“I know that because of my lapses of memory and my muddled brain I am not believed,” she said. “But I tell you that poor Mr Willard was killed—murdered, and that the identity of the culprits is known to me as well as to old Mr Homfray, the rector of Little Farncombe.”
“Ah! That is most interesting,” remarked the doctor, humouring her as he would a child. “And who, pray, was this Mr Willard?”
“Mr Willard was engaged to be married to me!” she said in a hard voice. “He lived in a house in Hyde Park Square, in London, a house which his father had left him, and he also had a pretty seaside house near Cromer. But he was blackmailed by that adventuress, your friend, Mrs Crisp, and when at last he decided to unmask and prosecute the woman and her friends he was one morning found dead in very mysterious circumstances. At first it was believed that he had committed suicide, but on investigation it was found that such was not the case. He had been killed by some secret and subtle means which puzzled and baffled the police. The murder is still an unsolved mystery.”
“And you know the identity of the person whom you allege killed your lover—eh?” asked the doctor with interest.
“Yes, I do. And so does Mr Homfray.”
“Then why have neither of you given information to the police?” asked the visitor seriously.
“Because of certain reasons—reasons known to old Mr Homfray.”
“This Mr Homfray is your friend, I take it?”
“He is a clergyman, and he is my friend,” was her reply. Then suddenly she added: “But why should I tell you this when you yourself are a friend of the woman Crisp, and of Gordon Gray?”
“My dear young lady,” he exclaimed, laughing, “you are really making a very great error. To my knowledge I have never seen you before I passed this house last evening, and as for this Mrs Crisp, I have never even heard of her! Yet what you tell me concerning Hugh Willard is certainly of great interest.”