“No—no!” she exclaimed. “I can’t believe——”
“Quite immaterial what you believe,” said Blick, with well-assumed indifference. “We know it! Now, Mrs. Tretheroe, all this pretended concern of yours about von Eckhardstein’s being lost through some accident is all pretence! I tell you we know things. Now, you haven’t been candid with us up to now, and you’re running into serious danger. Out with it, Mrs. Tretheroe! You know very well that von Eckhardstein left your house at a late hour the other night—intentionally? Where is he now?”
He waited with secret impatience, doubting even then if his fish would rise. But Mrs. Tretheroe, after an almost terrified glance at the Chief Constable’s stern face, spoke, faintly.
“I believe—in Paris!”
“How did he get away from here?” demanded Blick.
“He waited till all was quiet, then walked across to Carfant, and got a motor-car to run him along the coast-road to Newhaven, to catch the early morning boat for Dieppe.”
“Why did he go away like that?”
“He said,” answered Mrs. Tretheroe, in a very low voice, “because he didn’t want to be mixed up in the sordid details of a vulgar murder, and he’d go across to the Continent until you’d got the real man and the thing was settled.”
Blick got up, and silently motioned his companion to follow. Mrs. Tretheroe rose, too, white and trembling.
“You—you don’t think he killed Guy?” she whispered. “You surely don’t say he did?”