"Why, sir, he's nothing but a soft old fool!" protested his Sergeant "I've met his sort many times!"
"That's what he wanted you to think," said Hemingway. "What you're forgetting is that he's been an actor. Now, I know a bit about the stage. In fact, I know I lot about it. Joseph can tell me all he likes about playing Hamlet, and Othello, and Romeo: I don't believe him, and what's more, I never did. He's got Character-part written all over him. He was the poor old father who couldn't pay the rent in The Wicked Baron, or What Happened to Girls in the 'Eighties; he was the butler in about half a hundred comedies; he was the First Gravedigger in Hamlet; he was -"
"All right, I get it!" the Sergeant said hurriedly.
"And if I'm not much mistaken," pursued Hemingway, "his most successful role was that of the kind old uncle in a melodrama entitled Christmas at Lexham Manor, or Who Killed Nat Herriard? I'm bound to say it's a most talented performance."
"I don't see how you make that out, sir, really I don't! If he'd got his brother to make a will leaving everything to him, there might be some grounds for suspecting him. But he didn't: he got him to leave his money to Stephen Herriard."
"That's where he was cleverer than what you seem to be, my lad. In spite of having started life in a solicitor's office, he forgot the little formality of providing witnesses to see that will signed. You don't need to know much about law to know you've got to have the signature to a will properly witnessed. You heard Miss Herriard telling me that he also forgot to put in some clause or other. What she meant was an Attestation Clause. That meant that the witnesses to the will would have to swear to Nathaniel's having signed it in their presence before it was admitted to probate. So if Stephen didn't get convicted of the murder, Joseph had still got a trump-card up his sleeve. In due course, by which I mean when the case had been nicely packed up one way or another, it would transpire that the will wasn't in order after all."
"Yes, but it didn't transpire in due course," objected the Sergeant. "It transpired today, and the case isn't anything like packed up."
"No," said Hemingway. "It isn't. I told you I had a hunch things had been happening just a bit too quickly for someone. Kind Uncle Joseph hadn't reckoned with the Lord High Everything Else. For some reason, which I haven't yet had time to discover, something brought the matter up, and Sturry blew the gaff. I don't fancy Joseph wanted that at all. He wouldn't like Sturry cutting in ahead of his cue."
The Sergeant scratched his head. "It sounds plausible, the way you tell it, sir, but I'd say it was too cunning for a chap like Joseph Herriard."
"That's because you think he's just a ham actor with a heart of gold. What you ought to bear in mind is the possibility that he's a darned good actor, without any heart at all. You go back over all we've heard about this Christmas party! You picked up plenty of stuff from the servants yourself."