Llewellyn shook his head vigorously. “Never!” was his emphatic reply. “I knew that he was adding to his collection, but he never referred in any way to this screen that he already had in his possession. I’m absolutely sure on the point.”
“Forgive me, Mr. Llewellyn, if I appear insistent, but I’ve understood since I’ve been here that you were a very zealous assistant to Mr. Stewart in this particular branch of his work. Is that true?”
Here Goodall intervened abruptly. “Yes, Mr. Llewellyn, how was it, if you were so intimate with Mr. Stewart in all his collecting work, that he didn’t mention the fact of these two screens to you?” But Llewellyn was not to be so easily shaken.
“Without appearing to be disrespectful, I would suggest that Mr. Stewart would have been in a better position to answer that than I, Inspector,” he replied smoothly.
Goodall flushed, but Llewellyn went on. “All I can say is that he didn’t mention them.”
Then Anthony countered with another question. “Had Mr. Stewart confided in you at any time—before—had he discussed similar purchases on previous occasions?”
“Many times,” responded Llewellyn with absolute candor.
“Can you then account for a seeming lack of confidence on his part in this instance?”
“Frankly, Mr. Bathurst, I can’t! But Mr. Stewart, if his son will pardon my outspokenness at such a time as this, was a man of quick impulses. He was very impetuous and utterly impatient—caught by this whim and influenced by that wave of feeling—therefore not exactly a man that you could call a model of consistency. Not that I have any reason or desire to find fault with him as an employer. He was always just and always generous—I cannot complain of his treatment of me.” He looked up and caught Inspector Goodall’s eye and he was quick enough to sense its disapproval. For Goodall’s brain was considering several elements of doubt. “Why,” said the Inspector to himself, “why does this young man talk like this when Miss Marjorie Lennox accuses him of harboring revengeful feelings against the man of whom he speaks?” He decided that the solution to this little problem might possibly be more speedily forthcoming if he showed a little craft. So he affected an air of ingenuousness.
“The sentiments do you credit,” he declared. “It’s the fashion of the world nowadays to run down your employers as much as you can. Well, Mr. Bathurst, what about this screen of yours? I’m afraid there’s nobody here that can help you with those details you asked for. You’ll have to remain content with the description in the catalogue—‘an antique metal-work screen.’ I expect the only person that could have supplied more information was Mr. Stewart himself.”