Hannasyde had been twirling a pencil between his fingers, but he put it down at this, and sat a little straighter in his chair. “Are you sure of that?” he asked, watching Giles closely.
“I've found two waiters, one commissionaire, and the leader of a dance-band to identify her photograph,” answered Giles. “One of the waiters volunteered the information that he had several times seen her with Arnold Vereker, who was an habitué of that particular restaurant. The commissionaire also said that he had seen her with Arnold. The leader of the dance-band did not know Arnold by name, but he recognised his photograph. In fact, he said instantly that he was the man who was with the most striking woman in the room that night. He's an intelligent fellow, that musician - I've got his name and address for you. He not only recognised both photographs, but he was able to state on what date he saw the originals. The locality - my dear Watson - was Ringly Halt, which, as you probably know, is a very popular road-house about twenty miles to the east of Hanborough. And the date (which was imprinted on my observant friend's memory by the coincidence of its having been the date on which his pianist strained his wrist and had to be replaced by a substitute) was June 17th.”
“Good - God!” said Hannasyde very slowly. “But - she never came into the case at all!”
“No,” agreed Giles. “And if she hadn't committed the second murder she never would have come into the case. She said she had never even set eyes on Arnold; both my cousins said it; and not a soul came forward to explode that fallacy. Moreover, no one ever would have come forward. None of my witnesses have any idea of her name, you see.
“But” - Hannasyde was trying to puzzle it out - “how did she meet him? And having met him, why did she keep it so dark? Do you suggest that she set out to become acquainted with him with the idea of murder in mind? It's almost incredible!”
“No, I don't think she did. From what I've seen of her I imagine she started with the intention of getting Arnold to marry her. But when it came to marriage Arnold was very wary. He would never be caught by a girl of her type. I've no doubt it didn't take her long to realise that. She's acute, though not clever. And then she planned to get rid of him.”
“What made you suspect her in the first place?”
Giles reflected. “I don't think I know. It first occurred to me when Roger was killed, but it seemed wildly improbable. Then I made an excuse to call on her, and it struck me - perhaps I was already suspicious - that she was a little too anxious to convince me that she had an alibi for that evening. That might have been my imagination, of course, but it was enough to make me go back over everything I knew about her, and add it up, and find what the total was. To start with, I knew she was a gold-digger. My cousins were continually pointing that out to her. Also, I saw her setting her cap at Roger in a highly determined manner. She thinks more of money than anything else; that was always evident. To go on with, I learned from Kenneth (I think you were present too) that she was a close student of every kind of detective fiction. In itself that didn't mean anything, but added to the rest it seemed to me to mean quite a lot. Thirdly, Kenneth went to call on her on the night of Arnold's murder - and she was out.” He paused. “Little things like that - not much in themselves. Also the fact that she was obviously not in love with Kenneth. I could never imagine why she got engaged to him. I remembered, too, that Miss Vereker had told me, quite light-heartedly, that Violet had always been in the habit of picking up well-to-do men in hotel lounges, and that sort of thing. Then came Roger's death. You didn't know it, of course - how should you? - but she did a thing that evening that seemed to me stupid, and curiously unlike her. At the last moment she told Kenneth Vereker that she wouldn't go with him to that ball. She put his back up so badly that he at once rang up Miss Rivers, and invited her to go in Violet's stead. At the time I was merely surprised that Violet had handled him so clumsily - for the attitude she had adopted was that it would be indecent for either of them to appear at such a function. Now I think that she did it on purpose to ensure Kenneth's going to the ball, and thus providing himself with an alibi. She meant Roger's death to look like a suicide, and it was she who launched the theory that he was in a state of nerves on account of the police. That was one of the most suspicious things she did, I thought. The first murder had been so perfectly planned, and was so successful, that it went to her head. She's a conceited young woman, you know, and she ran away with the idea that if you could fool people once you could fool them any number of times.”
Hannasyde nodded. “Very often the way.”
“So I believe. Well, she was perfectly confident she could stage a convincing suicide, but in case of accidents she took care to provide herself with some sort of an alibi. Actually, it wasn't an alibi at all, but it might have worked if she hadn't made her fatal mistake.”