"Certainly, sir!... And since I am not so stupid as you imagine, I can tell you now that I understand the drift of your questions, and can forestall them: Yes, all of these people--_my friends_!--have had opportunity to take the gun and the silencer from the cupboard since it was placed there last Sunday, if it _was_ placed there by Mrs. Selim.

But may I remind you, sir, that opportunity alone is not sufficient; that _motive_--"

"Since Mrs. Selim is dead, murdered by the weapon which was stolen, we can a.s.sume, Judge Marshall, that someone had motive," Dundee reminded him implacably, for in his mind there was no doubt that the ballistics expert would bear him out.

There was a heavy, throbbing silence. The group that, with the exception of Dexter Sprague, had been so united, so cemented with long-sustained friendship, again dissolved visibly before Dundee's eyes into eleven individuals, each shrinking into himself, mentally drawing away from any possible contamination with a murderer....

"You have said, Judge Marshall," Dundee went on at last, "that Miss Crain and Mr. Sprague were not at your home for target practice Sunday.

Has either of them been in your home during this past week?"

"Penny--Miss Crain--spent an evening with my wife when I was--er--away from home on business. That was last Tuesday, I believe--"

"Yes, it was Tuesday, Hugo," Penny Crain interrupted firmly. "And Karen can vouch for the fact that I did not go into the gun room."

"Don't be silly, Penny!" Carolyn Drake scolded, as if she had long been bursting to speak. "Giving an alibi! As if _any_ of us who were playing bridge while that woman was being shot _needs_ any alibi!... But I'll tell you what _I_ think, Mr. Detective! I think Nita herself stole the gun and the silencer, to kill Dexter Sprague with, and that _he_ stole it from her and murdered _her_! n.o.body else has the slightest sc.r.a.p of a motive, and that note he wrote her ought to be enough to hang him on!"

Dexter Sprague had struggled to his feet during the woman's hysterical attack, his face like chalk, his eyes blazing. But Dundee waved him aside peremptorily.

"One more question, Judge Marshall," he said suavely, as if he had not heard a word that Carolyn Drake had said. "You knew Mrs. Selim before her arrival in Hamilton with Mrs. Dunlap, I believe.... Just when and where did you meet her?"

CHAPTER ELEVEN

"You are d.a.m.ned impertinent, sir!" Judge Marshall shouted, the ends of his waxed grey mustache trembling with anger.

"Then I take it that you do not wish to divulge the circ.u.mstances of your friendship with Mrs. Selim?" Dundee asked.

"Friendship!" the old man snorted. "Your implications, sir, are dastardly! I met Mrs. Selim, or rather, Nita Leigh, as she was introduced to me, only once, several years ago when I was in New York.

Naturally--"

"Just a moment, Judge. You say she was introduced to you as Nita Leigh.

Then you knew her as an actress, I presume?"

"I refuse to submit to such a cowardly attack, sir!"

"_Attack_, Judge?" Dundee repeated with a.s.sumed astonishment. "I merely thought you might be able to shed a little light on the past of the woman who has been murdered here today, with a weapon you admit to having owned.... However--"

The elderly ex-judge stared at his tormentor for a moment as if murder was in his heart. He gasped twice, then suddenly his whole manner changed.

"I apologize, Dundee. You must realize how--But that is beside the point. I met Nita Leigh at--er--at a social gathering, arranged by some New York friends of mine. She was young, attractive, more refined than--er--than the average young woman in musical comedy. Naturally I told her if she was ever in Hamilton to look me up. And she did."

"And because she was 'more refined than the average young woman in musical comedy'--than the average chorus girl, to put it simply," Dundee took him up, "you co-operated with Mrs. Dunlap to introduce her to your most intimate friends--including your wife?"

"Oh, Hugo! Why didn't you tell me?" Karen Marshall wailed.

"You see, sir, what you are doing!" Judge Marshall stormed.

"I am truly sorry if I have distressed you, Mrs. Marshall," Dundee protested sincerely. "But--" He shrugged and turned again to the husband. "I understand you were Mrs. Selim's landlord.... May I ask how much rent she paid?"

"The house rents for one hundred dollars a month--furnished."

"And did Mrs. Selim pay her rent promptly?" Dundee persisted.

"Since this is the 24th of May, sir, Mrs. Selim's rent for June was not yet due."

Not before poor little Karen could Dundee force himself to ask what, inevitably, would have been his next question--one which could not have been evaded, as the ex-judge had evaded the other two questions: "_Is it not true, Judge Marshal, that Nita Leigh Selim paid you no rent at all?_" But there were other ways to find out....

"Look here, Dundee!" a brusque voice challenged, and the detective whirled to face Polly Beale. It was like her, he thought with a slight grin, to address him as one man to another....

"Yes, Miss Beale?"

"I'm no fool, and I don't think any of my friends here are either--though two or three of them have acted like it today," the masculine-looking girl stated flatly. "You've made it very plain that any one of us here, except the Sprague man, could have stolen Hugo's gun and silencer.... Has the gun been found?"

"It has not, Miss Beale."

"O. K.!" The queer girl snapped her fingers. "I move that you or Captain Strawn search the men for the weapon, and that I search the Women.... Wait!" she harshly stopped a flurry of feminine protests. "I'll ask you, Dundee, to search me first yourself. I believe the technical term is 'frisking,' isn't it?... Then 'frisk' me.... Here is my handbag.

I wore no coat, except this--" and she pointed to the jacket of her tweed suit.

As she strode toward the detective Clive Hammond sprang after her with an oath and a sharp command.

"Shut up, Clive! I'm not married to you yet!" she retorted, but her eyes were gentler than her voice.

His face burning with embarra.s.sment, Dundee went through the traditional gestures of police "frisking"--running his hands rapidly down the girl's tall, st.u.r.dy body, slapping her pockets. And his fingers fumbled sadly as he opened her tooled leather handbag.

"Satisfied?" Polly Beale demanded, and at Dundee's miserable nod, the girl faced her friends: "Well, come along, girls!"

"Lord! What a girl!" Dundee muttered to Strawn, as the young Amazon herded Flora Miles, Penny Crain, Karen Marshall, Carolyn Drake, Lois Dunlap and Janet Raymond into the dining room.

Silently, and almost meekly, as if shamed into submission by Polly Beale's example, John Drake, Tracey Miles, Clive Hammond, Judge Marshall, and Dexter Sprague permitted Captain Strawn and Sergeant Turner to search them.

"How about the guest closet and the cars?" Dundee asked of Strawn in a low voice, when the fruitless, unpleasant task was finished.

"Gone over with a fine tooth comb long ago," Strawn a.s.sured him gloomily. "And not a hiding place in or outside the house that the boys haven't poked into--including the meadow as far as anyone could throw from the bedroom window."

The women were filing back into the room, some pale, some flushed, but all able to look each other in the eye again.

With surprising jauntiness Polly Beale saluted Dundee. "Nothing more deadly on any of us than Flora's triple-deck compact."

"I thank you with all my heart, Miss Beale," Dundee said sincerely. "And now I think you may all go to your homes.... Of course you understand,"

he interrupted a chorus of relieved e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns, "that all of you will be wanted for the inquest, which will probably be held Monday."

"And what's more," Captain Strawn cut in, to show his authority, "I want all of you to hold yourselves ready for further questioning at any time."

There was a stampede for coats and hats, a rush for cars as if the house were on fire, or--Dundee reflected wryly--as if those he had tortured were afraid he would change his mind. Rushing away with hatred of him in their hearts....

Only Penny Crain held back, maneuvering for a chance to speak with him.