"So?" he grunted, peering round a poisonous cloud of smoke. "Have you been tryin' to play detective too? But that's right. It must 'a' been the grapefruit. First, the cook swears it's the only thing Mrs. Fane ate on Thursday. Second, grapefruit's one of the few things that'd be bitter enough of itself to hide the bitter taste of strychnine — drat him!"
"Drat who?"
"This feller who's been foolin' us!" roared H.M. "I was the one who led everybody up the garden path. I was the one who fell into the trap, as smooth and slick as you please, and started babblin' about tetanus. It's small thanks to me Mrs. Fane's alive now. Cor!"
"Have you found the grapefruit that was used?"
It was Masters who answered him.
"No, sir, we haven't. And we're not likely to. At the time we had other things to think about — Mrs. Fane. When Sir Henry asked the cook later, she said she'd thrown the grapefruit in the dustbin. It wasn't there when we looked. Naturally. Somebody'd removed it."
Masters drew a design on the edge of his notebook with his pencil. His boiled eye looked wicked. He added sinister curlicues to the design, and said:
"It's not likely the murderer'd go poking about a dustbin in broad daylight. Especially as the dustbin's by that garden shed near the back door. Too conspicuous. So it'll be very interesting to know, sir, who was hanging about that back garden after dark." Courtney thought back.
"It'll also be a good thing to know," continued Masters, scoring black lines, "who was hanging about when Mrs. Propper prepared the grapefruit. And who could have got at it. And who carried it up to Mrs. Fane."
"But it certainly wasn't—"