AUSTIN’S THEORY
“If I hadn’t turned up just at that very moment, I believe Grace would have died on the doorstep. I hope there’s not another woman in the world would have behaved so abominably as Mrs. Armitage; but it is just like her. I never could imagine how she came to have such a daughter as Grace! But of course she takes after her father—the professor’s a dear. But what a life the pair of them have had with that horrid little creature!”
Winnie Winston spoke in an emphatic undertone, for the walls of the Chelsea flat were thin, and in the adjoining room Grace was in bed, worn out and fast asleep.
Winnie had insisted on administering hot soup and a full dose of aspirin, and sat beside the exhausted girl, holding her hand, stroking her aching forehead, cherishing her with all womanly endearments, till, between them, she and Mother Nature, and the beneficent drug brought blessed sleep and oblivion to the tortured brain and heart.
Then Winnie stole away, and presently, as he so often did, Austin Starr turned up, to whom she poured out her indignation at Mrs. Armitage’s callous conduct.
“I always guessed she could be a holy terror if she chose. Though she has always been mighty civil to me,” said Austin.
“Of course. She always is to men, and most of them think she’s an angel. Why, she made a dead set at Roger when they first knew him, and was furious when she found he wasn’t taking any, and that it was Grace he was in love with. She’s been sniffy with them both ever since—mean little cat! What do you suppose she said to Grace at the very last moment before she went to the church the other day?”
“Something sweet and maternal,” suggested Austin sarcastically.
“I don’t think! She came into Grace’s room, preening herself like a canary—the first time she’d been near her to my knowledge, and I got there pretty early to help Grace dress. Mrs. Armitage just looked her up and down and said, ‘Really, Grace, you look like a corpse; white never did suit you. Hadn’t you better make up a bit?’ I could have shaken her! And when there was that dreadful delay at the church she never even came through to the vestry with us, but was only fussing and fuming because the Rawsons hadn’t come. While now, if you please, she’s made up her nasty little mind that Roger is guilty and is going to be hanged, and had the fiendish cruelty to blurt it out to Grace the moment she arrived. It was enough to kill her!”
“Sure,” conceded Austin gravely. “I’m not making any excuse for Mrs. Armitage—her conduct was just abominable—but we’ve got to face facts, Miss Winnie; and the great fact is that I’m afraid a good few people are of the same opinion.”
Winnie sprang up, a passionate figure, and pointed an accusing forefinger at him.
“Austin Starr, you don’t dare to sit there and tell me that you believe your friend Roger Carling is a murderer!”
His clever, good-tempered face—a face that inspired confidence in most people—betrayed embarrassment, distress, perplexity; his silence infuriated Winnie.
“Answer me!” she ejaculated in an imperative whisper, emphasized by a stamp of her foot.
“No, I do not,” he said slowly. “I never will. But the case is very black against him, and there’s a lot of excuse for the people who do think it.”
She gave a little sigh of relief.
“I’m glad you don’t, anyhow; for if you did I’d never willingly speak to you again.”
Austin rose, and stood beside her, looking down earnestly at her charming, animated face.
“I’d give my right hand, I’d give ten years of my life at its best—Winnie, I’d give everything dearest to me in the world except the hope of winning you—to be able to clear Roger Carling from this charge,” he said slowly.
For weeks, for months she had known in her heart that Austin Starr loved her, had known too that she loved him, but never before had he spoken like this, never had there been any sentimental passages between them, only a beautiful frank friendship, that after all is the very best foundation on which a man and a woman can build the love that lasts!
And now—though how it came about neither of them could have said—her hands were in his, he drew her, unresisting to his arms, and their lips met for the first time.
A wonderful moment for them both, when, without another word, he knew his hope was fulfilled—that he had already won her. It was excusable that, for a few moments, they almost forgot those other hapless lovers, their nearest friends, now so tragically parted. Yet they soon remembered and resumed counsel, with just one little difference that meant a lot to them—that whereas before they had sat facing each other, one each side the fire-place, they were now side by side.
“Can’t you do anything to bring light on it all, Austin?” she asked.
He passed his hand perplexedly over his sleek hair.
“I mean to do everything I can, dear, but——”
“Haven’t you any theory?”
“I’ve had quite a lot, and tried to follow them up, but they won’t wash—not one. I felt mighty uneasy when I found Lady Rawson had been to your old maestro’s flat and that Roger had followed her there.”
“Did he! When did you find that out?”
“The same night, just after Snell, the detective, came here, and asked so many questions. I went straight to the flat.”
“You never told me!”
“I never told anyone; but I soon found that Snell knew all about it too, and as he kept silence so did I. Though what I couldn’t make out was why Roger went on her track like that, when he had so little time to spare. It was an utter mystery till I got the clue when the news came through about those secret papers, and I went straight to Sir Robert and saw him. It was he who sent it; Snell must have known it all the time and suppressed it—never gave even me a hint.”
“Then you wrote the ‘interview’? I thought so. Did Sir Robert say anything else? What does he think?”
“That’s the worst of it. He is absolutely convinced that his wife was murdered by Roger, and is implacable against him. That’s not to be wondered at, with the poor thing still lying dead in that great, silent house. The funeral is to-morrow, and as I can’t go to both, I shall go there instead of to the court to hear the case opened against Roger.”
“Oh, Austin, why? It would be a comfort to him and to Grace too, to have you there!”
“Yes, but I’ve a queer sort of feeling that at the funeral I may get some clue that would be of value. I can’t explain it, but there it is. And anyhow the case will surely be adjourned to-morrow. They can’t do anything else. It was terrible to see Sir Robert to-day. He is making a wonderful recovery physically, and was sitting up in a wheel-chair, though he’s paralysed in the lower limbs, and I doubt if he’ll ever walk again. But his brain is clear enough, and his animus against Roger is simply awful. The queer thing is that he acknowledges that those papers were of such supreme importance that—well honestly, I gathered the impression that if anyone but his own wife had been murdered in order to recover them he’d have considered the crime justifiable and tried to hush it up. The things we’re most up against are that Roger undoubtedly was there on the scene, and that he was the one person concerned who knew the contents of the papers and was most interested in getting them back to Sir Robert. You and I, and poor Mrs. Carling herself, are certain he did not commit the murder—just because we know him. But the question is—Who did?”
“It’s curious that the maestro should be mixed up in it,” mused Winnie.
“Have you seen him since?”
“No, there was no reason why I should.”
“I have, and Boris Melikoff too—this afternoon. I remembered him—Melikoff—when I saw him again. I met him here some months back, in the summer.”
She nodded.
“That Sunday night, when he sang so divinely. It’s the only time I’ve seen him. A handsome boy, but there’s something queer and unbalanced about him, though I believe the maestro cares for him more than for anyone else alive. Grace was here that night, too—not Roger; it was when he was abroad with the Rawsons. Why, Austin, could it have been him, Melikoff—in jealousy? I could imagine him doing anything!”
Starr shook his head.
“No. He’s ruled out personally. He was down at Birmingham. But I’m going to cultivate him assiduously, and, if possible, his compatriots who forgather with him at Cacciola’s and elsewhere. I believe that’s the direction in which the truth will be found. Snell doesn’t. He is sure he’s got a clear, straightforward case, and that his duty’s finished!”
Winnie frowned thoughtfully.
“You think Lady Rawson and Boris were members of a secret society?”
“Sure!”
“And that one of them watched, and followed, and killed her?”
“Possibly.”
“Then why didn’t he keep the papers?”
“That’s the snag. But suppose he or she—it might have been a woman—didn’t want the papers, that it was a personal vendetta? That’s the line I mean to follow now.”
“It sounds quite likely,” she agreed. “How clever of you, Austin. But how are you going to set about it?”
“Can’t say yet, dear. I must feel my way somehow.”
“Perhaps something fresh and helpful will come out in court to-morrow,” said Winnie hopefully.