“Only Levy’s private diary. I brought it away with me. Here it is. It doesn’t tell one much, though. It’s full of entries like: ‘Tom and Annie to dinner’; and ‘My dear wife’s birthday; gave her an old opal ring’; ‘Mr. Arbuthnot dropped in to tea; he wants to marry Rachel, but I should like someone steadier for my treasure.’ Still, I thought it would show who came to the house and so on. He evidently wrote it up at night. There’s no entry for Monday.”
“I expect it’ll be useful,” said Lord Peter, turning over the pages. “Poor old buffer. I say, I’m not so certain now he was done away with.”
He detailed to Mr. Parker his day’s work.
“Arbuthnot?” said Parker. “Is that the Arbuthnot of the diary?”
“I suppose so. I hunted him up because I knew he was fond of fooling round the Stock Exchange. As for Milligan, he looks all right, but I believe he’s pretty ruthless in business and you never can tell. Then there’s the red-haired secretary—lightnin’ calculator man with a face like a fish, keeps on sayin’ nuthin’—got the Tarbaby in his family tree, I should think. Milligan’s got a jolly good motive for, at any rate, suspendin’ Levy for a few days. Then there’s the new man.”
“What new man?”
“Ah, that’s the letter I mentioned to you. Where did I put it? Here we are. Good parchment paper, printed address of solicitor’s office in Salisbury, and postmark to correspond. Very precisely written with a fine nib by an elderly business man of old-fashioned habits.”
Parker took the letter and read:
Crimplesham and Wicks,
Solicitors,
Milford Hill, Salisbury,
17 November, 192—.
Sir,