‘Well,’ said Jane slightly mollified, ‘that may be so. Anyway, he described this woman as tall and fair with big blue eyes and very good-looking, so I suppose it must have been near enough. He certainly had no suspicions. She sat down and began talking about his play and said she was anxious to do it. Whilst they were talking cocktails were brought in and Mr Faulkener had one as a matter of course. Well—that’s all he remembers—having this cocktail. When he woke up, or came to himself, or whatever you call it—he was lying out in the road, by the hedge, of course, so that there would be no danger of his being run over. He felt very queer and shaky—so much so that he just got up and staggered along the road not quite knowing where he was going. He said if he’d had his sense about him he’d have gone back to The Bungalow and tried to find out what had happened. But he felt just stupid and mazed and walked along without quite knowing what he was doing. He was just more or less coming to himself when the police arrested him.’

‘Why did the police arrest him?’ asked Dr Lloyd.

‘Oh! didn’t I tell you?’ said Jane opening her eyes very wide. ‘How very stupid I am. The burglary.’

‘You mentioned a burglary—but you didn’t say where or what or why,’ said Mrs Bantry.

‘Well, this bungalow—the one he went to, of course—it wasn’t mine at all. It belonged to a man whose name was—’

Again Jane furrowed her brows.

‘Do you want me to be godfather again?’ asked Sir Henry. ‘Pseudonyms supplied free of charge. Describe the tenant and I’ll do the naming.’

‘It was taken by a rich city man—a knight.’

‘Sir Herman Cohen,’ suggested Sir Henry.

‘That will do beautifully. He took it for a lady—she was the wife of an actor, and she was also an actress herself.’

‘We’ll call the actor Claud Leason,’ said Sir Henry, ‘and the lady would be known by her stage name, I suppose, so we’ll call her Miss Mary Kerr.’

‘I think you’re awfully clever,’ said Jane. ‘I don’t know how you think of these things so easily. Well, you see this was a sort of week-end cottage for Sir Herman—did you say Herman?—and the lady. And, of course, his wife knew nothing about it.’

‘Which is so often the case,’ said Sir Henry.

‘And he’d given this actress woman a good deal of jewellery including some very fine emeralds.’

‘Ah!’ said Dr Lloyd. ‘Now we’re getting at it.’

‘This jewellery was at the bungalow, just locked up in a jewel case. The police said it was very careless—anyone might have taken it.’

‘You see, Dolly,’ said Colonel Bantry. ‘What do I always tell you?’

‘Well, in my experience,’ said Mrs Bantry, ‘it’s always the people who are so dreadfully careful who lose things. I don’t lock mine up in a jewel case—I keep it in a drawer loose, under my stockings. I dare say if—what’s her name?—Mary Kerr had done the same, it would never have been stolen.’