“What time was that?”

About two, he thought. It was storming hard by that time. He had telephoned for an ambulance, taken his bag, and gone to the corner. The woman was lying on the pavement, with one or two people with her. She was pretty badly hurt. He had done what he could, and then gone with the ambulance to the hospital.

“I stayed while they operated,” he said. “It’s my old hospital, Mount Hope. They all knew me.”

“At ten minutes to two you were in bed?”

“I was in bed when this fellow rang the bell. I opened a window and he called up to me.”

“You were undressed?”

Brooke grinned.

“I’ll say I was. I haven’t got much on now, under this suit.”

“You didn’t run into Mrs. Susie Fairbanks, at the garage at five minutes to two, and catch hold of her?”

He looked astounded.

“Good God, no! Why should I?”

But he lost some of his spontaneity after that. He was wary. He answered the routine questions more carefully, and at last the inspector shrugged and let him go. He was irritable, however.

“What’s the idea?” he said to Hilda grumpily. “That fellow knows something. Everybody around here knows something—except me. Even you, probably.” He looked at her keenly. “I wouldn’t put it past you, you know. You’ve held out on me before.”

“Only when I thought it was necessary,” she said, smiling up at him delicately.

But he had enough. He had had too much. He got up and banged the table.

“God damn it, Hilda,” he roared. “If I thought you have any pets around here and are protecting them, I’d—I’d turn you over my knee.”

Chapter 14

It was eight o’clock in the morning before they could rouse Eileen enough to be interviewed. Carlton, unshaven and still only partially dressed, was at the telephone trying to locate his sister. Susie had brought him a cup of coffee, but it sat untouched beside him.

“Hello. That you, Blanche? Sorry to bother you. Did Marian happen to tell you where she was going to stop while she’s away? It’s rather urgent.”

He would hang up after a minute or two, feverishly thumb the telephone book and commence all over again.

In the morning room Courtney Brooke was trying to comfort Jan, a Jan who lay face down on a long davenport and refused to be comforted. One of the curlers on the end of her long bob had come loose, and he sat turning the soft curl over a finger.

“Believe me, darling, it’s all right. You mustn’t go on like this. You break my heart, sweet.”

“Granny’s dead.” Her voice was smothered. “Nothing can change that.”

“It’s a bad business, Jan. I know that. Only try to face it as it is, not as you’re afraid it is. You’re not being fair. Even the police don’t condemn people until they have the facts.”

“I saw him. I spoke to him.” She turned over and sat up, her eyes wide with fear. “Now it will all come out, Court. She had it in the safe. She told me so. They’ll open it, and—then they’ll know.”