"Well," said Horace, dropping into a chair, "he's gone!"

"Who?" said Lady Margaret.

"Robin," answered the boy, "and I must say he took it very well ..."

"You don't mean to tell me, Horace," said his mother, "that you have actually sent Robin Greve away ...?"

Mary Trevert put her hand on her mother's arm.

"I wished it, Mother. I asked Horace to send him away ..."

"But, my dear," protested Lady Margaret.

Mary interrupted her impatiently.

"Robin Greve was impossible here. I had to ask him to go. I suppose he can come back if ... if they want him for the inquest ..."

Lady Margaret was looking at her daughter in a puzzled way. She was a woman of the world and had brought her daughter up to be a woman of the world. She knew that Mary was not impulsive by nature. She knew that there was a wealth of good sense behind those steady eyes.

In response to a look from his mother, Horace got up and left the room.

"Mary, dear," said the older woman, "don't you think you are making a mistake?"

The girl turned away, one slim shoe tapping restlessly against the bra.s.s rail of the fireplace.

"My dear," her mother went on, "remember I have known Robin Greve all his life. His father, the Admiral, was a very old friend of mine. He was the very personification of honour. Robin is very fond of you ... no, he has told me nothing, but I _know_. Don't you think it is rather hard on an old friend to turn him away just when you most want him?"

There was a heightened colour in the girl's face as she turned and looked her mother in the face.

"Robin has not behaved like a friend, Mother," she answered. "He knows more than he pretends about ... about this. And he lets me find out things from the servants when he ought to have told me himself. If he is suspected of having said something to Hartley which made him do this dreadful thing, he has only himself to thank. I _did_ try to shield him--before I knew. But I'm not going to do so any more. If he stays I shall have the police suspecting me all the time. And I owe something to Hartley ..."

Her mother sighed a soft little sigh. She said nothing. She was a very wise woman.

"Robin left me to go to the library ... I am sure of that ..." Mary went on breathlessly.

"Why?" her mother asked.

The girl hesitated.

Then she said slowly:

"You and I have always been good pals, Mother, so I may as well tell you. Robin had just asked me to marry him. So I told him I was engaged to Hartley. He went on in the most awful way, and said that I was selling myself and that I would not be the first girl that Hartley had kept ..."

She broke off and raised her hands to her face. Then she put her elbows on the mantel-shelf and burst into tears.

"Oh, it was hateful," she sobbed.

Her mother put her arm round her soothingly.

"Well, my dear," she said, "Robin was always fond of you, and I dare say it was a shock to him. When men feel like that about a girl they generally say things they don't mean ..."

Mary Trevert straightened herself up and dropped her hands to her side.

She faced her mother, the tear-drops glistening on her long lashes.

"He meant it, every word of it. And he was perfectly right. I _was_ selling myself, and you know I was, Mother. Do you think we can go on for ever like this, living on credit and dodging tradesmen? I meant to marry Hartley and stick to him. But I never thought ... I never guessed ... that Robin ..."

"I know, my dear," her mother interposed, "I know. Perhaps it doesn't sound a very proper thing to say in the circ.u.mstances, but now that poor Hartley is gone, there is no reason whatsoever why you and Robin ..."

The Treverts were a hot-tempered race. Lady Margaret's unfinished sentence seemed to infuriate the girl.

"Do you think I'd marry Robin Greve as long as I thought he knew the mystery of Hartley's death!" she cried pa.s.sionately. "I was willing to give up my self-respect once to save us from ruin, but I won't do it again. I'm not surprised to find you thinking I am ready to marry Robin and live happy ever after on poor Hartley's money. But I've not sunk so low as that! If you ever mention this to me again, Mother, I promise you I'll go away and never come back!"

"My dear child," temporized Lady Margaret, eyebrows raised in protest at this outburst, "of course, it shall be as you wish. I only thought ..."

But Mary Trevert was not listening. She leant on the mantel-shelf, her dark head in her hands, and she murmured:

"The tragedy of it! My G.o.d, the tragedy of it!"

Lady Margaret twisted the rings on her long white fingers.

"The tragedy of it, my dear," she said, "is that you have sent away the man you love at a time when you will never need him so badly again ..."

There was a discreet tapping at the door.

"Come in!" said Lady Margaret.

Bude appeared.

"Mr. Manderton, the detective, my lady, was wishing to know whether he might see Miss Trevert ..."

"Yes. Ask him to come up here," commanded Lady Margaret.

"He is without--in the corridor, my lady!"

He stepped back and in a moment Mr. Manderton stepped into the room, big, burly, and determined.

He made a little stiff bow to the two ladies and halted irresolute near the door.

"You wished to see my daughter, Mr. Manderton," said Lady Margaret.

The detective bowed again.

"And you, too, my lady," he said. "Allow me!"

He closed the door, then crossed to the fireplace.

"After I had seen you and Miss Trevert last night, my lady," he began, "I had a talk with Mr. Jeekes, Mr. Parrish's princ.i.p.al secretary, who came down by car from London as soon as he heard the news. My lady, I think this is a fairly simple case!"