The first grey daylight had found Sir Ralph Fairfield pacing his
sitting-room with uneven strides, his hands clasped behind his back, the
stump of a cold cigar between his teeth. His interview with Heldon Foyle
had not been calculated to calm him.
"I'm a fool--a fool," he told himself. "Why should they suspect me? What
have I to gain by Grell's death?"
It was the attitude of a man trying to convince himself. There was one
reason why he might be supposed to wish his friend out of the way, but
he dared not even shape the thought. There was one person who might
guess, and it was she whose lips he hoped to seal. A quick dread came to
him. Suppose the police had already gone to her. The thought stung him
to action. He had not even removed his hat and coat since his return
from Grosvenor Gardens. He made his way to the street and walked briskly
along until he sighted a taxicab.
"507 Berkeley Square," he told the driver.
It was a surprised footman who opened the door of the Duke of Burghley's
house. Fairfield, at the man's look of astonishment, remembered that he
was unshaven, and that his clothes had been thrown on haphazard. It was
a queer thought to intrude at such a time. But he was usually a
scrupulously dressed man, and the triviality worried him.
"Lady Eileen Meredith. I must see her at once," he said peremptorily.
"Don't stand staring at me, man. You know me."
The footman coughed apologetically.
"Yes, Sir Ralph. Lady Eileen is not up yet. If it is important I can get
a maid to call her. Shall I tell his Grace?"
"No. It is of the utmost importance that I see her personally
immediately."
Sir Ralph breathed a sigh of relief as he was ushered into the cool
morning room and the door closed behind him. At all events, the police
had not seen her yet. He was first. That meant he would have to break
the news to her. How would she take it?
"The poor little girl!" he muttered to himself. And then the door
clicked.
Eileen Meredith stood there, a pink dressing-gown enveloping her
graceful figure from shoulders to feet. There was questioning wonder in
her grey eyes as she extended her hand, but no alarm. He almost wished
there was. It would have made things easier.
"You, Sir Ralph?" she cried. "What has brought you here so early? Has
Bob repented of his bargain and sent you to call it off at the last
moment?"
The man fumbled for words. Now that he was face to face with her the
phrase he had so laboriously worked out to lead up to the news had
deserted him. He pushed a chair towards her.
"Er--won't you sit down?" he said awkwardly.
He was striving for an opening. Both words and tone called the girl's
direct attention to the haggard face, the feverish eyes. Her fears were
alight on the instant. She regarded him with parted lips and gripped
his arm impulsively.
"Something has happened!" she cried apprehensively. "Why do you look
like that? What is it?" Her voice rose and she tried to shake the silent
man. "Answer--why don't you answer? Is he ill--dead?"
Sir Ralph choked over his reply.
"He was killed last night--murdered."
It was out at last. He had blundered clumsily, and he knew it. The
colour drained from Eileen's face and she stood rigid as a statue for a
moment. Then slowly she swayed forward. He stretched out his arms to
prevent her from falling. She waved him aside dumbly and tottered to a
couch. His directness had been more merciful than he had thought. She
was stunned, dazed by her calamity. Her very silence frightened the man.
She sat bolt upright, her hand resting limply in her lap and her dull
eyes staring into vacancy. A tiny clock on the mantelpiece ticked
loudly.
"Dead!" she whispered at last. There was no trace of unsteadiness in her
voice and her eyes were dry. She spoke mechanically. "And it is our
wedding-day! Dead! Bob is dead?"
Her hair had fallen about her shoulders, and, beautiful in her grief,
she inspired the man with almost supernatural awe. He had moved to the
mantelpiece and, resting an arm upon it and one foot upon the fender,
remained looking down upon her. He was waiting until the first numbness
of the shock had passed. The little clock on the mantelpiece had ticked
out ten minutes ere she spoke again. But her voice was pitched in more
natural tones, and her face had regained something of its colour.
"How did it happen?"
Haltingly he gave such details as he knew. Her eyes were fixed on his
face as he narrated his story. He hesitated as he referred to his
telephone conversation with her. In her clear eyes he saw challenging
scorn and stopped abruptly.
"You say that Bob asked you to lie to me?" she demanded.
"Not to you in particular. To any one who rang up. I couldn't know
whether he wished his instructions to apply to you."
"No, no, of course not," she interposed quickly, but with a tightening
of the heart he recognised the bitterness of her tone. For all her soft
daintiness, there was something of the tigress in Eileen Meredith.
The man she loved was dead. Well, she would have her vengeance--somehow,
on some one. She was ready to suspect without thinking. And Sir Ralph
Fairfield had laid himself open to suspicion.
"He was killed before eleven," she went on remorselessly, "and you told
me he was in the club with you at that time."
"You don't believe me." He held out his arms to her imploringly, and
then dropped them to his side. "I give you my word that everything I
have told you is true. Why should I lie now?"
She wheeled on him passionately.
"You ask me that?" she said tensely. "You who thought he was in your
way--that what you could not gain while he was living you might take
when he was dead. Do you think your smooth-faced hypocrisy deceives me
now? You pretended to accept your dismissal, pretended to be still my
friend--and his."
Her anger disconcerted the man more than her anguish had done. His
breath caught sharply.
"You don't realise what you are saying," he said, speaking calmly with
an effort. "Because I once loved you--love you still if you will--before
ever Robert Grell came into your life, you hint an unthinkable thing."
She crossed the room in a graceful swirl of draperies, and laid a finger
on the bell. Her features were set. She was in no state to weigh the
justice or injustice of the implied accusation she had made. And the
man, for his part, felt his oppression brushed away by anger at her
readiness to judge him.
"We shall see whether the police believe it unthinkable," she said
coldly.
A servant tapped discreetly and opened the door.
"Show this person out," she said.
Sir Ralph bowed mechanically. There was nothing more to be said. He knew
that in her present condition an appeal to her to suppress the story of
the telephone message would be worse than useless. As he passed down the
steps and into the street, a man sauntered idly a dozen yards behind
him. And thirty yards behind that man was another whom the baronet might
have recognised as Chief Detective-Inspector Green--had he seen him.
Within the house a girl, no longer upheld by the strength of passionate
denunciation, had collapsed on a couch, a huddled heap of draperies,
sobbing as though her heart would break.