“Yes, she didn’t notice it was gone until after—after—”
“I see. Well, Miss Mertoun, I’ll let you know in case anyone mentions such a thing.”
“Oh, thank you. But don’t say I told you.”
The straggling procession into the breakfast-room was not merely a subdued but even a sorry lot. Dismay and hunger both had been at work on most of us. Few, I believe, had slept. I myself had, but it was a sleep tossed and pulled by past and future. Food, however, worked its customary melioration, and when at ten o’clock we were summoned to meet Salt in the conservatory, scarcely anyone looked the worse for the mental battering of the day before. I suppose Crofts Pendleton was actually the hardest hit.
It transpired that Salt had already been about the grounds, rain-infested as they were. Insulated in rubber, he had examined the site of Cosgrove’s death, seen the canvas-covered axe, and made a tour of the immediate environs of the house. Already, too, he had concluded an intensive search in Cosgrove’s room and among his belongings, and to that room the unlucky Irishman’s body had lately been conveyed, which relieved some of the gloom in the Hall of the Moth. Now, with the Coroner of few words seated beside him, the Superintendent stood watchfully in the sinus of the piano while we filed into the undertakers’ Elysium. The servants were already standing hangdog along the wall.
“I’ll have to interview each of you separately, ladies and gentlemen,” Salt announced. “But I must really get acquainted a bit with you first, and have your names down. So, if you please, I’ll just ask each of you in turn to tell who you are and what brought you—I mean what association you’ve had with Mr. Pendleton here.”
At this moment Blenkinson took the centre of the stage without a cue. “If I may hinterpose, sir, I ’ave in my pocket a very comprehensive document, I may call it, which will simplify your task considerably.”
“What’s that, for God’s sake?” exclaimed Crofts.
I am sure that the butler never had so many heads looking at him before, but with the coolest air he produced from his tail-pocket a sheaf of papers, and smoothed them lovingly.
Blenkinson was balancing a pince-nez on the bridge of his nose. “With your permission, sir, I will read. Hm! Hrrum!” He teed off and began.