"A quarter to ten?" he repeated, raising his head from his notebook.
"Yes. There was a clock on the mantelpiece, and I happened to notice the time."
"Then you were only with Mr. Fletcher for ten minutes?"
"I suppose so. Yes, it must have been about that."
"A very short call, Mrs. North, was it not?"
"I don't see why - What do you mean?"
"Merely that it strikes me as odd that having, as you yourself state, gone to see Mr. Fletcher because you were bored, you stayed so short a time with him. Did anything happen to make you anxious to leave at once?"
"No. No, of course not. Only I could see he was busy, and I didn't want to be a nuisance."
He made a note in his book. "I see. So you left the study at 9.45. Did you return home by the way you had come?"
"Yes. But not immediately. I heard the garden-gate open, and - and it occurred to me that it would look rather odd - my being there at that hour. I didn't want anyone to see me, so I hid behind a bush."