They were a voluble lot, and it was easier to get information than to prevent it.
Daisy Lee was among the most vindictive. Although a frail, pale little thing, she was full of indignation at the late Sir Herbert’s ways, and expressed herself without reserve.
“He was an old nuisance!” she averred; “he was free with his presents and he was a gentleman,—I’ll say that for him,—but he thought he could pat any girl on her shoulder or even snatch a kiss, without making her mad. He made me so mad I wanted to kill him,—and I told him so, lots of times. I didn’t, and there’s no way I could have done it, so I am not afraid to say that I would have stabbed him myself if I’d had a good chance!”
“You don’t mean that, Miss Lee,” said Gibbs, coolly, “and you’re only saying it to make a sensation.”
“Why, what a story!” and Daisy turned on him. “Well, that is, I don’t suppose I really would have done the actual killing, but I’d have the will to.”
“Quite a different matter,” said the detective, “and your will would have fizzled out at the critical moment.”
“Of course it would,” put in Julie Baxter, the telephone girl. “Daisy’s an awful bluffer. None of us girls would kill anybody. But one and all we are glad to be rid of Sir Herbert, though I can’t help being sorry he’s killed.”
“You mean you’d have been glad to be rid of him in some more peaceable fashion?”
“That’s exactly what I mean. He was insufferable——”
“In what way?”