“Did she see all these letters?”
“Not the telephone calls, sir. I 'ad put them on one side. But.... It's a little thing, sir.”
He paused and came a step nearer. “You see, sir,” he explained with the faintest flavour of the confidential softening his mechanical respect, “yesterday, when 'er ladyship was 'ere, sir, some one rang up on the telephone—”
“But you, Merkle—”
“Exactly, sir. But 'er ladyship said 'I'LL go to that, Merkle,' and just for a moment I couldn't exactly think 'ow I could manage it, sir, and there 'er ladyship was, at the telephone. What passed, sir, I couldn't 'ear. I 'eard her say, 'Any message?' And I FANCY, sir, I 'eard 'er say, 'I'm the 'ousemaid,' but that, sir, I think must have been a mistake, sir.”
“Must have been,” said Benham. “Certainly—must have been. And the call you think came from—?”
“There again, sir, I'm quite in the dark. But of course, sir, it's usually Mrs. Skelmersdale, sir. Just about her time in the afternoon. On an average, sir....”
7
“I went out of London to think about my life.”
It was manifest that Lady Marayne did not believe him.