“You ought to go; I think you’d find it interesting. The household, I mean.”
“As a matter of fact, I haven’t felt quite hardened enough to my new profession yet. I don’t think I could butt in on Dr. Vane and ask him for an interview just at present. Can’t you tell me about them and save me the trouble?”
“Well, I daresay I could. There’s not really much to tell you. But the doctor’s a queer stick. Big man, he is, with a great black beard, and spends most of his time in a laboratory he’s had fitted up at the back of the house. Research work of some kind. Bit brusque in his manner, if you understand me, and doesn’t seem any too cut up by his wife’s death—or doesn’t show it if he is, perhaps I ought to say.”
“Oh, he doesn’t, doesn’t he?”
“But I gather that the two of them didn’t hit it off any too well together. That seemed the idea among the servants, anyhow. I had all of them up and questioned them this morning, of course. Then there’s his secretary, a dry stick of a woman with pince-nez and short hair, who might be any age between thirty and fifty, and a cousin of Mrs. Vane’s who’s been living there for the last few months called Miss Cross. That’s the girl who’s come into all the money, as I expect you’ve heard.”
“And the girl who was the last person apparently except one to see Mrs. Vane alive,” Roger nodded. “Yes, I’ve seen her, had a chat with her in fact.”
“Oh, you have, have you? And what did you think of her, Mr. Sheringham?”
“I don’t know,” Roger hedged. “What did you?”
The inspector considered. “I thought she was quite a nice young lady,” he said carefully, “though perhaps a bit deeper than one might think—or than she’d like you to think, maybe. Did you get any information from her?”
“Look here, Inspector,” Anthony burst out suddenly, “just tell me this, will you? Do you really honestly think that⸺”