Geoffrey hesitated, and then flung round on his heel and strode to the door. As he opened it Harding spoke again. "Oh, just one moment! Did the Chief Constable warn you that it would be necessary for the safe in your father's study to be opened in my presence?"
"Yes, he did, and Father's lawyer is coming down tomorrow," snapped Geoffrey, and walked out, banging the door behind him.
Inspector Harding gazed meditatively after him. He said, without turning his head: "You looked at me once I think, Sergeant. What was it?"
"Well, sir, I couldn't help thinking that for Mr. Billington-Smith to say the General was a joke to him was a very different tale from any I ever heard. It didn't seem to me that you could very well rely on anything he said. What I should call a mighty bad witness, sir."
"Atrocious," said Harding.
The Sergeant coughed behind his hand. "Begging your pardon, sir, I thought you was a bit high-handed with him — if I might pass the remark. If he had happened to object to the question he took exception to I couldn't help wondering where we'd have been then."
"We should have apologised gracefully, Sergeant. But if I hadn't bullied him a little I should have got nothing out of him at all. A tiresome young gentleman."
"Yes, sir. And it's a weak story he told you."
"A very weak story," said Harding.
"He's what you might call hasty-tempered too," pondered the Sergeant. "Very excitable, he seemed."