriously, “what do you make of it all?”
“Make of what?” asked Alec.
“Make of what?” Roger repeated scornfully. “Why, the whole blessed business, of course. Alec, you’re uncommonly slow in the uptake. Can’t you see that Jefferson is hiding something for all he’s worth?”
“He did seem a bit reticent, certainly,” Alec agreed cautiously.
“Reticent? Why, if that fellow’s telling one tenth of what he knows I should be surprised. And what about Mrs. Plant? And why doesn’t anybody know the combination of that safe? I tell you, there are wheels within wheels going on here.”
Alec threw caution to the winds. “It is curious,” he admitted recklessly.
Roger was intent on his own thoughts. “And why was Jefferson searching Mr. Stanworth’s pockets?” he demanded suddenly. “Oh, but of course, that’s obvious enough.”
“I’m dashed if it is. Why was he?”
“To find the keys of the safe, I suppose. What else could it be? For some reason or other Jefferson is all against having that safe opened. By the police, at any rate. And so is Mrs. Plant. Why?”
“I don’t know,” said Alec helplessly.
“Nor do I! That’s just the annoying part. I hate things I don’t understand. Always have done. It’s a sort of challenge to get to the bottom of them.”
“Are you going to get to the bottom of this?” Alec smiled.
“If there’s a bottom to get to,” said Roger defiantly. “So don’t grin in that infernally sarcastic way. Dash it all, aren’t you curious?”
Alec hesitated. “Yes, I am in a way. But after all, it doesn’t seem to be our business, does it?”
“That remains to be seen. What I want to find out is—whose business is it? At present it seems to be everybody’s.”
“And are you going to tell the police anything?”
“No; I’m hanged if I am,” said Roger with conviction. “I don’t mind whose business it is; but it isn’t theirs. Not yet, anyway,” he added with a touch of grimness.
Alec was plainly startled. “Good Lord! You don’t think it might be eventually, do you?”
“I’m blessed if I know what to think! By the way, reverting to Jefferson, you remember when I found those ashes in the hearth and suggested that they might be the remains of those mysterious private documents Jefferson had been hinting about? Well, did it appear to you that he looked uncommonly relieved for the moment?”
Alec reflected. “I don’t think I was looking at him just then.”
“Well, I was. And I made the suggestion on purpose, to see how he’d take it. I’d take my oath that the idea appealed to him immensely. Now why? And what’s he got to do with Mr. Stanworth’s private papers?”
“But look here, you know,” said Alec slowly, “if he really was hiding something, as you seem to think, surely he wouldn’t go and give the whole show away by telling us straight out like that what sort of thing it is that he’s hiding? I mean, if he really is hiding something he’d mention papers to put us off the scent, wouldn’t he? Really, I mean, it would be something quite different. What I mean is—”
“It’s all right. I’m beginning to get an idea of what you mean,” said Roger kindly. “But seriously, Alec, that’s rather an idea of yours. After all, Jefferson isn’t the man to give himself away, is he?”
“No,” said Alec earnestly. “You see, what I mean is—”
“Hullo!” Roger interrupted rudely. “There’s the inspector going down the drive. And without Jefferson, by all that’s lucky! Let’s cut after him and ask him if he’s brought anything else to the surface.” And without waiting for a reply he set off at a run in the wake of the retreating inspector.
The latter, hearing their footsteps on the gravel, turned round to wait for them.
“Well, sir?” he said with a smile. “Remembered something else to tell me?”
Roger dropped into a walk. “No; but I was wondering whether you had anything to tell me. Found anything more out?”
“You’re not connected with the press by any chance, Mr. Sheringham, are you?” the inspector asked suspiciously.
“Oh, no; it’s just natural curiosity,” Roger laughed. “Not for publication, and all that.”
“I was thinking you might get me into trouble if it came out that I’d been talking more than I ought to, sir. But I haven’t found anything more out in any case.”
“Lady Stanworth wasn’t any help?”
“Not a bit, sir. She couldn’t throw any light on it at all. I didn’t keep her long. Or any of the others, either, for that matter. There was nothing more to be got out of them, and I’ve got to get back and make out my report.”
“Not even found the safe’s combination?”
“No,” returned the inspector disappointedly. “I shall have to ring up the makers and get that. I’ve taken a note of the number.”
“And who saw him last?”
“Mrs. Plant. He stopped her in the hall to ask her if she liked some roses he’d had specially sent up to her room for her, and left her to go into the library. Nobody saw him after that.”
“And is the body still in there?”
“No, sir. We shan’t want that any more. The constable I brought with me, Rudgeman, is helping them take it upstairs now.”
The lodge gates appeared in sight, and Roger halted.
“Well, goodbye, Inspector. Shall we see you over here again?”
“Yes, sir. I shall have to come over about that safe. I don’t suppose we’ll find anything
