“If you are suggesting that Tony Summers almost died, probably passed out, in the bathtub, then we have to look at who would want to implicate Belinda,” I said. “If he’d been found floating in his bath, dead, it could have been perceived as an accident and certainly hard to prove it was murder, so the killer would have got away with it easily. Why risk taking him the length of the hall and stabbing him on Belinda’s bed if not to involve her in the crime? Until now we have thought that somebody specifically wanted to kill Tony Summers, but what if that person equally wanted to kill Belinda Warburton-Stoke?”

“And who might come to mind, in your opinion?”

“The only person who had means and motive is his wife, Rose,” I said, and I told him about the strange confession that Tony wanted to kill her, my own encounter on the cliff top and the gleam in her eye when she said she was now a rich widow.

DI Watt nodded. “Certainly she’d have had the best chance of catching him unawares in his bath, but why would she dislike Miss Warburton-Stoke? You said yourself that she hadn’t seen you since childhood, didn’t you?”

“I can’t think, Detective Inspector,” Belinda said. “Unless I was the privileged one and she was the servant’s child and that had always rankled.”

“Or she might be off her head, sir,” the sergeant suggested. It was the first time he had spoken and he blushed scarlet when we all looked at him. “Perhaps she enjoys killing people. Some do, don’t they?”

“Not many, in my experience,” the inspector replied. “In the cases I’ve followed there has been a compelling reason for murder—fear or greed or vengeance. Not many people kill for the sport.”

“In any case, Inspector,” I said, “I take it this means that my friend is no longer your prime suspect and is free to go?”

He scratched his nose, considering this. “I suppose I have to say that she would no longer be our prime suspect, Lady Georgiana, given the facts that have been discussed this morning. However, this case is far from solved. I am willing to release her from custody at this moment but I don’t want her leaving the vicinity for the time being. Is that clear?”

“Oh yes, Inspector,” Belinda said. “And anything we can do to help?”

“I think it might be better if you don’t go near Trewoma while we are conducting our inquiries,” he said hastily. “Let’s hope that the lady breaks down and confesses or someone at that house knows something, because frankly this whole thing still is a long way from making sense to me.”

Chapter 30

OCTOBER 20

IN AND AROUND TRURO