The meal over, Margaret was given the one comfortable chair, Hastings sat on the table, and Anthony leaned against the mantelpiece.
“Now, my children,” he said, “I have congratulated you, I have filled your stomachs. To work. What of the crowner’s quest?”
“Adjourned till three-thirty,” said Hastings, “when, after a quarter of an hour’s cosy talk, they’ll bring in a red-hot verdict of willful murder aganst the hulking private secretary. We needn’t go back, I think. There’s one of our men there. He’ll take the rest of the report; and it’s all over except the shouting.”
Anthony nodded. “No, you needn’t stay.”
“I,” said Margaret, “don’t think the secretary had anything to do with it. Not with those sort of eyes—he couldn’t.”
Hastings guffawed.
“I agree with you, Miss Warren,” Anthony said. “And it was the eyes which made me think that way.”
Hastings exploded. “Oh! I say! But——”
“Quiet, dog!” Anthony waved him to silence. “I am Richard on the Spot. The case is mine, and I say that Archibald Deacon’s a non-starter. Children, I am about to question you. Make ready.”
Hastings cast his smile. Margaret produced a notebook.