He cackled. Masters only nodded stolidly. "Why, sir, if you put it like that, it's quite possible I might have been thinking some such thing."
"And as for you-" He suddenly pointed at Bennett. "You're thinking, `There's that son of a bitch again.' Aren't you, now; aren't you?" For a second the weird stare was as terrifying as his grin; then it grew muddled, bewildered, and somehow defeated. "Why do you think that?" he asked curiously. "Why does everybody think it? All my life I've been trying to find out. I'm Carl Rainger. I started on a railroad construction gang. Want to see my hands, even now? I can command as high a salary as any star I ever worked with, because when I get through with that picture, whoever's in it is a star. That's me. That's what I can do. Then why. " He fumbled at his forehead and said in a flat voice, "Why, to hell with 'em. That's all I've got to say." He seemed surprised. "They're lousy rats, every one of them. I'll trust to this. Yes. And now — where are you, inspector? Ah!.. I'll proceed to show you what you've overlooked, and offer you proof."
"Well, sir?"
"Proof," said Rainger, his face lighting up again, "that a Mr. John Bohun killed Marcia Tait."
"Good God!" said Dr. Wynne, and stopped as Masters turned to glare.
"Thank you very much, doctor," observed the chief inspector in a quick, colorless voice. "You've been most helpful. We needn't detain you any longer… Er, hullo? Thompson? Still here, eh? I thought I told you; well, my mistake. You'd better wait outside, now."
"I know the man's drunk," snapped the little doctor, "but does he realize who he's talking about? John Bohun, hah? His host. Well, well, well. Yes, I'm going. John's having breakfast. I think I shall just inform him he's needed here."
Masters — big and urbane, but with a vein beating at his temple-edged the doctor away as though he were smoothing off crumbs, and spoke in a low voice. Remembering what had happened upstairs, Bennett quickly suggested a visit to Louise Carewe; and, as he sketched out what had happened, it caught Masters' ear more easily than the doctor's. Masters said, "Oh, ah?" and to Bennett, "Stay here!" as he sent out Thompson and edged out Dr. Wynne. When the strident voice was fading down the hall Masters returned to Rainger, who had got a bottle of gin out of his pocket and was tilting it to his lips while a sardonic eye rolled round at the chief inspector.
"You want to accuse Mr. John Bohun," said Masters, with another silencing gesture at Potter, "of murder. I dare say you realize that's rather a serious matter to speak of, even when you can back it up?"
"Certainly I can back it up, my friend. Hoho. Yes. You've had statements," replied the director, suddenly becoming cool and sharp-faced, "from both Bohun and an actor named Willard. Now don't put on that pawn-broker-refusing-a-loan look, my friend; I heard you discussing it, and I know what they said. They gave their version of what happened last night. Now I'll give you mine. Don't you realize why there was only one set of tracks in the snow, going in?"
"Be careful, sir. Remember, they were fresh tracks."
"Of course they were fresh tracks." He controlled his hard breathing. "First! Bohun was in London last night, to see His Lordship. To see the great Lord Canifest. Did he tell you that?"
"Oh, ah?" inquired Masters, his dull eye turning sideways towards Bennett. Bennett remembered that Masters had spoken to H. M., and must know a good deal of the story. "Mr. Bohun said he had a business appointment; that was all. You mean the newspaper-owner? Just so."
"Now you had better know why Bohun saw him, if you don't know," said Rainger, looking at him queerly, "already. Canifest intended to put up the money for the play Marcia was to appear in. And last night Canifest refused. Bohun and Marcia were afraid he was going to refuse. That was why Bohun got nervous and rushed over to see him last night."
"Well" prompted Masters, after a pause. "Why should this — ah — Lord Canifest refuse?"
"Because somebody had been telling him things. Lord Canifest was contemplating matrimony. He had already laid his hand and heart," said Rainger, with an appropriate gesture, "before our lovely nymph. His Lordship, you may know, is a very upright man, and much too discreet to risk anything but marriage. And then somebody told his Lordship something. Bohun was afraid there would be bad news from Canifest last night, and so was Marcia."
Masters cleared his throat. "Just so. I dare say you mean, now, he was told something against Miss Tait's character, eh?"
"What? Oh, God love us, inspector," said Rainger, with a sort of wild helplessness, "your thrice-blessed innocence! No! Don't you suppose Canifest hadn't heard all the rumors of that kind? Her family was good enough for that conduct to have seemed just prankish. Haha, no. What somebody told him, I fear, was that Marcia might have been too virtuous."
"Too virtuous?"
"That she had a husband already," said Rainger, and cackled.
"A husband already!" the chief inspector snapped, after a pause. "Who-?"
Rainger indulged himself in an elaborate Frenchified shrug. He shut one eye, a tubby little Mephistopheles in a bright-flowered robe, and the other staring little bloodshot eye showed through the smoke of his cigar. He smiled.
"How should I know? That part, I grant is theory; but it's mine, and it's a good theory. Now who might that husband be? I wonder. Eh?"
Before Masters could voice a suggestion he went on softly:
"Let's go on. Do you understand now what my good friend Jervis Willard told you about Marcia being upset, distraught, desperately waiting last night? — waiting for Bohun to return.’
‘Yes, I think even you understand. If Canifest refused to back this play, it would never be put on at all."
"Now, now," urged Masters, with goading tolerance, "Miss Tait was a very popular actress, I should fancy. Surely any number of producers — “
"That's where you're wrong," the other said, nodding several times. "Not after what she had said of them separately and individually in the newspapers, and also to their faces." The mechanical smile broadened with rather horrible effect. "And what she didn't say, I quoted her as saying. Get it?"
"And this was the news," Masters said slowly, "you say Mr. Bohun was bringing back to her last night?"
"Naturally. She was a very temperamental wench, I can tell you. What must Bohun have thought when he had to come back and explain it was all off? They might get another angel, but. Marcia wasn't too popular. She certainly wasn't popular in this house. It amused me last night, when Miss Katharine Bohun attempted to give her a shove that would send her down a flight of stone stairs..:'
"What the devil's this?"
Bennett felt his heart pounding, and an empty sensation in his chest. He took a step forward, so that Rainger caught his eye.
"What's the matter?" asked Rainger harshly. "Friend of yours? Never mind. That's what she did. Come on, flatfoot: let me get back to the subject. Willard didn't tell you about that little episode, did he? You can forget it. I want to tell you the first step in the case that'll hang John Bohun.. He told you (didn't he?) that he arrived back from London about three A.M. Well, he lied. He got back here at one-thirty, when it was still snowing hard."
"Did he, now?" inquired Masters in a curious tone. "Well. Get this down, Potter. How do you know? Did you see him?"
"No."
Masters said heavily: "Then you'll excuse me. I've listened, and I've listened for something more than vague accusations, and I'm admitting to you I've got a little tired of it. Now I'll ask you to stop this sort of talk and go up to bed where you belong."
Rainger's arm jerked.