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“You can’t tell, of course,” said Mr. Satterthwaite mildly. “I just thought you might have some idea—you know, nothing scientific or reasoned. Just an ordinary guess.”
“Well, I haven’t…” He thought for a minute and then burst out: “You know, Satterthwaite, the moment you begin to think it seems impossible that any of them did it.”
“I suppose your theory is right,” mused Mr. Satterthwaite. “As to the assembling of the suspects, I mean. We’ve got to take it into account that there were certain definite exclusions. Yourself and myself and Mrs. Babbington, for instance. Young Manders, too, he was out of it.”
“Manders?”
“Yes, his arrival on the scene was an accident. He wasn’t asked or expected. That lets him out of the circle of suspects.”
“The dramatist woman, too—Anthony Astor.”
“No, no, she was there. Miss Muriel Wills of Tooting.”
“So she was—I’d forgotten the woman’s name was Wills.”
He frowned. Mr. Satterthwaite was fairly good at reading people’s thoughts. He estimated with fair accuracy what was passing through the actor’s mind. When the other spoke, Mr. Satterthwaite mentally patted himself on the back.
“You know, Satterthwaite, you’re right. I don’t think it was definitely suspected people that he asked—because, after all, Lady Mary and Egg were there…No, he wanted to stage some reproduction of the first business, perhaps…He suspected someone, but he wanted other eyewitnesses there to confirm matters. Something of that kind….”
“Something of the kind,” agreed Mr. Satterthwaite. “One can only generalize at this stage. Very well, the Lytton Gores are out of it, you and I and Mrs. Babbington and Oliver Manders are out of it. Who is left? Angela Sutcliffe?”
“Angie? My dear fellow. She’s been a friend of Tollie’s for years.”
“Then it boils down to the Dacres…In fact, Cartwright, you suspect the Dacres. You might just as well have said so when I asked you.”
Sir Charles looked at him. Mr. Satterthwaite had a mildly triumphant air.
“I suppose,” said Cartwright slowly, “that I do. At least, I don’t suspect them…They just seem rather more possible than anyone else. I don’t know them very well, for one thing. But for the life of me, I can’t see why Freddie Dacres, who spends his life on the racecourse, or Cynthia, who spends her time designing fabulously expensive clothes for women, should have any desire to remove a dear, insignificant old clergyman….”
He shook his head, then his face brightened.
“There’s the Wills woman. I forgot her again. What is there about her that continually makes you forget her? She’s the most damnably nondescript creature I’ve ever seen.”
Mr. Satterthwaite smiled.
“I rather fancy she might embody Burns’s famous line—‘A chiel’s amang ye takin’ notes.’ I rather fancy that Miss Wills spends her time taking notes. There are sharp eyes behind that pair of glasses. I think you’ll find that anything worth noticing in this affair has been noticed by Miss Wills.”
“Do you?” said Sir Charles doubtfully.
“The next thing to do,” said Mr. Satterthwaite, “is to have some lunch. After that, we’ll go out to the Abbey and see what we can discover on the spot.”
“You seem to be taking very kindly to this, Satterthwaite,” said Sir Charles, with a twinkle of amusement.
“The investigation of crime is not new to me,” said Mr. Satterthwaite. “Once when my car broke down and I was staying at a lonely inn—”
He got no further.
“I remember,” said Sir Charles, in his high, clear carrying actor’s voice, “when I was touring in 1921….”
Sir Charles won.
Four
THE EVIDENCE OF THE SERVANTS
Nothing could have been more peaceful than the grounds and building of Melfort Abbey as the two men saw it that afternoon in the September sunshine. Portions of the Abbey were fifteenth century. It had been restored and a new wing added onto it. The new Sanatorium was out of sight of the house, with grounds of its own.
Sir Charles and Mr. Satterthwaite were received by Mrs. Leckie, the cook, a portly lady, decorously gowned in black, who was tearful and voluble. Sir Charles she already knew, and it was to him she addressed most of her conversation.
