But Miss Cornelia seemed to have no great patience with her dejection.
“One of two things will happen now,” she said, with acrid, logic. “Either the Doctor’s an honest man—in which case, as coroner, he will hand that paper to the detective—” Dale gasped. “Or he is not an honest man,” went on Miss Cornelia, “and he will keep it for himself. I don’t think he’s an honest man.”
The frank expression of her distrust seemed to calm her a little. She resumed her interrogation of Dale more gently.
“Now, let’s be clear about this. Had Richard Fleming ascertained that there was a concealed room in this house?”
“He was starting up to it!” said Dale in the voice of a ghost, remembering.
“Just what did you tell him?”
“That I believed there was a Hidden Room in the house—and that the money from the Union Bank might be in it.”
Again, for the millionth time, indeed it seemed to her, she reviewed the circumstances of the crime.
“Could anyone have overheard?” asked Miss Cornelia.
The question had rung in Dale’s ears ever since she had come to her senses after the firing of the shot and seen Fleming’s body stark on the floor of the alcove.