“Take Case No. 2, then: A double suicide. What about that?”
“These lovers’ suicide-pacts aren't uncommon,” the Inspector admitted. “That might be near the truth. And I suppose he might have put a bullet through her head before shooting himself, just in case the poison hadn't worked.”
He drew a notebook from his pocket.
“Just a moment, sir. I want to make a note to remind me to see about young Hassendean's pistol license, if he had one. I think he must have had. I found a box and a half of ammunition in one of the drawers when I was searching the house after you'd gone.”
Sir Clinton paused while the Inspector made his jotting.
“Now we can take the third case,” he continued, as Flamborough closed his pocket-book. “It implies that Mrs. Silverdale was deliberately poisoned and that young Hassendean was shot to death intentionally, either by her before she died or by some third party.”
“Three of them seems more likely than two,” the Inspector suggested. “There's the man who opened the window to be fitted in somewhere, you know, and there were signs of a struggle, too.”
“Quite true, Inspector. I suppose you can fit the shot in Mrs. Silverdale's head into the scheme also?”
Flamborough shook his head without offering any verbal comment on the question.
“Then we'll take Case 4,” the Chief Constable pursued. “Mrs. Silverdale deliberately poisoned herself, and young Hassendean came by his end accidentally. In other words, he was shot by either Mrs. Silverdale or by a third party—because I doubt if a man could shoot himself twice over by accident.”