"Miss Butterworth," he said at last, "most detectives would have held their peace and let you go on with what you have to tell without a hint that it was either unwelcome or unnecessary, but I have consideration for persons' feelings and for persons' secrets so long as they do not come in collision with the law, and my opinion is, or was when I entered this room, that such discoveries as you have made at your old friend's house" (Why need he emphasize friend—did he think I forgot for a moment that Althea was my friend?) "were connected rather with some family difficulty than with the dreadful affair we are considering. That is why I hastened to tell you that we had found a clue to the disappearances in Mother Jane's cottage. I wished to save the Misses Knollys."
If he had thought to mollify me by this assertion, he did not succeed. He saw it and made haste to say:
"Not that I doubt your consideration for them, only the justness of your conclusions."
"You have doubted those before and with more reason," I replied, "yet they were not altogether false."
"That I am willing to acknowledge, so willing that if you still think after I have told my story that yours is apropos, then I will listen to it only too eagerly. My object is to find the real criminal in this matter. I say at the present moment it is Mother Jane."
"God grant you are right," I said, influenced in spite of myself by the calm assurance of his manner. "If she was at the house night before last between eleven and twelve, then perhaps she is all you think her. But I see no reason to believe it—not yet, Mr. Gryce. Supposing you give me one. It would be better than all this controversy. One small reason, Mr. Gryce, as good as"—I did not say what, but the fillip it gave to his intention stood me in good stead, for he launched immediately into the matter with no further play upon my curiosity, which was now, as you can believe, thoroughly aroused, though I could not believe that anything he had to bring up against Mother Jane could for a moment stand against the death and the burial I had witnessed in Miss Knollys' house during the two previous nights.
XXIV
THE ENIGMA OF NUMBERS
"When in our first conversation on this topic I told you that Mother Jane was not to be considered in this matter, I meant she was not to be considered by you. She was a subject to be handled by the police, and we have handled her. Yesterday afternoon I made a search of her cabin." Here Mr. Gryce paused and eyed me quizzically. He sometimes does eye me, which same I cannot regard as a compliment, considering how fond he is of concentrating all his wisdom upon small and insignificant objects.