"I should think it very unlikely," said Mr. Carrington without hesitation. "At least, I have never heard of anything of the kind, and so far I have come across no trace of anything of the kind among his papers."
Mr. Flexen frowned, considering; then he said: "Do you happen to know whether he employed any one besides your firm to do legal work for him?"
"As to that I can't say. But I should not think it likely. It was always a business to get him to attend to anything that wanted doing, and he always made a fuss about it. I can't see him employing another firm too. But he may have done. The only thing is that I ought to have found either their bills or the receipts for them among those papers—except that my late client does not appear to have taken the trouble to keep many receipts."
"The thing is that I've learnt that Lord Loudwater had a furious quarrel with some unknown woman between eleven and a quarter-past on the night of his death, and I want to find her. You can see how important it is. It may be that she stabbed him, or it may be that she provided him with the motive to commit suicide—not that that seems likely. But you can't tell: she might have been able to threaten him with some exposure. Those people without any self-control are always doing the most senseless things—bigamy, for instance, is often one of their weaknesses."
"Loudwater was certainly without self-control; but I hardly think that he was the man to commit bigamy," said the lawyer.
"It would very much simplify matters if he had," said Mr. Flexen in a dissatisfied tone. "I wonder whether Manley would know anything about it?"
"He might," said Mr. Carrington.
Mr. Flexen went through the library window to find Mr. Manley strolling up and down the lawn with every appearance of enjoying his pipe and the respite from perusing papers.
"Mr. Carrington tells me that you were in Lord Loudwater's confidence," said Mr. Flexen.
"Wholly," said Mr. Manley, with more promptness than his actual knowledge of the facts warranted.