“Setting that aside, sir,” said Harbottle obstinately, “I never saw a young lady less like a murderess!”
“Pray, is it your experience, Inspector, that murderesses—or, for that matter, murderers—look the part? It is my belief that Miss Warrenby is a very clever young woman.”
“Well, now, that's highly interesting,” said Hemingway. “Because I'm bound to say she doesn't give that impression.”
Mr. Drybeck uttered a shrill little laugh. “I've no doubt she impressed you as a woman overcome by the death of a dear relation. Bunkum, Chief Inspector! Bosh and bunkum! She talks as if Warrenby rescued her from destitution when she was a child. You may as well know that she has only lived with him for rather less than three years. He offered her a home when her mother died, and she accepted it, although I happen to know that she has a small income of her own, and was certainly of an age to earn her own living. No doubt she had her reasons for preferring to take up the position of an unpaid housekeeper and hostess in her uncle's house. Indeed, one is tempted to say that one now sees she had! If rumour does not lie, she has lately become attracted by a young Pole, who rides about the country on a noisy motor-cycle. I need scarcely say that the popular theory in the village is that this man is the guilty party. My own belief is that such a theory will not hold water. If it is true that the young man went to Fox House at the hour stated, I find it impossible to believe that he can have waited until twenty minutes past seven before shooting Warrenby. Consider! The house contained none but Warrenby himself; not only the front-door, but the windows on the ground-floor also, stood open. Why, then, did this man wait until Warrenby stepped into the garden?”
“Why indeed?” said Hemingway.
“The trained mind, therefore rejects the theory,” said Mr. Drybeck, rejecting it. “Consider again! Let us follow Miss Warrenby's own story step by step!”
“Well, if it's all the same to you, sir, I've done that twice already today and though I'm sure it's highly instructive—”
“She leaves The Cedars alone, and by the garden-gate,” pursued Mr. Drybeck, disregarding the interruption, and stabbing an accusing finger at Hemingway. “In spite of the fact that during the course of the afternoon she repeatedly told us of her qualms at leaving her uncle alone, she remained on at The Cedars after all the other guests, with the single exception of Mrs. Cliburn, had left. She thus makes sure that she will not meet any of the party on her way home. She states that she climbed the stile into the lane, and entered Fox House through the front gate. It may have been so, but I incline, myself, to the belief that she approached the house from the rear. A hedge separates its grounds from the footpath that runs between them and the spinney attached to The Cedars: not, you will agree, an insuperable obstacle! In this way she is able to abstract her uncle's rifle from the house without his knowing that she had in fact returned from the tennis-party. No doubt she regained the footpath by the same route, having ascertained that her uncle was conveniently seated in the garden. Then, and then only does she cross the stile.”
“Always supposing her uncle happened to have a rifle,” interpolated Hemingway. “Of course, if he didn't, it upsets your theory a bit. Did he?”
“I am not in a position to say whether he had a rifle or not,” said Mr. Drybeck testily. “A .22 rifle is a very ordinary weapon to find in a country house!”