“And did he leave it open, or did he lock it up again?”
“He locked it before I left the room.”
“I see. When would that be?”
“Oh, past one o’clock, I should say. I didn’t notice the time very particularly. I was feeling too upset.”
“Naturally. And nothing of any importance occurred between his—his ultimatum and your departure upstairs?”
“No. He refused to give way an inch, and at last I left off trying to persuade him and went up to bed. That is all.”
“And nobody else came in at all? Not a sign of anybody else?”
“No; nobody.”
“Humph!” said Roger thoughtfully. This was decidedly disappointing; yet somehow it was impossible to disbelieve Mrs. Plant’s story. Still, Jefferson might have come in later, having heard something of what had taken place from outside the room. At any rate, it appeared that Mrs. Plant herself could have had no hand in the actual murder, whatever provocation she might have received.
He decided to sound her a little farther.
“In view of what you’ve told me, Mrs. Plant,” he remarked rather more casually, “it seems very extraordinary that Stanworth should have committed suicide, doesn’t it? Can you account for it in any way?”
“No, I certainly can’t. It’s inexplicable to me. But, Mr. Sheringham, I am so thankful! No wonder I fainted when you told us after breakfast. I suddenly felt as if I had been let out of prison. Oh, that dreadful, terrible feeling of being in that man’s power! You can’t imagine it; or what an overwhelming relief it was to hear of his death.”
“Indeed I can, Mrs. Plant,” Roger said with intense sympathy. “In fact, what surprises me is that nobody should ever have killed him before this.”
“Do you imagine that people never thought of that?” Mrs. Plant retorted passionately. “I did myself. Hundreds of times! But what would have been the use? Do you know what he did—in my case, at any rate, and so in everyone else’s, I suppose? He kept the documentary evidence against me in a sealed envelope addressed to my husband! He knew that if ever he met with a violent death the safe would be opened by the police, you see; and in that case they would take charge of the envelope, and presumably many other similar ones, and forward them all to their destinations. Just imagine that! Naturally nobody dared kill him; it would only make things worse than before. He used to gloat over it to me. Besides, he had always a loaded revolver in his hand when he opened the safe, in my presence at any rate. I can tell you, he took no chances. Oh, Mr. Sheringham, that man was a fiend! Whatever can have induced him to take his own life, I can’t conceive; but believe me, I shall thank God for it on my bended knees every night as long as I live!”
She sat biting her lip and breathing heavily in the intensity of her feelings.
“But if you knew the evidence was kept in the safe, why weren’t you frightened when it was being opened by the inspector?” Roger asked curiously. “I remember glancing at you, and you certainly didn’t seem to be in the least perturbed about it.”
“Oh, that was after I’d had his letter, you see,” Mrs. Plant explained readily. “I was before, of course; terribly frightened. But not afterwards, though it did seem almost too good to be true. Hullo! isn’t that the lunch bell? We had better be going indoors, hadn’t we? I think I have told you all you can want to know.” She rose to her feet and turned towards the house.
Roger fell into step with her.
“Letter?” he said eagerly. “What letter?”
Mrs. Plant glanced at him in surprise. “Oh, don’t you know about that? I thought you must do, as you seemed to know everything. Yes, I got a letter from him saying that for certain private reasons he had decided to take his own life, and that before doing so he wished to inform me that I need have no fears about anything, as he had burnt the evidence he held against me. You can imagine what a relief it was!”
“Jumping Moses!” Roger exclaimed blankly. “That appears to bash me somewhat sideways!”
“What did you say, Mr. Sheringham?” asked Mrs. Plant curiously.
Roger’s dazed and slightly incoherent reply is not recorded.
XXIV
Mr. Sheringham Is Disconcerted
Roger sat through the first part of lunch in a species of minor trance. It was not until the necessity for consuming a large plateful of prunes and tapioca pudding, the two things besides Jews that he detested most in the world, began to impress itself upon his consciousness, that the power of connected thought returned to him. Mrs. Plant’s revelation appeared temporarily to have numbed his brain. The one thing which remained dazzlingly clear to him was that if Stanworth had written a letter announcing his impending suicide, then Stanworth could not after all have been murdered; and the whole imposing structure which he, Roger, had erected, crumbled away into the sand upon which it had been founded. It was a disturbing reflection for one so blithely certain of himself as Roger.
As soon as lunch was over and the discussion regarding trains and the like at an end, he hurried Alec upstairs to his bedroom to talk the matter over. It is true that Roger felt a certain reluctance to be compelled thus to acknowledge that he had been busily unearthing nothing but a mare’s nest; but, on the other hand, Alec must know sooner or later, and at that moment the one vital necessity from Roger’s point of view was to talk. In fact, the pent-up floods of talk in Roger’s bosom that were striving for exit had been causing him something very nearly approaching physical pain during the last few minutes.
“Alexander!” he exclaimed dramatically as soon as the door was safely shut. “Alexander, the game is up!”
“What do you
