‘Yes, I can,’ said Tuppence. ‘I can rub my hands together when I’m pleased. That’s quite enough to get on with. I hope you’re going to take plaster casts of footprints?’
Tommy was reduced to silence. Having collected the corkscrew they went round to the garage, got out the car and started for Wimbledon.
The Laurels was a big house. It ran somewhat to gables and turrets, had an air of being very newly painted and was surrounded with neat flower beds filled with scarlet geraniums.
A tall man with a close-cropped white moustache, and an exaggeratedly martial bearing opened the door before Tommy had time to ring.
‘I’ve been looking out for you,’ he explained fussily. ‘Mr Blunt, is it not? I am Colonel Kingston Bruce. Will you come into my study?’
He let them into a small room at the back of the house.
‘Young St Vincent was telling me wonderful things about your firm. I’ve noticed your advertisements myself. This guaranteed twenty-four hours’ service of yours – a marvellous notion. That’s exactly what I need.’
Inwardly anathematising Tuppence for her irresponsibility in inventing this brilliant detail, Tommy replied: ‘Just so, Colonel.’
‘The whole thing is most distressing, sir, most distressing.’
‘Perhaps you would kindly give me the facts,’ said Tommy, with a hint of impatience.
‘Certainly I will – at once. We have at the present moment staying with us a very old and dear friend of ours, Lady Laura Barton. Daughter of the late Earl of Carrowway. The present earl, her brother, made a striking speech in the House of Lords the other day. As I say, she is an old and dear friend of ours. Some American friends of mine who have just come over, the Hamilton Betts, were most anxious to meet her. “Nothing easier,” I said. “She is staying with me now. Come down for the weekend.” You know what Americans are about titles, Mr Blunt.’
‘And others beside Americans sometimes, Colonel Kingston Bruce.’
‘Alas! only too true, my dear sir. Nothing I hate more than a snob. Well, as I was saying, the Betts came down for the weekend. Last night – we were playing bridge at the time – the clasp of a pendant Mrs Hamilton Betts was wearing broke, so she took it off and laid it down on a small table, meaning to take it upstairs with her when she went. This, however, she forgot to do. I must explain, Mr Blunt, that the pendant consisted of two small diamond wings, and a big pink pearl depending from them. The pendant was found this morning lying where Mrs Betts had left it, but the pearl, a pearl of enormous value, had been wrenched off.’
‘Who found the pendant?’
‘The parlourmaid – Gladys Hill.’
‘Any reason to suspect her?’
‘She has been with us some years, and we have always found her perfectly honest. But, of course, one never knows –’
‘Exactly. Will you describe your staff, and also tell me who was present at dinner last night?’
‘There is the cook – she has been with us only two months, but then she would have no occasion to go near the drawing-room – the same applies to the kitchenmaid. Then there is the housemaid, Alice Cummings. She also has been with us for some years. And Lady Laura’s maid, of course. She is French.’
Colonel Kingston Bruce looked very impressive as he said this. Tommy, unaffected by the revelation of the maid’s nationality, said: ‘Exactly. And the party at dinner?’
‘Mr and Mrs Betts, ourselves – my wife and daughter – and Lady Laura. Young St Vincent was dining with us, and Mr Rennie looked in after dinner for a while.’
‘Who is Mr Rennie?’
‘A most pestilential fellow – an arrant socialist. Good looking, of course, and with a certain specious power of argument. But a man, I don’t mind telling you, whom I wouldn’t trust a yard. A dangerous sort of fellow.’
‘In fact,’ said Tommy drily, ‘it is Mr Rennie whom you suspect?’
‘I do, Mr Blunt. I’m sure, holding the views he does, that he can have no principles whatsoever. What could have been easier for him than to have quietly wrenched off the pearl at a moment when we were all absorbed in our game? There were several absorbing moments – a redoubled no trump hand, I remember, and also a painful argument when my wife had the misfortune to revoke.’
‘Quite so,’ said Tommy. ‘I should just like to know one thing – what is Mrs Betts’s attitude in all this?’
‘She wanted me to call in the police,’ said Colonel Kingston Bruce reluctantly. ‘That is, when we had searched everywhere in case the pearl had only dropped off.’
‘But you dissuaded her?’
‘I was very averse to the idea of publicity and my wife and daughter backed me up. Then my wife remembered young St Vincent speaking about your firm at dinner last night – and the twenty-four hours’ special service.’
‘Yes,’ said Tommy, with a heavy heart.
‘You see, in any case, no harm will be done. If we call in the police tomorrow, it can be supposed that we thought the jewel merely lost and were hunting for it. By the way, nobody has been allowed to leave the house this morning.’
‘Except your daughter, of course,’ said Tuppence, speaking for the first time.
‘Except my daughter,’ agreed the Colonel. ‘She volunteered at once to go and put the case before you.’
Tommy rose.
‘We will do our best to give you satisfaction, Colonel,’ he said. ‘I should like to see the drawing-room, and the table on which the pendant was laid down. I should also like to ask Mrs Betts a few questions. After that, I will interview the servants – or rather my assistant, Miss Robinson, will do so.’
He felt his nerve quailing before the terrors of questioning the servants.
Colonel Kingston Bruce threw open the door and led them across the hall. As he did so, a remark came to them clearly through the open door of the room they were approaching and the voice that uttered it was that of the girl who had come to see them that morning.
‘You know perfectly well, Mother,’ she was saying, ‘that she did bring home a teaspoon in her muff.’
In another minute they were being introduced to Mrs Kingston Bruce, a plaintive lady with a languid manner. Miss Kingston Bruce acknowledged their presence with a short inclination of the head. Her face was more sullen than ever.
Mrs Kingston Bruce was voluble.
‘– but I know who I think took it,’ she ended. ‘That dreadful socialist young man. He loves the Russians and the Germans and hates the English – what else can you expect?’
‘He never touched it,’ said Miss Kingston Bruce fiercely. ‘I was watching him – all the time. I couldn’t have failed to see if he had.’
She looked at them defiantly with her chin up.
Tommy created a diversion by asking for an interview with Mrs Betts. When Mrs Kingston Bruce had departed accompanied by her husband and daughter to find Mrs Betts, he whistled thoughtfully.
‘I wonder,’ he said gently, ‘who it was who had a teaspoon in her muff?’
‘Just what I was thinking,’ replied Tuppence.
Mrs Betts, followed by her husband, burst into the room. She was a big woman with a determined voice. Mr Hamilton Betts looked dyspeptic and subdued.
‘I understand, Mr Blunt, that you are a private inquiry agent, and one who hustles things through at a great rate?’
‘Hustle,’