Jean’s lip quivered. She felt as if, in spite of his brave words, he was beginning to believe that he was confronted with an unfathomable mystery.
“Sir Harold and I are old friends,” went on the detective with a queer smile. “Thanks to me, a murderer Sir Harold was bent on getting off was hung. So there’s no love lost between us! Still, he’s a tower of strength with a jury—makes them see black’s white, so to speak.”
“Do you think that will be necessary?” she asked in a trembling voice.
“I think Sir Harold will start some queer theory of his own—such as that the poor lady may have poisoned herself.”
“That won’t be the truth,” said Jean.
“And when you are in the witness-box it will be very pleasant for you, Miss Bower—very pleasant, I mean, that Sir Harold will be with you, and not against you.”
“Mr. Garlett means to go into the box,” said Jean quickly.
“I know he does,” said the other, “and I’m sorry for it. It’s an unfair thing that any man now standing on trial for his life has to go into the box or be considered guilty! Why, it’s a monstrous thing in a way. Those who changed the law never thought it would be like that.”
“I don’t understand,” she exclaimed, bewildered. “Why shouldn’t he go into the box?”
“Because, Miss Bower, he’ll be up against people very much cleverer than himself, if you’ll forgive me for saying so—people, too, who’ll be keen and resourceful, while he’ll be nervous and dejected. Now take one thing”—he looked at her hard, hesitated in his own mind, then determined that he would go through with what he felt ought to be said—“Mr. Garlett will be asked when he first began to feel for you those—well—sentiments that led to his asking you to be his wife? If he is an absolutely honest man I expect he will feel compelled to answer that he was attached to you long before anybody else knew that he was. That will look pretty bad from our point of view. Motive, Miss Bower—that’s what judge, jury, everybody in a word, is always looking for in a murder mystery. And you would provide a very strong motive—if you take my meaning.”