"If that means me, don't worry! I told you he wasn't, when you asked me."
"But isn't he?" asked Vicky anxiously.
"Definitely not. If you want the truth, I did rather wonder if he was going to be, at one time, because I like him tremendously. Only, since all this happened - I can't explain, but I know he isn't. We don't think on the same lines. You probably think I'm very dull and serious minded, and I dare say I am, for I can't see any humour in the present situation, and, frankly, it annoys me when I hear Hugh being thoroughly flippant about it."
"Well, it means nothing to me," said Vicky. "He's fusty, and dusty, and he doesn't think I'm a great actress. In fact, I practically abominate him, and I shouldn't in the least mind if the Inspector suddenly started to suspect him of being the murderer."
Fortunately for Mr. Hugh Dering, the Inspector had not yet started to suspect him of anything worse than a pronounced partiality for his chief tormentor. The Inspector's suspicions were still equally divided between the only five people who appeared to have any motive for having killed Wally Carter. Of these, young Baker, whom he interviewed at Burntside after leaving Palings, seemed to be the least likely, and Robert Steel the most probable suspect.
The Inspector, returning to Fritton a little while after five o'clock, said that he knew Baker's type well, and that his knowledge of psychology informed him that loudvoiced young men who stood upon soap-boxes and inveighed against the existing rules of society were not potential murderers. Sergeant Wake, who had a prosaic mind, said: "To my way of thinking, the fact of its having been Carter's own rifle pretty well rules him out. It doesn't seem to me that he could have got hold of it, let alone have carried it off on his motor-bike, which is what you'd think he must have done, if he stole it on the Saturday evening."
But a day spent by the Sergeant and his underlings in searching for circumstances or witnesses either to disprove or to corroborate the stories told by Prince Varasashvili and Robert Steel, had been unsuccessful enough to cast him into a mood of pessimism. "The case looked straightforward enough when we started on it, but the conclusion I've come to is that the man who did this murder laid his plans a sight more carefully than we gave him credit for."
"Yes," said the Inspector cheerfully, "he certainly knew his onions. It's a pleasure to deal with him. You keep right on pursuing investigations into Steel and the Prince. You'll maybe get something sooner or later." He looked at Superintendent Small, who had joined the conference. "Am I right in thinking Mr. Silent Steel's wellliked in these parts?"
"I never heard anyone speak ill of him," replied Small. "He's not one to throw his weight about, mind you, and he doesn't belong to the real gentry, but they all seem to like him well enough."
"That's what I thought. Everyone likes him, and everyone knows he's been hanging round the fair Ermyntrude these two years, and nobody means to give him away if he can help it."