Polly looked swiftly at John Hale and then away. She was deadly white.
“Last week,” she began, “I had a letter from Austin in which he said that rumors had reached him of my infatuation for”—she stammered, then went bravely on—“for his stepfather, that if I permitted John to make love to me he would show him a letter I had written. It was a piece of sheer folly, but”—her voice trembled—“the letter was compromising. Austin stated that he kept the letter in a locket I had given him and would bring them both to Washington.”
“What followed?” asked Mrs. Hale, more absorbed in Polly’s tale than in all else.
“I wrote Austin that I did not fear his threat and broke our engagement.” The girl paused. “I have already told you that Austin wired he would be here Tuesday night. I heard that Mrs. Hale and John were going to the French Embassy, I knew that Mr. Hale was ill in bed, and so I came here that night on impulse, trusting to chance to see Austin alone and persuade him to destroy the letter. The murderer,” she shuddered, “has testified that I entered the house after he had killed Austin.” She turned abruptly to Judith. “What was your object in taking the locket?”
“My desire to shield you,” Judith answered. “Austin wrote me at the same time he did you, telling of the existence of such a letter, and that he carried it in a locket to have it in instant readiness. I had no idea that he would be here Tuesday night, and when I found his body as I started to leave the library, I jumped to the conclusion, Polly, that you had killed him and in terror had run away without securing the locket.”
“Would it not have been easier for you to have taken the watch and chain as well?” asked Richards.
“I feared that if the watch were missing search would be made for it,” she explained. “Whereas, if only Polly and I knew about the locket it would not be missed. I had Polly’s shears in my sewing bag, having picked them up when in Father’s den early Tuesday afternoon. I dropped them after securing the locket, and afterwards came down into the library to get them and found Joe talking to Coroner Penfield and Mr. Ferguson.”
“Polly,”—Robert Hale’s sudden pronouncement of her name made the girl start nervously—“why did you supply Austin with the combination of my safe?”
“I did not give it to him,” she denied indignantly.
“Indeed? Then why did you write this cryptic message, ‘Saw Austin-10-t-b-53-76c,’ over and over on a page of copied manuscript?” and Hale held out the sheet he had shown his brother earlier that day.