“I don’t possess any, no. But she did.”
“You know, I suppose, that she says she was upstairs sleeping at the time it happened.”
“I know,” said the veil contemptuously. “But she wasn’t.”
“Did you see her leave the house or sneak into the woods?”
“No.”
Wolfe sighed. “I was hoping perhaps you had. I understand you were out in a field picking black-eyed susans.”
“I was picking daisies.”
“All right, daisies. I haven’t seen a map of the grounds, so I wouldn’t know whether you could see the house or the border of the woods from where you were. Could you?”
“Not the house actually, on account of trees around it. Besides the woods skirting the hill, there are clumps of trees all around there. They shielded me — that is, they shielded the house from my view, and the woods too. The reason I made that slip of the tongue — I am accustomed to regard myself as being in need of shielding.” A long thin finger touched the edge of the veil.
“Of course. I wouldn’t call that a slip. From where you were could you hear all three of the gunshots?”