“Good!” said Gibbs, “just what I want.” And he spoke sincerely, for he began to see that he would learn little from the display of rancor and temper that moved them all.
He put definite and straightforward questions, and elicited the information that they were all in their beds and asleep at the hour of the murder. This could not be corroborated from the very nature of things, but he let it pass.
There was fierce disagreement as to which had first declared a willingness to kill Sir Herbert Binney, and which had said she, too, was inclined to the deed, but it was admitted that such hasty and unconsidered declarations had been made.
In fact, the gist of the long and difficult grilling was an apparent determination on the part of each one of the two factions to accuse the other, and a most plausible and complacent assumption of innocence by both.
This seemed a non-committal situation, but Gibbs did not deem it such. He was definitely persuaded as to the guilty party, and his satisfied nods and approving smiles showed Richard Bates plainly which way the detective’s opinions leaned.
And the young man was thoroughly frightened. Though, for his part, it would be a difficult matter to make a preference between the belief in the guilt of his aunt or the guilt of the mother of the girl he loved.
And the trend of Gibbs’ investigation led surely to one or the other. The use of the paper-cutter that Miss Prall admitted having given into Sir Herbert’s keeping gave wide-spread opportunity. Any one desiring to kill the man had a means provided, that is, reasoning that Sir Herbert had the knife with him for the purpose of getting it mended.
Again, that story might be pure fabrication, in which case the suspicion swung back to Miss Prall and Eliza.
It was Gibbs’ theory that the unintelligible letters of the dead man’s message implied two women and the attempted direction was to get both. This, he argued, meant either Miss Prall and Eliza Grundy or Mrs Everett and her faithful aide, Kate Holland.
It seemed to him that the case narrowed itself down to these women, either pair of which had both motive and opportunity.