George thought a minute.
'I think – yes. Iris was odd man out last, and Ruth the time before.'
'You don't remember when your wife drank champagne last?'
'Let me see, she had been dancing with Browne. I remember her coming back and saying that had been pretty strenuous – he's rather a fancy dancer. She drank up the wine in her glass then. A few minutes later they played a waltz and she – danced with me. She knew a waltz is the only dance I'm really any good at. Farraday danced with Ruth and Lady Alexandra with Browne. Iris sat out. Immediately after that, they had the cabaret.'
'Then let's consider your wife's sister. Did she come into any money on your wife's death?'
George began to splutter.
'My dear Race – don't be absurd. Iris was a mere child, a schoolgirl.'
'I've known two schoolgirls who committed murder.'
'But Iris! She was devoted to Rosemary.'
'Never mind, Barton. She also had the opportunity. I want to know if she had motive. Your wife, I believe, was a rich woman. Where did her money go – to you?'
'No, it went to Iris – a trust fund.'
He explained the position, to which Race listened attentively.
'Rather a curious position. The rich sister and the poor sister. Some girls might have resented that.'
'I'm sure Iris never did.'
'Maybe not – but she had a motive all right. We'll try that tack now. Who else had a motive?'
'Nobody – nobody at all. Rosemary hadn't an enemy in the world, I'm sure. I've been looking into all that – asking questions – trying to find out. I've even taken this house near the Farradays' so as to –'
He stopped. Race took up his pipe and began to scratch at its interior.
'Hadn't you better tell me everything, young George?'
'What do you mean?'
'You're keeping something back – it sticks out a mile. You can sit there defending your wife's reputation – or you can try and find out if she was murdered or not – but if the latter matters most to you, you'll have to come clean.'
There was a silence.
'All right then,' said George in a stifled voice. 'You win.'
'You'd reason to believe your wife had a lover, is that it?'
'Yes.'
'Stephen Farraday?'
'I don't know! I swear to you I don't know! It might have been him or it might have been the other fellow, Browne. I couldn't make up my mind. It was hell.'
'Now tell me what you know about this Anthony Browne? Funny, I seem to have heard the name.'
'I don't know anything about him. Nobody does. He's a good-looking amusing sort of chap – but nobody knows the first thing about him. He's supposed to be an American but he's got no accent to speak of.'
'Oh, well, perhaps the Embassy will know something about him. You've no idea – which?'
'No – no, I haven't. I'll tell you, Race. She was writing a letter – I – I examined the blotting-paper afterwards. It – It was a love letter all right – but there was no name.'
Race turned his eyes away carefully.
'Well, that gives us a bit more to go on. Lady Alexandra, for instance – she comes into it, if her husband was having an affair with your wife. She's the kind of woman, you know, who feels things rather intensely. The quiet, deep type. It's a type that will do murder at a pinch. We're getting on. There's Mystery Browne and Farraday and his wife, and young Iris Marle. What about this other woman, Ruth Lessing?'
'Ruth couldn't have had anything to do with it. She at least had no earthly motive.'
'Your secretary, you say? What sort of a girl is she?'
'The dearest girl in the world.' George spoke with enthusiasm. 'She's practically one of the family. She's my right hand – I don't know anyone I think more highly of, or have more absolute faith in.'
'You're fond of her,' said Race, watching him thoughtfully.
'I'm devoted to her. That girl, Race, is an absolute trump. I depend upon her in every way. She's the truest, dearest creature in the world.'
Race murmured something that sounded like 'Um-hum' and left the subject. There was nothing in his manner to indicate to George that he had mentally chalked down a very definite motive to the unknown Ruth Lessing. He could imagine that this 'dearest girl in the world' might have a very decided reason for wanting the removal of Mrs George Barton to another world. It might be a very mercenary motive – she might also have envisaged herself as the second Mrs Barton. It might be that she was genuinely in love with her employer. But the motive for Rosemary's death was there.
Instead he said gently: 'I suppose it has occurred to you, George, that you had a pretty good motive yourself.'
'I?' George looked flabbergasted.
'Well, remember Othello and Desdemona.'
'I see what you mean. But – but it wasn't like that between me and Rosemary. I adored her, of course, but I always knew that there would be things that – that I'd have to endure. Not that she wasn't fond of me – she was. She was very fond of me and sweet to me always. But of course I'm a dull stick, no getting away from it. Not romantic, you know. Anyway, I'd made up my mind when I married her that it wasn't going to be all beer and skittles. She as good as warned me. It hurt, of course, when it happened – but to suggest that I'd have touched a hair of her head –'
He stopped, and then went on in a different tone:
'Anyway, if I'd done it, why on earth should I go raking it all up? I mean, after a verdict of suicide, and everything all settled and over. It would be madness.'
'Absolutely. That's why I don't seriously suspect you, my dear fellow. If you were a successful murderer and got a couple of letters like these, you'd put them quietly in the fire and say nothing at all about it. And that brings me to what I think is the one really interesting feature of the whole thing. Who wrote those letters?'
'Eh?' George looked rather startled. 'I haven't the least idea.'
'The point doesn't seem to have interested you. It interests me. It's the first question I asked you. We can assume, I take it, that they weren't written by the murderer. Why should he queer his own pitch when, as you say, everything had settled down and suicide was universally accepted? Then who wrote them? Who is it who is interested in stirring the whole thing up again?'
'Servants?' hazarded George vaguely.
'Possibly. If so, what servants, and what do they know? Did Rosemary have a confidential maid?'
George shook his head.
'No. At the time we had a cook – Mrs Pound – we've still got her, and a couple of maids. I think they've both left. They weren't with us very long.'
'Well, Barton, if you want my advice, which I gather you do, I should think the matter over very carefully. On one side there's the fact that Rosemary is dead. You can't bring her back to life whatever you do. If the evidence for suicide isn't particularly good, neither is the evidence for murder. Let us say, for the sake of argument, that Rosemary was murdered. Do you really wish to rake up the whole thing? It may mean a lot of very unpleasant publicity, a lot of washing of dirty linen in public, your wife's love affairs becoming public property –'
George Barton winced. He said violently: 'Do you really advise me to let some swine get away with it? That stick Farraday, with his pompous speeches, and his precious career – and all the time, perhaps, a cowardly murderer.'
'I only want you to be clear about what it involves.'
'I want to get at the truth.'
'Very well. In that case, I should go to the police with these letters. They'll probably be able to find out fairly easily who wrote them and if the writer knows anything. Only remember that once you've started them on the trail, you won't be able to call them off.'
'I'm not going to the police. That's why I wanted to see you. I'm going to set a trap for the murderer.'
'What on earth do you mean?'
