Inez smiled.
“Anybody who had been at the inquest might have, I suppose; but as a matter of fact, the handsome but earnest Mr. Poole did.”
Ryland tried to jump up from the chair, but Inez pressed him gently back.
“Blast the fellow! Has he been bullying you again?” he said angrily.
“He hasn’t; I bullied him. He came to see you but I waylaid him. I . . .”
“But why should he . . .”
“Don’t interrupt, Ry; let me tell my simple story in my own old-fashioned way. Odd as it may seem, I wanted to know what had been happening today that had worried you so much. You didn’t tell me anything worth hearing so I went to the fons et origo mali and turned it on. It was a bit sticky—‘not at liberty to divulge’ and all that sort of eyewash—but it’s a nice young man really and responded to my womanly appeal—as one sister to another effect, you know.”
Ryland snorted.
“It’s quite all right, Ry; I didn’t vamp him—at least, not much. He told me what you seem to have told the Coroner, and pretty thin we both thought it. He naturally wanted to hear a bit more; that’s what he came here for—to put you through it—third degree—in quite a nice, gentlemanly sort of way. Well, knowing what sort of a Ryland my brother Ryland is, I thought I saw him getting a bit mule-headed and sticking his toes in and giving a general representation of a man who has got nothing good to tell and won’t tell it. So I told him to go off and apply third, fourth and even fifth degrees to the pantry boy while I asked you what it was really all about. You see, I start with the advantage of knowing that you are telling the truth, however thin it may sound, so I . . .”
“Inez, did you know that father wasn’t—wasn’t my father?”