“All I know is what was printed in the newspapers,” Renard explained. “I would like to learn the truth of the case—the real facts. And you are in charge of the case, I was told. So I come to you.”
Flamborough, after a moment's hesitation, gave him an outline of the bungalow tragedy, softening some of the details and omitting anything which he thought it undesirable to make public. Renard listened, with an occasional nervous twitch which showed that his imagination was at work, clothing the bare bones of the Inspector's narrative with flesh.
“It is a bad business,” he said, shaking his head mournfully as Flamborough concluded. “To think that such a thing should have happened just when she had had her great stroke of good-fortune! It is incredible, the irony of Fate.”
The Inspector pricked up his ears.
“She'd had a piece of good luck, lately, you say, Mr. Renard? What was that?”
“You do not know?” the little man inquired in surprise. “But surely her husband must have told you? No?”
Flamborough shook his head.
“That is strange,” Renard continued. “I do not quite understand that. My sister was the favourite of her aunt. She was down in her will, you understand? And my aunt was a very wealthy woman. Pots of money, as you English say. For some time my aunt has been in feeble health. She has been going downhill for the last year or more. A heart trouble, you understand. And just a fortnight ago, puff!—she went out like that. Like a blown-out candle.”
“Yes?” the Inspector prompted.
“Her will was in the keeping of her lawyer and he communicated the contents to myself and my sister. We were trustees, you see. I had a little bequest to myself; but the principal sum went to my sister. I was surprised; I had not thought that my aunt had so much money—mostly in American stocks and shares. In your English money it came to about £12,000. In francs, of course, it is colossal—a million and a half at least.”