Dance to Your Daddy

'All the same, he did his best to persuade you not to take her to Swanage that first day.'

'I have thought about that, too. His concern for my safety may have been genuine.'

'But you had George with you.'

'Romilly does not know George as well as we do. Besides, a young woman who was prepared to murder me, would have no scruples about making sure that my chauffeur did not live to tell the tale. In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. Against a determined gunman, even the most resourceful and courageous of the unarmed are at a serious disadvantage.'

'But she didn't have a gun?'

'Oh, yes, she had a gun, child, but then, you see, so had I. The difference was that hers was an old flint-lock pistol-part of her costume, she assured me-and mine was a modern automatic.'

'So, in the country of the one-eyed, the two-eyed man was king. Well, all I can say is that, for my own sake, I'm glad I didn't know about this at the time. All the same, you can't mean that it was Rosamund who shot at you through the squint? Why should she, anyway?-not that I'm sticking up for her, of course.'

'The bullet came from a .22 rifle, so I keep an open mind. However, I was not sorry when the time seemed ripe for me to leave Galliard Hall.'

'I should think not, indeed! Of course, Rosamund could have had the horse-pistol merely for show, or to protect herself against Romilly and Judith, I suppose, and an old horse-pistol isn't a rifle.'

'One does not need to exaggerate the significance, if any, of the horse-pistol, and I did not do so. The next point of interest relates to Rosamund and the child, but, so far, the evidence we have is so conflicting that perhaps this is not yet the time to consider it.'

'Do you think there was a child?'

'If there was, it might account for Rosamund's conduct as reported by Romilly.'

'Conduct which she denies.'

'And if there was a child, it might be important to find out the identity of the father.'

'You mean it might have been the illegitimate baby mentioned by the Reverend Hubert?'

'Well, Rosamund lived in the same hotel for some years as Willoughby did, and Willoughby has been murdered. I thought at first that it was because Willoughby would have been able to certify that Romilly was an imposter, but, now we can be reasonably certain that Willoughby could not have known this, the picture alters. We have realised that.'

'That's if Hubert was telling the truth. As he's a clergyman, we're inclined to believe him without further proof.'

'Therefore, if we believe Hubert, Romilly was in no danger from Willoughby. Why, then, was not Willoughby invited to Galliard Hall along with the others? That is still the question to which we must find the answer.'

'Perhaps he was, and decided not to go.'

'If so, why did Luke lie about the number of letters he posted? On the other hand, if we suppose (merely for the sake of argument) that Judith was telling the truth when she said that Rosamund, and not Romilly, sent out the invitations, then Rosamund may have had a very good reason for excluding Willoughby.'

'You mean he may have been the father of her baby, and she hadn't forgiven him for seducing her?'

'We might entertain that as one theory, I think, but there could be others.'

'Meaning there is something you've guessed, and I haven't. Oh, well, that's nothing new. Are you going to tell me what it is? You don't think it was Judith who abstracted those two letters?'

'I know nothing now which you do not know. Did anything strike you about the remark made by the manager of the Carlisle hotel?'

'About the other girl, the little friend (as the French have it) of Felix Napoleon? What an old rip he must have been!'

'Yes, about the other girl. I wonder what has happened to her? It might be interesting to find out.'

'I suppose, when Felix Napoleon died, there was nothing for her to do but to fade out. Incidentally, what about the tale Rosamund told about Hubert's officiating at the funeral?'

'I do not suppose she envisaged the possibility of our approaching Hubert to ask whether it was true.'

'Any good confronting her with him?'

'It will not be necessary.'

'Well, what do we do now?'

'That will depend upon whether the magistrates decide in favour of Romilly (we must continue to call him that, I am afraid, although he has no right to the name) or against him. So far, the police have very little evidence for a committal.'

'There's the sword.'

'His prints would be on it in any case, since he picked it up from where it was lying in the grass.'

'That's his story-that he found it lying in the grass.'

'Judith is his witness.'

'Hopelessly biased in his favour, of course.'

'The fact that he reported having seen the body lying out on Dancing Ledge will also be in his favour. I really see no reason why the justices should commit him.'

Kirkby, however, was obstinately hopeful of a conviction.

'The evidence offered by the weapon is significant, in my opinion, ma'am. I know he says he picked it up on the cliff-top, but the coastguards to whom he reported spotting the body didn't see him with it. It wasn't until I visited Galliard Hall that he produced it and told us this tale about finding it above Dancing Ledge. Says he concluded the death was due to an accidental fall on to the rocks and that the sword had no connection with it. Affected to be quite astounded when he heard that the deceased had died of a stab wound. Then, if his prints (and he, and other members of the household, certainly let us take as many as we liked and made no objection), if his prints, I was saying, had been superimposed on any others, we might be disposed to believe his version, but his prints are the only ones on the hilt of the sword. Of course the defence will be that the murderer had wiped the weapon clean before Mr Romilly handled it, but the prints, taken in conjunction with the fact that he may have reported finding the body as a means of putting up a sort of screen, seem to me quite enough to justify a committal. Besides, there's no real evidence to show that Mr Willoughby could not have exposed Mr Romilly for the imposter he is. The clergyman, Mr Hubert, no doubt spoke in good faith when he told you that neither he nor his brother had ever met the real Mr Romilly, but he could only speak out of his own knowledge, and that may not be sufficient. I think we shall find that the magistrates decide there is a case to answer. I shall be very much surprised if they don't. There's the cook's evidence that the sword belonged to Mr Romilly, although he denies it.'

'I noticed that, at the interview in which you produced the sword, you pressed Rosamund very hard. Do you suspect her of the murder?'

'No, ma'am, not to say "suspect her." It was only that, as she was accustomed to wear fancy dress, it just made me wonder whether a sword went with it.'

'Ah,' said Dame Beatrice, 'that, as Laura would say, rings a bell. The first time I met Rosamund she was in costume-that is to say, in stage armour-as Joan of Arc. She was not wearing a sword. I noticed, by the way, that at the time you entirely disregarded my remark that, sword or no sword, she certainly was in possession of an old-fashioned pistol, which she was carrying in her pocket when we went to Swanage together.'

'I didn't disregard it, ma'am. I was on a different tack, that's all. It's not as though the bullet you found came from that pistol, and I didn't want to confuse the issue, me having only a single-track mind, as Mrs Gavin would put it. Moreover, you have never made any formal complaint about that shooting. You merely told me about it in the course of conversation. Whom do you suspect of taking a pot-shot at you?'