“Who is Mr. Thoyne?” I asked. “My cousin said nothing about him. Is he suspected also?”
“Why,” he responded, with a queer laugh, “you might guess again and get farther off.”
“Do you mean he did it?” I asked.
“I don’t mean anything,” he replied cautiously, and then he added, “It was Mr. Thoyne who sent me here.”
“But why did he do that?” I demanded. “So that the police would—think things?”
“If you didn’t do it you were a fool to quit,” Stillman said.
“Yes, I was a fool, that’s plain enough,” Tulmin muttered, with an unpleasant sort of laugh. “Thoyne’s had me for a fool.”
He reached out his hand for some more whisky, which Stillman supplied.
“I see now,” Tulmin went on, almost as if talking to himself, “that was why Thoyne offered me a job and was so anxious to get me away. Yes, and then he almost pushed me off that blasted yacht of his, and told me to come to London and wait for him. I see his game. He wanted me out of the way, so they’d think—but I didn’t do it, though I know who did.”
I did not allow so much as an eyelid to quiver. If Tulmin stopped talking now I might never get him again.