“You have all my most heartfelt sympathy, Miss Seymour,” I said. “I have ventured to come here to-day to see if I could be of any service to you.”
“Ah, what service can you render me, Mr Kemball, now that poor Guy is, alas! dead—dead!” she cried hoarsely, staring straight before her. “The inquest was held to-day. What have they decided?”
“That the poor fellow died of natural causes. He suffered from an unsuspected disease of the brain.”
“Ah, yes,” she sighed. “I expected they would say something like that. But—” and she broke off short without concluding her sentence.
“You dined with him only a few hours before,” I remarked; for I had gone there on purpose to question her, and I hardly knew how to commence, fearing lest, in my anxiety, I might blunder.
“Yes. Who would have thought that when I parted from him I should never see him again?”
“You left before the Vanes, did you not?”
“Yes. My father, just before eleven, told me that he was not feeling very well, so I ordered the car, and we came home, after a most delightful evening. The weather was bright, and everything had been done to perfection. On the way home Dad complained of bad pains in his head, and I became alarmed. Indeed, when we got here he seemed so very queer that I tried to persuade him to let me telephone for Doctor Redwood. But he would not hear of it. He begged me to go to bed, but I remained with him in the smoking-room until nearly three o’clock.”
“Until three o’clock?” I echoed. “And you did not leave him at all?”
“No. Because he seemed so very queer. I mixed him some brandy and water several times, and he tried to smoke, but could not.”