‘Certainly, Mr Alleyn,’ said Miss Harris crisply. ‘Dorothea Violet Harris. Address—town or country?’

‘Both, please.’

‘Town: fifty-seven Ebury Mews, S.W. Country: The Rectory, Barbicon-Bramley, Bucks.’ She glanced at Fox. ‘B-a-r-b-i-’

‘Thank you, miss, I think I’ve got it,’ said Fox.

‘Now, Miss Harris,’ Alleyn began, ‘I wonder if you can give me any help at all in this business.’

To his tense astonishment Miss Harris at once opened her pad on which he could see a column of shorthand hieroglyphics. She drew out from her bosom on a spring extension a pair of rimless pince-nez. She placed them on her nose and waited with composure for Alleyn’s next remark.

He said: ‘Have you some notes there, Miss Harris?’

‘Yes, Mr Alleyn. I saw Miss O’Brien just now and she told me you would be requiring any information I could give about Lord Gospell’s movements last night and this morning. I thought it better to prepare what I have to say. So I just jotted down one or two little memos.’

‘Admirable! Let’s have ’em.’

Miss Harris cleared her throat.

‘At about twelve-thirty,’ she began in an incisive monotone, ‘I met Lord Robert Gospell in the hall. I was speaking to Miss O’Brien. He asked me to dance with him later in the evening. I remained in the hall until a quarter to one. I happened to glance at my watch. I then went downstairs to top landing. Remained there. Period of time unknown but I went down to the ballroom landing before one-thirty. Lord Gospell—I mean Lord Robert Gospell—then asked me to dance.’

Miss Harris’s voice stopped for a moment. She moved her writing-pad on the arm of her chair.

‘We danced,’ she continued. ‘Three successive dances with repeats. Lord Robert introduced me to several of his friends and then he took me into the buffet on the street-level. We drank champagne. He then remembered that he had promised to dance with the Duchess of Dorminster—’ Here Miss Harris appeared to lose her place for a moment. She repeated: ‘Had promised to dance with the Duchess of Dorminster,’ and cleared her throat again. ‘He took me to the ballroom and asked me for the next Viennese waltz. I remained in the ballroom. Lord Robert danced with the Duchess and then with Miss Agatha Troy, the portrait painter, and then with two ladies whose names I do not know. Not at once, of course,’ said Miss Harris in parenthesis. ‘That would be ridiculous. I still remained in the ballroom. The band played the ‘Blue Danube.’ Lord Robert was standing in a group of his friends close to where I sat. He saw me. We danced the ‘Blue Danube’ together and revisited the buffet. I noticed the time. I had intended leaving much earlier and was surprised to find that it was nearly three o’clock. So I stayed till the end.’