“I decline to say.”
“But don’t you see, Lady Rellingham, that if that other person can corroborate what you say, you have won your case. If, as you admit, there was another person, and you don’t call that person as a witness, the natural presumption is that you are afraid to do so because that person would tell a different story. Now, who was that other person?”
“The other person is dead.”
“Well, we’ll leave that point for the present. Have you any children, Lady Rellingham?”
“No.”
Tempest handed the witness a birth-certificate. “Isn’t that the certificate of the birth of a daughter of Sir John and yourself?”
“Yes.”
“Then, why did you say you had no children?”
“You asked me if I have any children. That child was adopted by somebody very soon after it was born. I didn’t want anyone to know I had had a child.”
“Who adopted it?”