But Tish paid no attention to him whatever. So far as she was concerned he might not have been there.
“With a little cinnamon toast, too, Aggie,” she said. “I’m about famished.”
“She’s brazen!” cried Will. “She’s insane! Where is Emmie, Tish Carberry?”
She looked at him as if she saw him for the first time.
“Oh, Emmie!” she said. “Well, that’s a long story. Now, Aggie, do I get tea, or do I not?”
Well, they were obliged to wait, for it was clear she would tell them nothing until she was ready. They had to lock Will in a room until she had had it, however, and, although the men who had been digging in the cellar had stopped work, they still held onto their spades. They were certain they would have to dig somewhere.
But at last she had finished, and they brought Will down again and confronted her with him again. She gave him a long, hard look, and then she smiled.
“You’re a fool, Will Hartford,” she said calmly, “and your poor helpless Emmie knows it. That’s why she’s helpless.”
“I know a murderess when I see one,” said Will.
“As to her being helpless,” Tish went on inexorably, “let me tell you that, in spite of her total paralysis, she placed herself where you will find her, and has since remained there of her own free will.”