“And you were there all the time between ten and eleven?” asked his wife.
“Till half-past eleven.”
“And there was no one else?”
Mr. Altham looked up brightly.
“The club waiter,” he said, “and the page. The page has been dismissed for stealing sugar. The sugar bill was preposterous. That was how we found out. Did you mean to ask about that?”
“No, my dear. Nor do I want to know.”
At the moment the parlour-maid left the room, and she spoke in an eager undertone.
“Mrs. Ames told me that Major Ames went up to the club last night, when she went to bed at half-past ten,” she said. “You told me at breakfast whom you found there, but I wanted to be sure. Call them Mr. and Mrs. Smith and then we can go on talking.”
The parlour-maid came back into the room.
“Yes, Mr. Smith apparently went up to the club at half-past ten,” she said. “But he can’t have gone to the club, for in that case you would have seen him. It has occurred to me that he didn’t feel well, and went to the doctor’s.”