“But, even if they did, you can’t make it fit. Look here——”
“My dear Baxter, it does fit. They changed places, and then changed back again. I’d thought of the possibility of one change; it never dawned on me that there were two changes. This is what happened: Eulalie married Sir John, and keeps her marriage secret, and Sir John makes her an allowance. His father was alive then, and probably didn’t approve of actresses. Then she gets engaged to Lord Madeley, for I daresay Rellingham wasn’t much catch then. Now, she can’t marry Lord Madeley—that would be bigamy; and she’s just going to have a child, so she persuades her sister Dolores to go through the ceremony in her place and in her name; and I have no doubt whatever that the arrangement was that Eulalie was to take the place of Lady Madeley when the honey-moon was over. I knew Lord Madeley, and it would have been quite possible with him. He never noticed the difference between one woman and another.
“Now, Sir John Rellingham hears of the engagement and protests. Eulalie tells him of the expected child, and explains that it is her sister who is really to marry Lord Madeley, and that it was arranged that she would marry him in the name of Eulalie Alvarez. That being merely an assumed name, one sister has no greater right to it than the other. So Sir John was content, for, of course, he wouldn’t be told the sisters intended to change places after the marriage. Well, the marriage does take place, and Eulalie’s child Evangeline is born and adopted by Lady Stableford. Then Lord and Lady Madeley come back from the honey-moon, and Eulalie, of course, wants her sister to stand down and carry out the arrangement they had come to. Dolores, who has found her feet, very naturally objects. Then she goes to tea with her sister. The maid sees the two sisters together, and is sent out on an errand. Eulalie poisons Dolores in the bedroom. The maid comes back, is told Lady Madeley has gone, and is at once sent out again. Then Eulalie strips the body of Dolores, and puts those clothes on. She leaves her own clothes in the bedroom, because she cannot dress the dead body in them. From that moment she becomes Lady Madeley, and she leaves the flat before the maid returns. She bears Lord Madeley a child, the present Consuelo, Baroness Madeley. Lord Madeley dies. Lady Madeley has a small jointure, but she has a handsome allowance for the maintenance of Consuelo, and has the use of Madeley Manor. Consuelo will be of age in a year’s time, and Eulalie’s income would be reduced to her jointure. Consuelo, I hear, is engaged already, so there was no chance of staving off the drop to the jointure. Sir John, believing his wife was dead, later on marries again. Now Sir John, as time goes by, discovers that his first wife, whom he had thought was dead, is really alive, and masquerading as Lady Madeley. He ought to have shown her up at once, but he hesitates to do so, because not only does it lay his wife open to a charge of fraud and probable imprisonment, but it also bastardises Consuelo and creates a huge scandal, and, moreover, it is a slur on the memory of his second wife, to whom he was very devoted. Added to all, it means that he himself has committed bigamy. So he lets things slide. Then Lady Stableford quarrels with Evangeline, and alters her will, and Sir John realises that somehow or other he must provide for his daughter. He therefore creates the secret trust, knowing that if he puts everything in your hands in that way he can trust his wife’s secret not to be revealed, if this can possibly be avoided; but he is so loyal that even to you he won’t reveal it, unless this becomes absolutely unavoidable. If he hadn’t been murdered, none of this would ever have come out. Then, knowing he was going to be operated upon whilst Evangeline was still a minor, he sends to Lady Madeley to come to his office, and he sends for Evangeline. He gives that paper and letter to Evangeline, but tells her she is not to use it if Lady Stableford provides for her. But if he himself dies before she comes of age, and if Lady Stableford does not provide for her, then she is to use it, unless, to obviate the risk of her secret being disclosed, Lady Madeley, her mother, prefers to make the necessary provision. He probably tells them in each other’s presence, so as to give each the hold on the other. But Lady Madeley, knowing she will be reduced to her jointure in a year or two, or else trying to avert the disclosure, or in temper, kills Sir John. I fancy it must have been a right down quarrel, and she probably killed him in temper, though the use of the revolver looks as if she had planned it out beforehand. It may have been that she was fond of Consuelo, and was willing to sacrifice anything to prevent her succession being interfered with or jeopardised. Sir John may have threatened her with disclosure, or she may have shot him to stop his speaking. Anyhow, she kills him, and then it dawns on her that she is at the mercy of Evangeline, who knows she has killed him. So she determines to murder Evangeline. She remembers that Dolores’ death was put down to suicide, and the nude body was used as an argument to suggest insanity. So she lays her plans, takes a room at Charing Cross Hotel, and entices Evangeline there, and poisons her. She takes away her clothes, to prevent or delay a discovery of the identity of the body, and to suggest insanity, forgetting all the time that at an hotel the absence of any clothes in the room would establish the complicity of another person. She finds the letter from Sir John in the pocket of Evangeline, and appropriates it. As soon as I had stated in court that the directions to your partners had been destroyed, she sees her chance, and, knowing her income will very shortly be reduced, and relying on this letter, she brings the action against you three. As to the other paper, very likely Clutch & Holdem wrote that out, and were responsible for that part of the story. Now, that’s the whole explanation of everything.”
“Shall you tell the police, Tempest?”
“No, old man. I don’t hunt murderers for a living. The police read the papers. If they like to put two and two together, from what came out in court to-day, let them. It’s not my business or yours.”
“Would she be convicted?”
“I doubt it. I’m certain of what I’ve told you; but there’s too much deduction for a jury. A jury will only convict for murder on cold-drawn facts, and plenty of them. But that woman will save them the trouble. Unless they’ve arrested her already, I expect she’ll commit suicide before the morning. She’s shown up to the world—utterly discredited. She isn’t Lady Madeley, and consequently she hasn’t got any income now. And she knows what the chances are, that she’ll be arrested for murder. You’ll see she won’t risk it.”
“Then Consuelo isn’t Lady Madeley either?”
“As it happens, she is, because I happen to know that her trustees very wisely got letters patent of confirmation when she succeeded. It only means that Billy Fitz Aylwyn succeeds to the old barony, whilst the girl gets a new peerage, dating from her patent.”