My chief frowned.
“And yet one of them has proved pretty serious in its consequences,” he observed. “You don’t agree with Miss Weathered that it was her father who left that bunch of keys in the door of the open safe?”
I did my best to control myself as I shook my head.
“Rather curious that she should have interfered, though, instead of her mother,” Captain Charles put in with an air of sagacity.
Tarleton threw himself into the doctor’s own chair, and taking out his watch, began to swing it gently.
“I expect to meet with more than one curious circumstance in the course of this inquiry,” he said lazily. “It is just possible that Weathered’s daughter knew more about him than his wife did.” He sat up suddenly. “But I am wasting your valuable time, Captain Charles. There is nothing here that Cassilis and I cannot deal with. It is simply a question of having the body identified, and brought round here, if the authorities decide to keep the case private. You had better lose no time in communicating with the Foreign Office and the Home Office, and letting me know their decision. And don’t forget there are the costumes to be traced.”
The Captain was already on the move. I fancied he was not sorry to be released. Tarleton was too big a personality for anyone else to find himself much more than a dummy in his company, and the Inspector’s sense of self-importance must have suffered as long as he was in the physician’s train.
My chief was good enough to offer me a private explanation as soon as we were alone.
“I have every confidence in Charles’s honesty, but very little in his tact. And this is a case that calls for very careful handling. These people won’t tell us more than they can help if they are afraid of a public scandal. And, on the other hand, if they know that the whole affair is going to be hushed up they won’t tell us anything at all.” Tarleton let his eyes rove round the walls of the room as he proceeded. “I don’t want Charles to see the direction in which I am feeling my way. You see, he is not my subordinate. He isn’t responsible to me for his actions. He is quite at liberty to go to the Chief Commissioner behind my back, and tell him whatever is in his mind, and the Commissioner can go to Sir James Ponsonby in the same way. We must walk warily Cassilis.”
I tried in vain to catch the doctor’s eye while he was speaking. How much did he mean to convey by that singular warning? Was he referring to my admission that I had heard Dr. Weathered’s name before, and cautioning me to make no more such admissions in the Inspector’s hearing? I felt a sick apprehension which I dared not show.