"My information is that you were seen coming away from the deceased's bedroom in your dressing-gown," he answered, at his most stolid.
He was startled by the sudden leap of flame into her eyes, the rush of colour to her cheeks. She was a dangerous piece of goods, and no mistake! he thought.
"My God, what does this house do to people? Who's been spying on me? Did I have a bloodstained dagger in my hand?"
He was shocked by her brutality, but although he was not an imaginative man, he thought he could readily picture her as a villainess in the kind of good oldfashioned melodrama you never seemed to see nowadays. He replied dampingly: "No, miss."
"You astonish me! Now tell me this: Was I seen coming out of my uncle's room? Was I?"
"Never mind asking me questions, miss, if you please! Did you go to your uncle's room after you had gone upstairs to change for dinner?"
"No, I didn't. I went to the door of his room, and no further."
"How was that, miss?"
She jerked up one shoulder. "He wouldn't let me in. I suppose he was dead."
"When you say he wouldn't let you in, what do you mean?"