“That is so.”
“But after you’d become secretary to the Etna China Company I take it you saw Mr. Garlett constantly, he being managing director of the business?”
“Yes, I used to see him quite often—not every day, but on most days.” She nearly added—“Most of my work lay with Mr. Dodson,” but something made her refrain from even making that true statement of fact.
“Now, Miss Bower”—he waited for some seconds, while she remained silent—“I’m going to ask you a question which I fear will be very disagreeable to you. I cannot force you to answer it truly, but I advise you in your own interest to do so.”
She said nothing, and he went on:
“Did Mr. Garlett, during the month that elapsed between your coming to the works and his wife’s death, ever make any improper advances to you?”
Twice she opened her mouth to speak, and twice the one word “Never!” she wished to utter, would not come.
She was bitterly angered and shocked by the blunt question, and to the man who gazed into her now flushed and quivering face her silence proclaimed, if not her own guilt, then certainly that of the man who would soon be on his trial for murder.
Perhaps because he felt he had scored a great point he went on in a kindlier tone:
“I’m sorry to have to press you about this matter, but it is far better you should tell me now than have it dragged out of you when you are in the witness-box. I suppose I may take it, Miss Bower, that there were”—he hesitated, then brought out awkwardly the words—“love passages, no doubt of a comparatively harmless kind, between yourself and Mr. Garlett?”