“Well, she’d probably have taken advice about it if she did,” said Mr. Murbles. “Who is her usual man of affairs?”
Wimsey shook his head.
“I don’t think she’d have asked him,” he objected. “Not if she was wise, that is. You see, if she did, and he said she probably wouldn’t get anything unless Miss Dawson either made a will or died before January, 1926, and if after that the old lady did unexpectedly pop off in October, 1925, wouldn’t the solicitor-johnnie feel inclined to ask questions? It wouldn’t be safe, don’t y’know. I ’xpect she went to some stranger and asked a few innocent little questions under another name, what?”
“Probably,” said Mr. Towkington. “You show a remarkable disposition for crime, don’t you, eh?”
“Well, if I did go in for it, I’d take reasonable precautions,” retorted Wimsey. “’S wonderful, of course, the tomfool things murderers do do. But I have the highest opinion of Miss Whittaker’s brains. I bet she covered her tracks pretty well.”
“You don’t think Mr. Probyn mentioned the matter,” suggested Parker, “the time he went down and tried to get Miss Dawson to make her will.”
“I don’t,” said Wimsey, with energy, “but I’m pretty certain he tried to explain matters to the old lady, only she was so terrified of the very idea of a will she wouldn’t let him get a word in. But I fancy old Probyn was too downy a bird to tell the heir that her only chance of gettin’ the dollars was to see that her great-aunt died off before the Act went through. Would you tell anybody that, Mr. Towkington?”
“Not if I knew it,” said that gentleman, grinning.
“It would be highly undesirable,” agreed Mr. Murbles.
“Anyway,” said Wimsey, “we can easily find out. Probyn’s in Italy—I was going to write to him, but perhaps you’d better do it, Murbles. And, in the meanwhile, Charles and I will think up a way to find whoever it was that did give Miss Whittaker an opinion on the matter.”