Joan drew a quick breath.
“The inquest——?”
“Yes. Haven’t they told you? I’m so sorry. It is wretched for you, having it dangling like this.”
“Why have they postponed it?”
“Had to. We’ve found some more evidence. Come on, Gilk. What a time the man takes.”
“What new evidence have you found?”
He jerked his head round, and looked full at her.
“I can’t tell you what it’s worth yet. Inspector Bradstreet and I have to go off to-morrow to interview a man in Devonport. I may be able to tell you more about it when I get back.”
“Do you think the man—killed father?”
“Most unlikely. But he may be able to give us a line on whoever did. That’s all I can tell you, now, and I oughtn’t to have told you that much: so you mustn’t ask me any more questions.”
He took her arm and gave it a friendly shake.
“Good-bye now, and don’t worry.”
“Will you come and tell me if you find out anything tomorrow?”
“All depends what it is. It might be something I’d have to keep secret, and not even tell Gilk. Wretched chaps, we policemen. We’re tied hand and foot. Now, now, what axe you looking so miserable about? I’ll tell you if I can—but I can’t promise. Cheer up.”
She watched them go, standing in the doorway, a tall slim figure with great mournful eyes.
Ellis stumped down the road, his bulging cheeks bright crimson. For the first hundred yards he said nothing. Gilkison dared not speak, for fear of an explosion. Then Ellis saw a tin lying by the side of the road. He took a running kick at it, and sent it in leaping, clamorous career along the tarmac till it bounced into the silence of the ditch.
“Hell!” he said. “What a job. What a bloody, bloody job, I get that poor kid a bit better, and then I have to go and make her worse than ever. She won’t sleep all night, now.”
He turned to Gilkison.
“I couldn’t help it,” he almost shouted. “I had to. It’s a foul split to have in one. No wonder people are afraid of us.”
“Ellis.”
“Eh?”
“She didn’t know that book was gone. She was knocked out with surprise. No one could act as well as that.”
“You mean, she was surprised the second edition was there. The one out of her room.”
“Yes.”
“I believe she was. But it doesn’t at all follow she didn’t know the original copy was gone—the one with the cancelled advertisement.” He swung round on Gilkison. “How did the subject crop up? Did you find her in there fiddling around, or what?”
Gilkison struggled with temptation, and overcame it. He confessed what had happened.
“I never meant to ask the question,” he finished. “It just came out.”
“I know. They do. I never consciously meant to put the wind up the child as I did. The policeman took charge.” He looked at Gilkison. “I had the feeling, after I left the Bradder, that something was going on here. I’d actually started for the pub, and I turned back. Good job I did.”
Gilkison, whose heart had been filled with relief and gratitude towards Ellis for not abusing him, now felt a perverse resentment. Ellis’s assumption that he would have done harm nettled him. To his dismay, he found himself hunting in his mind for some mistake of Ellis’s with which he could retort upon him. He thought of something, but did not at once utter it. Ellis seemed to have recovered his spirits. He was humming, snapping his fingers, and looking about him.
“Oh well,” he said suddenly, “it won’t be for much longer, I hope.”
His face cleared. To Gilkison’s jaundiced eye, it looked complacent. Gilkison took a deep breath, and launched his barb.
“One theory of yours you have had to scrap, I gather.”
“Meaning?”
“If you remember, from some slip of the tongue of Miss Caunter, you inferred that she was in love with Rattray.”
Ellis opened his eyes wide.
“Did I? Oh yes. She nearly called him David. Yes.”
“Well,” persisted Gilkison, “that hardly fits in with the violent jealousy you say she feels towards him, does it?”
“I don’t see why not. It might fit in very well. She used to be sweet on him. Then she gets jealous over Joan.”
“You’ve just made that up at this minute,” Gilkison exclaimed in disgust. “You’re just imagining. That’s all.”
“So are you. Tell me what possible value your remark had towards elucidating the case, and I’ll give it serious consideration.”
He went on humming, quite unruffled. Gilkison tried again.
“Why did you drag me away? There’s a good hour and a half till dinner.”
“We’d given her enough to chew on. I don’t want to leave you any longer with her. You’re too kind-hearted, Gilk. She’d have started pumping you.” He gripped Gilkison’s elbow. “I hate this business just as much as you do, but, for the moment, we’ve got to leave her guessing.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The telephone rang again before they had finished dinner, and Bradstreet informed Ellis that the coroner had made no difficulty about postponing the inquest till the Thursday. As no witnesses had to be brought from a distance, with the exception of Mr. Stuyvesant and, possibly, Nelder, a minimum of inconvenience would be caused.
“Ring Stuyvesant, will you?” he asked Bradstreet. “I think he’s happier with you than me. He thinks I’m mad, for some reason.”
A sound like a discreet chuckle came down the wire.
“Very good. I’ll tell him.”
“Bless you. Sweet sleep.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I said, Sweet sleep. Peepy-bye.”
“Thank you. The same to you.”
Ellis came back, grinning.
“When we have had our coffee and tarried awhile in carminative discourse, I shall leave you. I have an errand.”
“I can see you want me to ask you what it is.”
“And if I did not, your curiosity would compel you. Well, you shall know. There are no secrets between us; very few, anyway; and this shall not be one. I am going to call on friend Rattray just after nine, i.e., at the hour when he should be home from his do.”
“He won’t be there.”
“That’s what I’m hoping.”
“But he’ll spot it, Ellis. He told you he didn’t get back till ten.”
“He didn’t. She did.”
“Well then——”
“I’ll say they told me in the pub he was free at nine. That’ll give him a little explaining to do. I don’t see why we should do all the work.”
As soon as they had finished, Ellis took his book into the garden, and read till five to nine. Then he got up, and went off down the road to Rattray’s house.
On second thoughts, he did not go in at once. A long tête à tête with Ursula Rattray did not appeal to him. Accordingly he went down to the bridge, and spent a few minutes watching the trout which had had such a calming effect upon the emotions of Mr. Stuyvesant. He was not alone, and soon found himself an object of greater interest to the villagers than the trout, which, he supposed, they had likewise come to look at. What on earth did they imagine he was doing? The idea that the trout might be the object of his professional attention so amused Ellis that he gave a sudden shout of laughter, startling the onlookers, who, after the first stare of astonishment, looked away as if he had committed an indecency.
Still chuckling, Ellis walked on, making a circuit of the village and timing himself to arrive at Rattray’s just after half past nine. He entered the gate with an air of immense purpose.
There was no sign of Mrs. Rattray in the verandah. Her chair had been put away.