The Unfinished Clue (18 page)

Stephen Guest came in with his slow, deliberate tread.

Chapter Twelve

Guest's deep-set eyes considered the Sergeant for one indifferent moment, and then passed on to Harding's face, and remained there. "Good afternoon, Inspector," he said, and walked up to the chair by the table and sat down.

"Good afternoon," Harding returned. "I have one in two questions I want to ask you concerning your movements yesterday morning, Mr. Guest."

"Carry on," said Guest, feeling in one coat-pocket for his pipe and tobacco-pouch. He settled himself at ease in his chair and began in a methodical way to fill his pipe.

"Can you remember just what you were doing up till twelve o'clock?"

Guest smiled slightly. "Rather a tall order, Inspector. I don't think I did anything in particular. I read the papers, knocked the billiard balls about a bit, and went out to sit on the terrace — round about eleven-thirty, I should say. Halliday was with me: he might know the exact time."

"Then it was not because you had something particular to do that you told the footman he need not be in a hurry to pack your bag, as you had changed your mind and were not leaving by the early train?"

Guest struck a match, and waited for it to burn a little way up the stick before holding it to his pipe. "No," he said.

"What did induce you to change your mind, Mr. Guest?"

Stephen Guest puffed at his pipe, and pressed the tobacco down with one spatulate finger. "I thought I might as well travel up with the Hallidays on the afternoon train," he replied.

Harding glanced up from the paper in his hand. "There had been, before breakfast, some unpleasantness between Sir Arthur and Lady Billington-Smith, I think?"

"So I believe," replied Guest uncommunicatively.

"Did you hear this quarrel in progress?"

"I did."

"Did that in any way influence you when you decided to leave by the later train?"

"It did not."

There did not seem to be anything more to be got out of him on this point. Harding scrutinised him for a moment in silence, and then asked: "You were, I believe, related to General Billington-Smith?"

"Some kind of cousin," agreed Guest. "More like a connection."

"You visit this house fairly frequently?"

"Now and again," said Guest, carefully laying the charred match down on the edge of the table.

"You were, then, on good terms with the General?"

"We didn't quarrel," replied Guest?"

"What does that mean, Mr. Guest?

"Well -" Guest shifted the pipe to the corner of his mouth -"'The General wasn't just the type of man I get on very good terms with."

"Yet you stay in his house?"

"Oh yes!" said Guest with equanimity.

Harding looked at him for a moment; there was nothing to be learned from that square, contained face. Stephen Guest returned the look, and continued to puff at his pipe. "Will you now describe to me, as accurately as you can, what your movements were after twelve o'clock yesterday morning?" Stephen Guest reflected. "That would be about the time the General came in with Mrs. Halliday, wouldn't it? I was on the terrace."

"Was anyone with you?"

"Yes, Miss Fawcett joined me there."

"Mr. Halliday was not on the terrace?"

"Halliday went into the billiard-room shortly before Miss Fawcett turned up."

"When did you leave the terrace, Mr. Guest?"

"Very hard to say," Guest answered. "Somewhere about twelve-thirty, I should put it."

"Were you on the terrace when Mrs. Chudleigh arrived?"

"I was."

"And when she left?"

"No, I didn't see her go."

"And when the butler brought out the cocktails?"

"No."

"How long would you say that you were absent from the terrace, Mr. Guest?

Guest considered the point. "Some little while. Ten to fifteen minutes."

"What were you doing during that time?"

"I went up to my room to get some tobacco."

"Is that all, Mr. Guest?"

"Substantially," nodded Guest. "I opened a new tin, and cut myself on the jagged edge. It took a few minutes to stop it bleeding." He pulled up his shirt-cuff in a leisurely way, and showed Harding a long scratch on his wrist. "Nothing much, but I'm an easy bleeder."

"Did you see anyone while you were upstairs?"

"No."

"And when you had stopped the bleeding, did you go straight back to the terrace?"

"Straight back."

"Mr. Halliday, I think, called attention to the fact that there was blood on your cuff?"

"He did."

"Did you show him that cut?"

"I should say not."

"Or anyone else?"

"No."

"Did anyone ask you to show it?"

"I fancy Mrs. Halliday had a deal to say about it. I didn't show it. It was nothing to make a song about." Harding picked up his pencil. "Thank you, Mr. Guest: that's all at present. Will you please ask Miss de Silva to come here?"

Guest got up. "I will," he said tranquilly, and walked out.

Harding lifted an eyebrow in the Sergeant's direction.

"Did you make anything of that, Sergeant?"

"You can't, not when they stick to Yes, and No," said the Sergeant rather disgustedly. "Tough-looking customer.

Daresay he wouldn't stick at much."

Harding propped his chin in his hand, and looked thoughtfully before him, at the closed door. "He's got a very cool head on his shoulders," he remarked. "And he doesn't mean to give anything away. I wonder."

The Sergeant gave a little cough. "There was one thing as struck me, sir."

"Let's have it, Sergeant."

"Well, sir, he wouldn't show that scratch on his wrist to anyone yesterday, but he was what I'd call very prompt in letting you see it today."

"He was," agreed Harding.

"Of course, it doesn't prove anything," said the Sergeant.

"That," replied Harding, "is just the trouble."

The door opened, and Miss de Silva sailed into the room.

Harding rose, betraying no visible sign of surprise"Miss de Silva?" he asked.

"Yes," announced the lady. "I am La Lola." Her gaze lighted on the Sergeant, and kindled. "Is it you whom I have told that I will not have looking at me as though I am an assassin?" she demanded.

"No, miss, that was Constable Fletcher," replied the Sergeant hastily.

"To me," said Lola, "there is not any diflerence between you. Moreover you too stare at me. Perhaps, it is that you like to look at me a great deal because I am beautiful?"

"I'm sure I never -" began the Sergeant, flustered. Lola smiled kindly at him. "If that is it I do not at all mind, for you must understand that I am quite accustomed to be stared at."

"Miss de Silva, will you sit down?" interposed Harding.

"Yes, in that chair. I want you to try and remember just what happened yesterday morning."

"'That is not at all difficult," said Miss de Silva composedly. "I have a very good memory, let me tell you. But I must say that I do not understand why you have not seen me before that stupid woman who I find is not a true blonde in the least, but on the contrary dyes her hair. She is not at all important, and besides she has no sense, for she tells extremely foolish lies. I do not like her, she is to me quite unsympathetic, quite repulsive, but I will tell you that if you think it is she who has stabbed the General you are entirely wrong. For one thing she has not enough courage, and for another she wanted the general to make love to her, and, I think, to give her money. She had not any reason to stab him. It is I to whom he was so cruel who had reason."

The Sergeant looked helplessly at Harding, who, however, preserved a calm front.

"In what way was the General cruel to you, Miss de Silva?"

"I will tell you," replied Lola cordially. "From the moment when I have entered his house he has behaved to me with rudeness and brutality, though partly I blame Geoffrey, who was very foolish not to warn his papa that I do not like gin in my cocktail, but only absinthe. Then at dinner he was quite abominable to me because I would not sit and look at a dead hare with blood on its nose, which I find completely disgusting. And after dinner when I, La Lola, have said that I will dance he was not grateful, not at all, but on the contrary very rude, quite insupportable. I have great patience, so I did not walk straight out of the house, and besides it is not sensible to walk out of the house when it is time to go to bed. So the next day I was very nice to him, very kind, and I talked to him for quite an hour, but in spite of that, and because he was entirely disagreeable and of an immense stupidity, he declared that Geoffrey should not have any money at all if he married me. So you see it is I and uot in the least Camilla Halliday who had reason to stab the General."

"I see perfectly," said Harding. "Will you tell me just what happened, when Mr. Billington-Smith informed you of his father's threat?"

"But certainly I will tell you everything. It was a great shock to Geoffrey; he became quite out of his senses, and he tried to come into my bedroom at ten o'clock when he knows perfectly well that I do not see anybody but my maid until eleven. I forgive him because he was distracted."

"Was he distracted when he entered your room, Mis de Silva?"

"I will be very truthful," promised Lola. "You are a policeman, though I find that quite surprising, and it is not wise to tell lies to policemen. That I leave to Camillia Halliday. At first Geoffrey was angry only a little, but when I have pointed out to him that naturally it is impossible that we should be married when he has no longer any money, he became like a lunatic. That may be understood, for I must tell you that he loves me with desperation. I was sorry for him, most sorry for him, but happily it all arranges itself now that the General is dead."

"You are going to marry him, in fact?"

"Naturally I shall marry him, though I must tell you that I am very much upset by what Miss Fawcett says, he will not after all be Sir Geoffrey. It is to me quite incomprehensible."

"Then it is not true that Mr. Billington-Smith no longer wishes to marry you?" asked Harding bluntly.

l.ola's lovely eyes opened to their widest extent. "But how could it be? He is a little upset now, one must make allowances for him. Presently he will be very glad, quite transported, to find that our marriage is now possible. If he has told you that he does not want to marry me it is a great piece of nonsense."

She spoke somewhat heatedly, and Harding tactfully introduced a fresh subject. "Tell me, Miss de Silva," he said. "What did you do when Mr. Billington-Smith had left your room?"

"At first I did not do anything, because Geoffrey was very violent, and it was necessary that I should compose myself. Presently Concetta, who is my maid, prepared my bath - and that is another thing that I must tell you: there is not any shower to my bath, and I must share it with Miss Fawcett and Mr. Guest. And after my bath I made my toilette, and when I had made my toilette it was already past one o'clock, and I came downstairs."

"Was your maid with you all the time you were dressing?"

"No, for she had not enough spirit for the machine which makes a fire for my waving-irons, and she was forced to go to the kitchen to get some more. So you see when she was not there it was quite easy for me to go down in my negligee and stab the General. I did not stab the General, because I did not think of it, and besides, in England I find it does not make one popular to kill people."