“I couldn’t of stood it much longer, sir, reely I couldn’t! And ever since you stopped that great brute of a sergeant from popping it across me, sir, I’ve been tryin’ to make up me mind to tell you.” He paused as if expecting an answer; but getting none, plunged on. “I wasn’t upstairs all the time that night, like I said I was at the inquest!” Again he paused.
Anthony went on smoking. Here, if he wanted the story quickly, silence was best.
Belford swallowed hard. His face, as he went on speaking, turned from muddy gray to dead white.
“I—I come downstairs, sir, after I’d finished in the master’s room. And when I got to the ’all I heard old Poole starting on one of them sneezin’ fits. And—and, sir, I went into the study and I saw the master lyin’ there on the rug—just like they found ’im! And—and I shut that door behind me quick—old Pooley was still coughin’ and chokin’ his head off—and I nipped back up the stairs, sir. It’s God’s truth, sir! It is——”
This time the pause was so long that Anthony knew speech necessary.
“Are you trying to explain,” he said, “that though you did go into the study that night you didn’t have anything to do with the murder?”
“Yes, sir, yes.” The man’s eagerness was pathetic. “That’s just it, sir! I didn’t have nothink to do with it, sir, nothink! So ’elp me God!”
“What did you go into the room for?” Anthony shot out the question. “Must’ve been for something you didn’t want found out or Poole’s hay-fever wouldn’t have been so important to you?” The logic, he knew, was faulty. But the thrust told.
Belford hung his head. “Yes, sir, it was what you say. I thought—one of the girls told me—the master was in the billiard-room. And I knew as ’e always kept money somewhere in the study. I was goin’ to pin—steal it if I could. I was desprit, sir. Desprit!”
Anthony was puzzled. “But if you came out without stealing anything, why didn’t you rouse the house when you saw Mr. Hoode was dead?”