‘Perhaps it was a bit of both,’ Fabian continued. ‘But I fancy Uncle Arthur did tackle her. Before I left him he said with that wheezy little laugh of his: “It takes a strong man to be a weak husband. Matrimonially speaking, a condition of perpetual apology is difficult to sustain. I’ve failed signally in the role.” I think I know what he meant, don’t you, Terry?’

‘I,’ said Terence. ‘Why do you ask me?’

‘Because unlike Ursy you were not blinded by Flossie’s splendours. You must have been able to look at them both objectively.’

‘I don’t think so,’ she said, but so quietly that perhaps only Alleyn heard her.

‘And he must have been attached to you, you know, because when he became ill, you were the one he wanted to see.’

As if answering some implied criticism in this, Douglas said: ‘I don’t know what we’d have done without Terry all through that time. She was marvellous.’

‘I know,’ said Fabian, still looking at her. ‘You see, Terry, I’ve often thought that of all of us you’re best equipped to look at the whole thing in perspective. Or are you?’

‘I wasn’t a relation,’ said Terence, ‘if that’s what you mean. I was an outsider, a paid employee.’

‘Put it that way if you like. What I meant was that in your case there were no emotional complications.’ He waited, and then, with a precise repetition of his former inflection, he added: ‘Or were there?’

‘How could there be? I don’t know what you want me to say. I’m no good at this kind of thing.’

‘Not much in our line, is it, Terry?’ said Douglas, instantly forming an alliance. ‘When it comes to all this messing about and holding post-mortems and wondering what everybody was thinking about everybody else, you and I are out of the picture, aren’t we?’

‘All right,’ said Fabian, ‘let’s put it to the authority. What do you say, Mr Alleyn? Is this admittedly ragged discussion a complete waste of time? Does it leave you precisely where you were with the police files? Or has it, if only in the remotest degree, helped you along the path towards a solution?’

‘It’s of interest,’ Alleyn replied. ‘It’s given me something that no amount of poring over the files could have produced.’

‘And my third question?’ Fabian persisted.

‘I can’t answer it,’ Alleyn rejoined gravely. ‘But I do hope, very much, that you’ll carry on with the discussion.’

‘There you are, Terry,’ said Fabian, ‘it’s up to you, you see.’

‘To do what?’

‘To carry forward the theme, to be sure. To tell us where we were wrong and why. To give us, without prejudice, your portrait of Flossie Rubrick.’

Again Fabian looked up at the painting. ‘You said you thought that blank affair up there was like her. Why?’