“I think I do, sir.”
“So far so good. Now, I’ve not given it up yet. There are two little details that might pay for investigation. It’s no good trying to trace the prussic acid, but you’ve got the champagne bottle. You might try and trace that, and find out where that was bought and by whom. It’s labelled Veuve Cliquot ’93, but I remember the cork. You’ve got it still, I suppose?”
“Oh, yes, sir.”
“Last night I ordered a bottle of Cliquot ’93 at the club, and I saw the cork of that. It’s got a totally different brand on it. Here it is.” And the barrister passed the cork to the two detectives.
“But what do you make of that, sir?”
“Simply this—that one bottle or other is spurious. It’s not very likely the club one is wrong, but still find out which is spurious; and if it’s the one found in the hotel—you know the hotel people say they didn’t sell that bottle—then you must hunt round and find out where the spurious stuff is being made and sold. Then there’s another thing. The bedrooms at the hotel all have self-closing doors, locking with spring latches. They need the right key to open the doors.”
“Quite so.”
“Well, from the inquiries you made at the time it was perfectly evident that no one had had the key of that bedroom, for the key had not left the office for more than a week. The body had not been dead more than a few hours even when I saw it. The scent of prussic acid will disappear under twenty-four hours. Now, somebody entered that bedroom with a key. There are two master keys to find. One will open all doors on that corridor. That is in the possession of the head chambermaid, who has charge of that corridor. The other, which will open all doors in the annexe, the manager has. It is locked in his safe, and it is quite impossible that that one can have been used.”
“Then that proves the chambermaid’s key was used?”
“It looks like it; but in that case the chambermaid herself used it, for if you remember in her evidence at the inquest she said the key which she wore on the chain attached to her belt had never been out of her possession all day. She volunteered that evidence which is so damning that she would never have said it except on the assumption of its entire truth and her absolute innocence when she easily might have overlooked the conclusion it pointed to. So I don’t think the chambermaid’s key was used.”