“She mentioned the paper-knife but said nothing about the image till she was questioned.”
“And then?”
The sergeant reflected a moment. “I didn’t make much of what she said then. She was very upset, and rambled a good deal, till I think the coroner was glad to have done with her. I almost thought she attached as much importance to that as to the paper-knife, but of course she was hysterical.”
“Possibly,” murmured Derrick. “So I take it that Martin could not actually have seen the body till he returned with the doctor?”
“That is his evidence, which I will come to in a minute, and also Perkins statement. It would be a matter of perhaps twenty or twenty-five minutes after Perkins waked Mrs. Millicent.”
“And Mrs. Millicent, and I suppose her daughter, stayed with the body till the doctor came?”
“Yes.”
“Where was Perkins then?”
“Also in the study, trying to help Mrs. Millicent, who she thought was going off her head.”
“Let me go back a minute. The first time Perkins passed the study on her way up-stairs the door was shut, and the next time ajar. How long intervened?”