MURDER MYSTERY Boxed Set – Dorothy Fielding Edition (12 Detective Cases in One Edition). Dorothy Fielding

I! I hadn't the shadow of an idea that she was there until I ran into Miss Eden by chance. She told me of Mrs. Tangye's having seen me and my companion. And of her having looked terribly upset. I pooh-poohed the idea that she should mind. Naturally it wasn't what I should have chosen. But a flower-show! After all a flower-show I Second to being seen at a picture gallery I should have thought. Miss Eden, however, warned me that my wife was terribly upset. I didn't believe her. But I decided it might be as well not to linger. A meeting might have been most awkward. So the lady and I left. Next day came the quarrel. I think that's the circle complete!"

      Pointer thought a moment.

      "And how did you get hold of Mrs. Tangye's keys?"

      "Miss Saunders handed them to me. While we were in the car driving to Vardon's. I must have been ass enough to drop them in his rooms when I tried to open a book-case. I don't remember what became of them, so I suppose I left them lying on his table. You see, at the time I thought them of no importance. Then came the discovery of that missing, or rather unentered-money. I confess I thought that Miss Saunders had taken it, and only handed me the half. 'Pon my word, I hoped as much. I wish to Heaven she could be jailed, but I suppose there's no chance of that?"

      Pointer did not enter into that pious hope. There was a little silence.

      "I want to say one thing more." Tangye spoke very earnestly. "I want to say it solemnly you're making a mistake, Chief Inspector. There's no crime here. Mrs. Tangye fired that shot herself. That I swear."

      "And that I believe," Wilmot said simply.

      "Firmly?" asked Haviland.

      "I have intervals of doubt," Wilmot confessed, "but I find myself always swinging back to my original, and your original, belief."

      "You found the French windows open?" Pointer asked their host.

      "Ajar. Since learning of your suspicions of foul play I've searched my mind most anxiously, and there wasn't a footprint or any sign of disturbance as of any one else having been in the room," Tangye said, very thoughtfully. "My wife's chair was out of sight, back in the alcove hidden by that screen, but the other chair was in full view. Even the cushion on it was all plump and smooth. No sign of any one having sat in it."

      There was a pause.

      "Miss Saunders cleaned the door of the safe after opening it, I suppose?"

      "Trust her!"

      "And, since we are clearing up these various details, what became of the Lux camera you took with you to Tunbridge on Sunday?"

      Tangye seemed bewildered.

      "Lux camera? Oh—h—? I left it at the orchid show. Lost it. It was a present to the lady who was with me. I was carrying it for her and showing her how to use it, when she caught sight of some friends and went off to speak to them; I stayed behind trying it on some plants. That was when Miss Eden ran into me. I put it down beside us on the rustic bench we sat on to talk, and forgot the damned thing. It was never wanted again. Mrs. Bligh seemed to have lost all her interest in photography when I saw her next, and told her that I had just discovered what I must have done. I was thankful to be spared making any inquiries down at the show. Naturally, after Mrs. Tangye's death, the very name sickened me."

      Pointer had had his own inquiries made since learning from Mrs. Bligh's maid of the camera's disappearance. It had not been seen. If Tangye's story was true, some one had "annexed" it.

      "There's one other thing I wish to say," Tangye said as his guests rose to go. "I have withdrawn all opposition to the probating of that will that Mrs. Tangye signed the Monday before she died."

      "You think it's genuine?" Haviland frowned. He did not.

      "I always held that Vardon had a right to the land. As to the money—I have no wish to hand over the sum in question to the lawyers. Vardon agrees to leave it in my firm. They would not," was the laconic reply.

      "And your wife's notice of withdrawal of her funds?" Tangye's face darkened. "A cursed unfair and vindictive thing of her to want to do. I can't understand it. Except that the poor girl really was off her head."

      "You knew of the notice?"

      "Stewart gave me the note when you telephoned him for an interview. Lest you should ask...I destroyed it."

      Tangye still looked black. Evidently he had not forgiven his wife for that letter. Pointer thought that its existence had gone far to make Tangye take her death as he had done. There was a short silence in the police car that Pointer was driving.

      "Vardon's luck seems too good to last," Haviland spoke crossly. "And that's a fact! First he gets the fifteen hundred pounds handed him and no questions asked. Then a will is found on him giving him ten thousand in cash and close on that in land—and still no questions to be asked."

      "It does make one wonder!"

      "Whether he is Tangye's friend and accomplice?" mused Wilmot. "I've never had so fascinating a problem to ponder. No murder, I still think. Yes, in spite of the great Hart discovery. At least I think I think so. But there certainly is an intricate shadow-dance here, which is vastly interesting."

      "Quite apart from the rest of his story, I shouldn't wonder if Mrs. Tangye might not have told Tangye the truth about meeting Hart on Sunday, if it hadn't been for seeing Mrs. Bligh with him down at Tunbridge." The Chief Inspector had been pursuing his own thoughts.

      "You speak as though an assumption were the same as a fact," Wilmot's tone had something of bewilderment in it, "you assume Hart's still alive. Without a shred of evidence to back that assumption you go on to imagine him as having been at Tunbridge on Sunday, and at Riverview, Monday and Tuesday. My dear chap, you can't expect a logical mind to assume so much. You might equally well argue that Headly père was not really dead, and that it was him she saw, and so on..."

      "But if Hart's Vardon, Mr. Wilmot, then he becomes a fact," Haviland pointed out, as he got down at his police station. He wondered why the other two laughed.