WHO KILLED CHARMIAN KARSLAKE? (Murder Mystery Classic). Annie Haynes

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      "Yes. But not by the same train. I reached Hepton about half-past two. Miss Karslake and the majority of the guests from town travelled by the four o'clock express. I just saw Miss Karslake when she came in with the others to tea, which we had in the hall."

      "She was a good-looking woman, wasn't she?"

      "Every paper in the country tells you so," Miss Galbraith responded.

      "And your opinion?"

      "I don't know that my opinion is important or even relevant to the inquiry you are making," Paula Galbraith answered coolly. "But, yes, of course I thought her beautiful. It would be impossible to think otherwise. But I did not care for her face particularly."

      "Did you have much conversation with her?" The girl smiled a little. "None at all. We were not even introduced. Of course a crowd of people wanted to be introduced to her. Lady Moreton had her hands full. And as I was not particularly anxious to know her I remained where I was."

      "Where was that?"

      The faint, ironic smile that had been playing round the girl's lips ever since she entered the room deepened now.

      "I was sitting on the big oak settle to the right of the door."

      "Alone?" the inspector said sharply.

      "Certainly not!" the girl said in her turn, with a slight asperity. "I was with Mr. John Larpent."

      "Was he introduced to Miss Karslake?"

      "No. He remained with me until I went upstairs to dress. Miss Karslake had gone up some little time before, so that I know there was no introduction."

      "And at the scratch dinner, as Lady Moreton phrases it, you were not near the actress."

      "She did not come down," Miss Galbraith said at once. "She said she was very tired and would prefer to rest in her own room until the dance."

      "I see."

      The inspector leaned forward and fixed his penetrating glance upon the girl's mobile face.

      "Miss Galbraith, I wonder whether it will surprise you to hear that among the few papers found here in Miss Karslake's trunk was a piece of paper with your name written on it over and over again."

      "It would surprise me very much," she said at last. "In fact it would surprise me so much that I do not think I should be able to bring myself to believe it."

      "Yet it is so," the inspector said, still keeping his eyes on the girl. "You can give no explanation, Miss Galbraith?"

      "None at all," the girl said with a puzzled air.

      "I am to take it, then, that you saw practically nothing of Miss Karslake."

      "I saw her, of course, at the dance."

      It did not escape the inspector's keen gaze that the girl's eyes no longer met his in the same frank fashion, that a faint touch of colour flickered in her pale cheeks.

      "Did you speak to her then?" he questioned sharply.

      "No, I told you that I did not speak to her at all." Miss Galbraith's voice was as firm, as decided as his, but some quality there was in it that made Stoddart regard her even more closely.

      "You can give us no help at all, then, Miss Galbraith?"

      The girl shook her head. "None at all, I am sorry to say."

      The inspector rose. "Then, I will not keep you longer now. It is just possible that I may want to see you later."

      He opened the door for her. But her proudly poised head and her firmly compressed lips did not hide from him the shadow of the fear that lurked in her blue eyes.

      When they were once more alone and the door had closed behind Miss Galbraith, Stoddart looked across at Harbord.

      "What do you make of that young woman?"

      "I think she knows more than she says. She is obviously scared. But yet"—Harbord's voice dropped and he looked worried and puzzled—"it is difficult to believe that a girl like that could be implicated in a horrible murder."

      "She may not be implicated, but she may know, or guess, somebody who is," the inspector said with a far-away look in his eyes. "Anyway, guesses and surmises will not help us, and it strikes me there is a jolly lot of spade work in front of us before the mystery of Charmian Karslake's death is elucidated."

      Chapter V

       Table of Contents

      Hepton was the quaintest of old-fashioned villages, or perhaps we should say, since it boasted a market consisting of a few stalls in the little cobble-paved street, the tiniest of market-towns. It nestled under the shadow of the Abbey, and to the true Heptonian the Penn-Moretons represented the ruling class, all that they knew of rank, or wealth, or culture.

      True, the King and Queen were higher, but then the King and Queen did not come in the way of the Heptonians. Sir Arthur and Lady Penn-Moreton were good enough.

      On the morning after the discovery of Charmian Karslake's murder, Stoddart and Harbord walked slowly up the village street from the Abbey, glancing curiously from side to side.

      To reach it from the Abbey they had to cross a wide, open space, still known as the Bull Ring. On one side were the schools and the schoolmaster's house, on the other the church, the Abbey Church, as it had been at the Dissolution. It was little altered now, save in heavy wooden pews which had been put in by laterday Protestants.

      Once past that there were little, old-fashioned shops on one side, with high steps leading up to them. On the other was the butter and poultry market. Heavy oak standards of stout lattice-work at the sides and overhead, the fine old justice-room in which the local magistrates still sat to adjudicate upon the cases of drunkenness or pilfering that might be brought before them.

      The justice-room was well worth the antiquaries' attention, but Stoddart only bestowed the most cursory glance upon it. All his attention was given to the shops on the other side, or rather to the names upon them.

      By the local Bank he stopped and looked up the village street that led to the almshouses and past them to the open country beyond.

      "Quaint old spot, isn't it?" he said to Harbord. "Matter of fact, Sir Arthur told me it was said to be the original Dickens' Sleepy Hollow. Well, here we come to the parting of the ways. I will have a look at the shops and then have a glance at the 'Moreton Arms,' which seems to be about the biggest pub hereabouts, while you prowl around in the churchyard, get a look at the register if you can, and see if you can meet with the name—names I should say."

      "Names!" Harbord repeated in a puzzled fashion. "Karslake, of course one understands, but—"

      "Karslake and Charmian, of course," the inspector said quietly. "In fact I think the Christian name is the more important, as it is the more distinctive of the two."

      "Charmian Karslake." Harbord repeated the two words thoughtfully. СКАЧАТЬ