If it had been the detective's design to entrap her into a series of falsehoods he might easily have done so. But there was no object in pursuing that course. He met her ingenuous gaze with a little lift of his shoulders. "This is mere foolishness, Lady Eileen. I want to give you the opportunity of stating frankly what occurred from the moment you got Robert Grell's letter this morning. You know this story of the dressmaker would
fall to pieces the instant we started making inquiries to verify it."
"So I'm on my defence, then?" she said abruptly. He nodded and watched closely the changing expression of her features. "I have done nothing that gives you any right to question me," she went on defiantly. "And I am not going to submit to any more questions. Good morning. Can you find your own way out?"
She caught at her skirt with one hand and with her chin tilted high in the air would have withdrawn haughtily from the room. She was afraid that his shrewd, persistent questioning and persuasion might end in eliciting from her more unguarded admissions. He had reached the door before her, however, and stood leaning with his back against it and his legs crossed and his arms folded. She stopped sharply and he divined her intention.
"I shouldn't touch the bell if I were you," he said peremptorily. "It will be better for both of us if I say what I have got to say alone."
The decision in his tone stopped her as her hand was half-way to the bell-push. She paused irresolute, and at last her hand dropped at her side. Foyle moved to her, laid a gentle hand on her shoulder and half forced her to a seat. After all, with all her beauty and her wits she was but a wayward child. Her eyes questioned him and her lips quivered a little.
"Now," he said sternly. "Tell me if your father signed the cheque you cashed, or whether you put his signature to it yourself?"
Her lips moved dumbly and the room seemed to quiver around her. Finely as she had held herself in control hitherto, she was now thoroughly unnerved. She
covered her face with her hands, and her frail figure shook with dry sobs. Foyle waited patiently for the outburst to pass. Suddenly she sprang to her feet and faced him with clenched hands.
"Yes, I did sign it," she blazed. "My father was out, and I wanted the money at once. He will not mind—he would have given it to me had he been here."