“I did not touch that knife. If someone wanted to cast guilt on you—I don’t know why they’d do that. It wasn’t me.”

“It’ll be easy enough to find out,” Bill said. “Scotland Yard has a Fingerprint Bureau now, did you know that? Remarkable business. Everyone’s fingerprint is different, you see, and we leave them on whatever we touch. They’ve just convicted a murderer that way in Argentina. All the police have to do is check the hilt of the knife and compare the fingerprints left there to all of ours, and they’ll have the answer, with no room for debate. Unless you used gloves, Jack?”

Jack’s expression suggested he had not used gloves. “You’re lying,” he managed. “This is nonsense. Anyone could have touched the hilt. I could have, when I saw him—in fact, I’m sure I did.”

“You did not. I found Haworth’s body,” Bill said. “I was in there continuously until I locked the room, and I have had the key on me since. I will swear on oath that not one single person touched the knife after the body was found. You didn’t go near him.”

“And what’s your word worth when you already lied for Jimmy?” Jack flashed.

“More than yours, old man. I work in Whitehall for a bureau that doesn’t recruit idly, and I’m here on business. If your fingerprints are on that knife, you’ll have some explaining to do. If they aren’t, needless to say, you’ll be fine. Will you be fine?”

Jack’s mouth worked. He didn’t reply, and the silence damned him.

“Oh God,” Lady Anna said, high and shrill. “You killed him. You killed him and you came to me— Oh Christ!”

“I suppose we can’t give him a thrashing before the police arrive,” Jimmy said through his teeth.

“You will not do a damn thing,” Jack said, and withdrew his hand from his pocket, flicking out the blade of the straight razor he held. Victoria cried out. Fen took a shuddering intake of breath.

“Put it down,” Bill said. “You’ll only make things worse for yourself.”

“I don’t think so,” Jack said. “Now, Jimmy will order the motor-car warmed up while Merton goes and fetches me that knife. Miss Carruth and I are going take a trip out together, and none of you will stand in my way.”

He lifted the razor as he spoke, letting the blade flash in the sunlight. Fen’s eyes widened. And Pat took her hand from the deep pocket of her plain, practical dress, and with it the pearl-handled Harrington top-break revolver she’d carried there.

“Oh, Pat,” Fen said. “You are wonderful.”

Jack gaped. Pat extended her arm, levelling the gun at him. “Step away from her. If you think I’ll hesitate about pulling the trigger, you’re wrong.”