Late in the afternoon the world that had crashed about Diana re-formed itself. An impression lost sight of during black, hopeless hours illuminated her brain with all the brilliance of a new discovery. Why, she had her proof! How was it possible she had ever forgotten it? Tears, unshed till now, ran down her cheeks. She brushed her hair into its usual flat waves, dabbed powder on her nose, and telephoned Dr. Ladbroke.
At six o’clock, wrapped in her grey lambskin coat and with her head held high, she was slipping across Knightsbridge into the Park. The house-surgeon was waiting for her, under an inky cedar of Lebanon. He grasped her hand hard, and together they set off into the gloom of an avenue.
“Don’t say anything just yet,” Diana begged when they had covered fifty yards in silence. “Just let me talk first. I know what you must be thinking. I was, till I began remembering things.”
When they reached the fountains she was still speaking. Under the brim of his soft hat the doctor’s eyes remained gravely attentive with a look of weighing what she said and suspending judgment.
“Adrian can’t act. I’m an actress myself—of sorts—and I know. I tell you, till I broke that news to him no suspicion of any kind had crossed his mind. He’d bought a paper and—so exactly what he does do—never bothered to look at it. Think of it! Why, the news of the exhumation was on all the posters! It was being shouted in the streets. Don’t you see, if he’d been guilty, he’d have looked first thing to see who the well-known actress was and find out what was happening.”
Diana was appealing to him now. It seemed a tortuous age before his slow answer came.
“That does put rather a different light on it,” Ladbroke admitted. “You say the newspaper was folded up exactly as it was when you saw it before? Actually, of course, the thing was on the front page.”
“But even so he’d never seen it!” she insisted. “I could read it in his face. There are some things you can’t be mistaken about.”
“No, I quite agree with you there. I myself find it practically impossible to believe him the sort of coldblooded schemer he’d have to be to—to commit that sort of crime. It was that stuff found on him. I was knocked to bits.”
“But you do see my point, don’t you?”
“I—God knows I want to. Yes, as a matter of fact, I do.”
“Oh, thank God!”
Ladbroke, returning the sudden pressure of her hand on his arm, felt moved with a vast relief. It was a moment before either of them found composure to go on.
“That stuff in his pocket,” said Diana scornfully. “Do you imagine if he’d put it there it would ever have been found?”
“I see that point, too, but”—somewhat dryly—“I warn you it’s not much of an argument. It can be said—and depend upon it, it will be said—he emptied out the pocket and brushed it, only as he’s near-sighted, a bit of it got by him. It clings—and there was only an infinitesimal amount of it, remember. However, it didn’t get there by itself. Think he picked it up accidentally on some object he laid down and transferred it to his pocket without noticing?”
“Either that, or some one in the room put it there.”
“You meant that?” He gave her a startled glance. “You’re right, it could have happened. I imagine he believes it did happen, and that explains his saying he was the goat.”
“Certainly.”
“There was probably more of it,” continued the doctor musingly. “Only in the course of time it got shaken out. Well—any more ideas?”
“Several. Do you by any chance recall a woman who came to see Adrian just before I did that evening you let me in?”
He glanced sidewise at her, hesitating.
“You mean a weird female with ear-rings?”
“Exactly—Elsie Dilworth, my godfather’s secretary. I’ll tell you about her.” Diana proceeded to do so, emphasising the possibility of a double motive. “I believe she was fool enough to hope she could get Adrian, provided he had money. Indeed, it seems entirely plausible—to me—after watching her as I did the other night.”
“It takes a bit of believing, doesn’t it?” he pointed out. “Assuming you’re right in the main fact, why should she plant evidence on him?”
“I’ve thought of a reason, only just now. Suppose she doubted her ability to get him by fair means but was determined he shouldn’t escape her?”
“I’m beginning to grasp it. You mean her aim was to dig the stuff up out of his pocket as by accident and hold it over him like a bludgeon?”
“Why not?” Diana returned calmly. “No amount of denials would have helped him. He’d have been caught, landed—in her clutches for all time. Don’t let’s forget his is the motive everybody’s prepared to believe in. She knew that.”
“My God, it would have been a stranglehold and no mistake,” admitted Ladbroke, reluctantly admiring. “There’s one snag, though. Why didn’t she use her hold? At the crucial moment she seems to have thrown up her hand.”
“Maybe she weakened. It would be a fiendish thing to do to any one you loved, wouldn’t it? Or maybe she meant to do it but never got a chance. Oh, I quite see how difficult any of this will be to prove; but what if it could be shown she had had aconite in her possession?”
“Ah, now you’re talking! But I should doubt if there’s much hope of proving that with any one concerned.”
“We’ll have to see, shan’t we? Now let me tell you about the other possible suspects. We can’t entirely overlook the third guest at lunch—old Felix Arenson.”
“Yes. And the other one?” demanded the house-surgeon quickly.
“Oh, the housekeeper’s nephew.”
“I see.” There was a brief silence. “Well, how does he come into it?”
She outlined her tentative idea. George Petty might have got into some difficulty from which only money could rescue him. It was credible to suppose he had induced his gullible old aunt to carry out a plan in his behalf, telling her she would only be drugging her mistress, so that the key to the safe in the bedroom could be got hold of and jewels stolen.
“Petty would swallow any story George told her. She’s been frightened out of her life ever since, and so has George. I saw him this morning at the court. Don’t you think it suggestive that he should have come in white as a sheet, his face literally streaming with sweat, and that the instant the indictment was pronounced he should beam all over as though a big load were off him?”
“I must say your ideas are very ingenious. What about this man Arenson?”
“I watched him, too—and he showed just the same reactions. He was wedged far back in a corner, his old face so pale his red beak of a nose flamed out like a beacon. He kept wetting his lips with his tongue—till the end. I saw him again outside, very brisk and perky. He was speaking to Dame Charlotte Moon, though she’s been his sworn enemy for years. He actually asked for a lift in her car. I could see they were both dying to talk it all over.”
Diana stopped, suddenly recalling something else. Why, she wondered, had Dame Charlotte exhibited similar signs of acute nervousness and subsequent relaxation? She saw again the long, sallow horse-face of the tragedy-queen, as it had turned with a worried expression towards the prisoner. She saw the black-gloved hands ceaselessly fumbling with a tortoise-shell lorgnette or clasping and unclasping a huge, ugly reticule; and then, later, that smile of triumphant satisfaction! It had puzzled her vaguely at the time, and so it did now. Dame Charlotte had never cared for Rose. Adrian she could not have known even slightly. . . .
“I beg your pardon! You said something about Mr. Blundell?”
“I only wanted to know how much of this you’ve told him.”
“Very little. It’s difficult. You see, he’s bound to be biased, however hard he may try to keep an open mind. Mrs. Somervell was, I think, just about the one person he deeply cared about. I believe he’s taking a decent attitude mainly to spare my feelings.”
“All that matters,” said Ladbroke, “is that you give a full account to Michael Hull. He’s ready to see you. Shall I arrange an interview for to-morrow morning at ten?”
“The sooner the better. Oh,” she sighed, “if you knew how it’s helped me to talk this over with you! In the whole of London there’s no other person I feel like being frank with. I’ve been so hopelessly bottled up.”
“You needn’t be any longer,” he told her simply. “Adrian Somervell’s my friend. I admire his work. In fact, I consider him little short of a genius in his own line. If anything happens to him—but no, don’t let’s think it!”
With a strangely-lightened heart, Diana bade him goodbye on the pavement by the Albert Hall, and turned towards Queen’s Close.
In front of her door an enormous, oyster-coloured car was standing, with the door open, and a stiff chauffeur beside it. Two well-dressed men were just emerging from the house, and, coming face to face with her as she turned in, ceased their earnest conversation. Both were immaculate, with a look of opulence. The older, heavier-built man, now staring at her with hard, appraising admiration, had a big, florid face suggestive of high-living counteracted by fresh air and Turkish baths. She had seen him before, or else his photograph. In a flash it came to her that he was Lord Limpsfield, Uncle Nick’s pet client, of whom Aunt Rose had boasted.
The trim, dapper companion—she noted his waisted overcoat—was dark, with neat features and a sulky mouth cleanly-defined under an abbreviated smudge of a moustache. He, too, seemed familiar-looking, but Diana could not place him. When she turned to close the door she saw the two of them inside the car, with the chauffeur spreading a rug over their knees as obsequiously as though they had been royalty. In another moment the stream-lines of the oyster-coloured car had swept out of the Close.
“So I’ve set eyes on the great Lord Limpsfield,” she reflected indifferently. “I’m not surprised Aunt Rose adored his coming here. I don’t suppose there are three such cars as that in the whole of London. It’s simply super! She’d never trouble about how he got his first million. Face value was enough for her.”
As she passed the entrance to the lower flat she remembered she was expected to dine with her godfather. The prospect appalled her, yet she must, she supposed, go through with it. She entered her own quarters to find that in her absence fresh flowers had arrived. Every vase was filled with them.
“Oh, if only he wouldn’t do this!” she lamented. “I know he means it kindly, but how I wish I’d taken one room of my own, no matter how uncomfortable, so I shouldn’t have to eat six-course dinners to prove I’m grateful for things I don’t want! It’s beastly of me to feel this way. I am thankful for this lovely flat, and it’s the greatest possible help to have everything done for me and not have to bother. All the same, I’ve got to hang on to some independence, so I shall simply draw the line at accepting any more favours.”
It was a harder resolution to keep than she could at the moment foresee.