“I—er—I don't know what to think. Your father had some enemies, it is true. Every business man has. And a person with a temper easily aroused, such as—”
LeGrand Blossom stopped suddenly.
“You were about to name some one?” asked Viola.
“Well, I was about to give, merely as an instance, Jean Forette the chauffeur. Not that I think the Frenchman had a thing to do with the matter. But he has a violent temper at times, and again he is as meek as any one I ever knew. But say a person did give way to violent passion, such as I have seen him do at times when something went wrong with the big, new car, might not such a person, for a fancied wrong, take means of ending the life of a person who had angered him?”
“I never liked Jean Forette,” put in Miss Carwell, “and I was glad when I heard Horace was to let him go.”
“Do you think—do you believe he had anything to do with my father's death?” asked Viola quickly.
“Not the least in the world,” answered the head clerk hastily. “I just used him as an illustration.”
“But he quarreled with my father,” the girl went on. “They had words, I know.”
“Yes, they did, and I heard some of them,” admitted LeGrand Blossom. “But that passed over, and they were friendly enough the day of the golf game. So there could not have been murder in the heart of that Frenchman. No, I don't mean even to hint at him: but I believe some one, angry at, and with a grudge against, your father, ended his life.”
“I believe that, too!” declared Viola firmly. “And while I feel, as you do, about Jean, still it is a clew that must not be overlooked. I'll tell Colonel Ashley.”