When they reached police headquarters, she had to run to keep up with the florid policeman as he pulled her up the stone steps. They walked endless corridors, gray and gloomy, until they emerged into a small, dim room.
A man in a tweed coat, who smoked a pipe and spoke suavely, stepped from the group of men in street clothes.
"Did you kill them?" he asked. "Don't be afraid to tell me. I only want to know if you killed them."
She nodded. "Certainly I did it."
He took her purse from the uniformed policeman and removed the gun. "But why, tell me. Were you jealous of Alice, perhaps?" His pipe jumped as he smiled confidentially.
"Certainly not!" she said. "I did it to save the human race from suicide."
The men smiled, amused.
"Lock her up until we decide," the man in tweed instructed the florid policeman. He gave her the purse, minus the gun.
A bony, disapproving matron led her to a cell and locked her into it. Amanda requested pencil and paper.