“Thank you. You mentioned Alan Warburton. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting him. I understand that there was a likelihood once, we will say, of an engagement between him and Miss Delaney?”
“That is so, most certainly!”
“Now Sir Matthew—can you tell me this? Did the Westhampton Hunt Ball that we have been discussing coincide pretty closely with the ‘Mutual Bank’ scandal and the arrest and suicide of Sir Felix Warburton? Can you tell me that?”
“It did, Mr. Bathurst,” replied Sir Matthew grimly. “Not merely ‘pretty closely’ but absolutely. Sir Felix committed suicide on the very day that the ball took place.”
“Thank you,” said Mr. Bathurst. “I rather fancy that my case is nearly complete.”
CHAPTER XXII.
Gallant Mr. Bathurst
He rose. Sir Matthew Fullgarney’s face was a strange mixture of mystification and inclination towards asperity.
“Really,” he volunteered with a stiff pomposity. “I don’t quite understand——”
Mr. Bathurst smiled. “But I am inclined to linger with your permission, Sir Matthew, for a moment or two longer. I am sure you will do everything in your power to help me. That fact you have already demonstrated. I have heard much of Lady Fullgarney. I take it she accompanied you upon the occasion of the Hunt Ball?”
“Of course. I am not the kind of man to—but I don’t quite see——”