“Then she suspects Mrs. Stannard?”
“She doesn’t say so. She sticks to the safe theory of an intruder. You can’t blame her. None of us can suspect Joyce. It’s too absurd.”
“And Barry Stannard, what does he think?”
“Oh, he vows it was an intruder. He’s thought up a dozen ways for him to get in and out.”
“All equally impossible?”
“I suppose so. Unless,—I hate to say it,—but mightn’t Blake have let him out?”
“Not unless it was somebody known to the household.”
“Well?” said Natalie Vernon.
VIII
The Emeralds
“You mean?” prompted Bobsy.