As they left the room, Landis smiled back with real sympathy at the rather wan young lawyer, which served to modify Graham’s opinion of his cold-bloodedness.
Out in the hall the detectives looked at each other.
“Anita!” rumbled Bernard softly. “She told us she ran through the hall after the gong sounded and after Susan screamed! She may have done it, Landis! She knew where Miss Mount would be at that time. Joel had shown her the cross-bow in his den. She had every opportunity!”
“Her own father!”
“There’s everything to hint that she hated him!”
“Did she shoot Graham, too?” Landis demanded.
“Don’t forget that he was in the library Sunday night and overheard her quarrel with her father. Maybe she figured that he knew too much about her affairs. There’s nothing but her word to prove that she was in her room last night, when Graham was shot! Miss Mount was downstairs as before. It’s just a step from Anita’s room to Miss Mount’s, where the shot came from! And this time Graham wasn’t across the hall to hear her running feet!”
“It’s possible,” Landis admitted thoughtfully. “Anything is possible, damn it! Only, in that case, the rope makes no sense, nor the thread!”
“Planted, Landis! Planted afterwards! Anita and Allen may have planned the murder between them. Maybe he told the truth when he said he didn’t shoot Harrison. But he knows who did! He may have suggested the cross-bow scheme, may have tried it out on the third floor and planted the bit of feather on Stimson. When the trail got so hot the other night, they may have taken the precaution to hide the rope and thread in Miss Mount’s room and make that nail-hole in the reception-room window. Everybody knows that she was just lowering that window when Harrison was killed and again when Graham was shot. Anita and Allen strike me as a pretty shrewd pair—plenty shrewd enough to plant misleading clues. The cross-bow would leave marks on Miss Mount’s desk if Anita steadied it on the desk. The marks are in front only. They may have suggested the rope and thread idea. The girl’s a confirmed liar!”