“The fact is,” I went on, cutting short his excitement, “that Sir Philip Clevedon was murdered, and”—I paused a moment or two so that I might get the full effect—“there is a warrant out for your arrest.”
“Murdered!” he echoed. “Arrest!”
“Well,” Pepster interrupted slowly. “I wouldn’t say arrest. The police are interested—you see, your absence seemed to require—”
“And where the devil do you come into the picture?” the new Sir William demanded.
“I—oh, I am the police,” Pepster retorted.
“But, surely,” Kitty said haltingly, “Mr. Trevor has proved—Billy was in London on the night of the 23rd—an alibi—”
“There can be no alibi in a poison case,” I returned gravely. “The crime is committed, not when the victim dies but when the poison is placed—wherever it is placed. For example, if I were to put prussic acid now in some whisky which you were to drink next Sunday, I might go off to Paris, or be on the high seas far off enough, anyway, when you drink the whisky, but I should still be guilty of—”
“Is that the story?” Billy broke in. “Did I put prussic acid in Philip’s whisky? Come, we’ll get back to Cartordale. I am Sir William and White Towers belongs to me. I’m going to take possession. And if anyone thinks I killed Sir Philip, well, let them prove it and be damned to them.”
He broke off with an angry laugh and stood facing us. His lovely little bride thrust her hand through his arm.
“Yes,” she said, in that musical voice of hers that had charmed huge crowds on two continents, “let them prove it and—be damned to them!”