Miss Grison replied before the officer could open his mouth. “I telephoned for him,” she said sharply. “You thought that I left the room to take medicine, but it was to send for the police.”
“Then you were not ill?” said Latimer taken aback.
“No,” she answered coolly; “it was all acting; didn’t I act well?”
“I told you she was a wicked woman,” moaned Sorley, who stood passively between the two plain-clothes men.
“Wicked!” repeated Miss Grison with scorn; “if I am wicked, what are you?”
Inspector Moon made a sign that she should be silent, and explained his speedy presence quietly. “Miss Grison telephoned to me at Rotherhithe,” he said; “and as I happened to have business in the Bow Street police office my clerk repeated the telephonic message to that place. I was thus enabled to drive here in a cab with my men, in spite of the fog, although I must say that we drove very slowly. However,” he looked at Sorley, “we are in excellent time. May I ask what you two gentlemen are doing here?”
“We brought Mr. Sorley to see Miss Grison at his request,” said Latimer.
“You should have sent for me as this lady did,” rebuked Moon sharply.
“There was no need,” put in Alan. “Mr. Sorley intended to give himself up.”
Moon smiled derisively. “I doubt that, seeing how he ran away from his own house at Belstone.”