“Tell me just one thing,” she said. “Is it something to do with that man—the one they can't find?”
“Everything,” he answered, and kissed her, and got up from the sofa. “I'll ring you up tonight, my love. Don't worry!”
“As long as they don't arrest Mummy or Guy while you're gone,” she said doubtfully.
“They won't do that. They'll merely interrogate them in the light of the new discovery, and I don't suppose that even your little brother Guy can compromise himself sufficiently to make Hannasyde apply for a warrant for his arrest. Moreover, Hannasyde is hot on my trail now, and will in all probability put in some hours of research into my immediate past.”
It seemed as though he was right. When Superintendent Hannasyde saw Stella twenty minutes later he asked her if Randall were still in the house. When she shook her head he looked at her (or so she thought) rather intently, and inquired whether she knew where he had gone. She was glad to be able to say that she had no idea, but felt herself blushing. However, the Superintendent either did not notice this, or else he set no store by it, for he merely said that he expected he should find Randall at his flat, and went away with the Sergeant.
The Sergeant was in a thoughtful mood; and while they walked down the drive he did not speak. But at the gate he said: “Chief, I don't set myself up to know better than you, but when you let him go you could have knocked me down with a feather.”
“You know perfectly well I've no warrant for his arrest,” said Hannasyde.
“You didn't think to put a few questions to him?” ventured the Sergeant.
“Not then, or in that house. I'll see him in his own flat, where I trust we shall not be interrupted either by hysterical young men, or importunate matrons,” said Hannasyde a trifle grimly.
“Do you think he did it, Super?” inquired the Sergeant.