'Barrett? The one who brought you up. The comfort of my life! A grim old battle-axe, absolutely devoted. She's been with me for years.'
''And you are lucky, I should say, in having Miss Aldin.'
'You are right. I am lucky in having Mary.'
'She is a relation?'
'A distant cousin. One of those selfless creatures whose lives are continually being sacrificed to those of other people. She looked after her father — a clever man — but terribly exacting. When he died I begged her to make her home with me, and I have blessed the day she came to me. You've no idea what horrors most companions are. Futile, boring creatures. Driving one mad with their inanity. They are companions because they are fit for nothing better. To have Mary, who is a well-read, intelligent woman, is marvellous. She has really a first-class brain — a man's brain. She has read widely and deeply and there is nothing she cannot discuss. And she is as clever domestically as she is intellectually. She runs the house perfectly and keeps the servants happy — she eliminates all quarrels and jealousies — I don't know how she does it — just tact, I suppose.'
'She has been with you long?'
'Twelve years — no, more than that. Thirteen — fourteen — something like that. She has been a great comfort.'
Mr. Treves nodded.
Lady Tressilian, watching him through half-closed lids, said suddenly: 'What's the matter? You're worried about something?'
'A trifle,' said Mr. Treves. 'A mere trifle. Your eyes are sharp.'
'I like studying people,' said Lady Tressilian. 'I always knew at once if there was anything on Matthew's mind.' She sighed and leaned back on her pillows. 'I must say good night to you now' — it was a Queen's dismissal, nothing discourteous about it — 'I am very tired. But it has been a great, great pleasure. Come and see me again soon.'
'You may depend upon my taking advantage of those kind words. I only hope I have not talked too long.'
'Oh, no. I always tire very suddenly. Ring my bell for me, will you, before you go?'
Mr. Treves pulled gingerly at a large old-fashioned bell-pull that ended in a huge tassel.
'Quite a survival,' he remarked.
'My bell? Yes. No newfangled electric bells for me. Half of the time they're out of order and you go on pressing away! This thing never fails. It rings in Barrett's room upstairs — the bell hangs over her bed. So there's never any delay in answering it. If there is I pull it again pretty quickly.'
As Mr. Treves went out of the room he heard the bell pulled a second time and heard the tinkle of it somewhere above his head. He looked up and noticed the wires that ran along the ceiling. Barrett came hurriedly down a flight of stairs and passed him, going to her mistress.
Mr. Treves went slowly downstairs, not troubling with the little lift on the downward journey. His face was drawn into a frown of uncertainty.
He found the whole party assembled in the drawing-room, and Mary Aldin at once suggested bridge, but Mr. Treves refused politely on the plea that he must very shortly be starting for home.
'My hotel,' he said, 'is old-fashioned. They do not expect anyone to be out after midnight.'
'It's a long time from that — only half-past ten,' said Nevile. 'They don't lock you out, I hope?'
'Oh, no. In fact, I doubt if the door is locked at all at night. It is shut at nine o'clock, but one has only to turn the handle and walk in. People seem very haphazard down here, but I suppose they are justified in trusting to the honesty of the local people.'
'Certainly no one locks their door in the day-time here,' said Mary. 'Ours stands wide open all day long — but we do lock it up at night.'
'What's the Balmoral Court like?' asked Ted Latimer. 'It looks a queer, high Victorian atrocity of a building.'
'It lives up to its name,' said Mr. Treves. 'And has good solid Victorian comfort. Good beds, good cooking — roomy Victorian wardrobes. Immense baths with mahogany surrounds.'
'Weren't you saying you were annoyed about something at first?' asked Mary.
'Ah, yes. I had carefully reserved by letter two rooms on the ground floor. I have a weak heart, you know, and stairs are forbidden me. When I arrived I was vexed to find the rooms were not available. Instead, I was allotted two rooms (very pleasant rooms, I must admit) on the top floor. I protested, but it seems that an old resident who had been going to Scotland this month was ill, and had been unable to vacate the rooms.'
'Mr. Lucan, I expect?' said Mary.
'I believe that is the name. Under the circumstances, I had to make the best of things. Fortunately, there is a good automatic lift — so that I have really suffered no inconvenience.'
Kay said: 'Ted, why don't you come and stay at the Balmoral Court ? You'd be much more accessible.'
'Oh, I don't think it looks my kind of place.'
'Quite right, Mr. Latimer,' said Mr. Treves. 'It would not be at all in your line of country.'
For some reason or other Ted Latimer flushed. 'I don't know what you mean by that,' he said.
Mary Aldin, sensing constraint, hurriedly made a remark about a newspaper sensation of the moment.
'I see they've detained a man in the Kentish Town trunk case — ' she said.
'It's the second man they've detained,' said Nevile. 'I hope they've got the right one this time.'
'They may not be able to hold him even if he is,' said Mr. Treves.
'Insufficient evidence?' asked Royde.
'Yes,' said Kay, 'I suppose they always get the evidence in the end.'
'Not always, Mrs. Strange. You'd be surprised if you knew how many of the people who have committed crimes are walking about the country free and unmolested.'
''Because they've never been found out, you mean?'
'Not that only. There is a man' — he mentioned a celebrated case of two years back — 'the police know who committed those child murders — know it without a shadow of doubt — but they are powerless. That man has been given an alibi by two people, and though that alibi is false there is no proving it to be so. Therefore the murderer goes free.'
'How dreadful,' said Mary.
Thomas Royde knocked out his pipe and said in his quiet reflective voice: 'That confirms what I have always thought — that there are times when one is justified in taking the law into one's own hands.'
'What do you mean, Mr. Royde?'
Thomas began to refill his pipe. He looked thoughtfully down at his hands as he spoke in jerky, disconnected sentences.
'Suppose you knew — of a dirty piece of work — knew that the man who did it isn't accountable to existing laws — that he's immune from punishment. Then I hold — that one is justified in executing sentence oneself.'
Mr. Treves said warmly: 'A most pernicious doctrine, Mr. Royde! Such an action would be quite unjustifiable!'
'Don't see it. I'm assuming, you know, that the facts are proved — it's just that the law is powerless!'
'Private action is still not to be excused.' Thomas smiled — a very gentle smile.
'I don't agree,' he said. 'If a man ought to have his neck wrung, I wouldn't mind taking the responsibility of wringing it for him!'
'And in turn would render yourself liable to the law's penalties!'
Still smiling, Thomas said: 'I'd have to be careful, of course … In fact, one would have to go in for a certain amount of low cunning …'
Audrey said in her clear voice: 'You'd be found out, Thomas.'
'Matter of fact,' said Thomas, 'I don't think I should.'
'I knew a case once,' began Mr. Treves, and stopped. He said apologetically: 'Criminology is rather a hobby of mine, you know.'
'Please go on,' said Kay.
'I have had a fairly wide experience of criminal cases,' said Mr. Treves. 'Only a few of them have held any real interest. Most murderers have been lamentably uninteresting and very short-sighted. However, I could tell you
