"Who was the person?"
"There was no name signed to the letter, as you well know who wrote it," cried Madame Alpenny indignantly. "And it said also that if the person who wrote was not there I was to wait if it was two or three hours. I go"--she spoke dramatically, in the present tense--"I find no one. I wait and wait and wait; hour and hour and hour I wait. After ten o'clock--yes, and nearer eleven, if I remember--I come back disappointed to this place. I hear no more of the letter or of the person. But you see that I am innocent. Could I be in two places at once, I ask you, Monsieur?"
"No. But have you any witness to prove that you were at Hampstead?"
"No," said Madame Alpenny, in her turn, and disconcerted again as she was quite sharp enough to see the flaw in her story. "I cannot bring any one to prove I was at Hampstead. But I was----I was----I was."
"Show me the letter."
"I have not got it. I tore it up and so made a mistake."
"You did," said Hench coolly, and not believing a word of her tale. "All the worse for you, Madame. Well"--he rose and took up his hat--"it only remains for me to go to the police and tell them everything."
If Hench thought that this statement would frighten the woman, he was never more mistaken in his life. She snapped her fingers right under his nose. "Go! Go! Go!" she cried. "You have robbed me of my daughter by giving money to that fool to marry her; now you would rob me of my liberty. I defy you. I care not for the police, nor for you, nor for anything."
"Very good." Hench walked towards the door. "If you had behaved in a different spirit I would have tried to arrange matters differently for your daughter's sake. As it is you must take the consequence. To clear my own character, you can understand----"
"Oh, yes, I well understand, Monsieur. You murdered your uncle; you wrote that letter asking me to leave this house, so that I could be unable to explain where I was, and now you accuse me at the bidding of Mistare Spruce. I see it all, and I defy you; I spit upon you; I----" Here Hench, unable to stand any more of her savage anger, left the room, while she still raged.