谋杀启事31

II

Phillipa Haymes straightened her back and pushed back a tendril of hairfrom her damp forehead. She was cleaning a flower border.

“Yes, Inspector¹?”

She looked at him inquiringly. In return he gave her a rather closerscrutiny than he had done before. Yes, a good-looking girl, a very Englishtype with her pale ash-blonde hair and her rather long face. An obstinatechin and mouth. Something of repression—of tautness² about her. The eyeswere blue, very steady in their glance, and told you nothing at all. The sortof girl, he thought, who would keep a secret well.

“I’m sorry always to bother you when you’re at work, Mrs. Haymes,” hesaid, “but I didn’t want to wait until you came back for lunch. Besides, Ithought it might be easier to talk to you here, away from Little Paddocks.”

“Yes, Inspector?”

No emotion and little interest in her voice. But was there a note of wari-ness—or did he imagine it?

“A certain statement has been made to me this morning. This statementconcerns you.”

Phillipa raised her eyebrows³ very slightly.

“You told me, Mrs. Haymes, that this man, Rudi Scherz, was quite un-known to you?”

“Yes.”

“That when you saw him there, dead, it was the first time you had seteyes on him. Is that so?”

“Certainly. I had never seen him before.”

“You did not, for instance, have a conversation with him in the summer-house of Little Paddocks?”

“In the summerhouse?”

He was almost sure he caught a note of fear in her voice.

“Yes, Mrs. Haymes.”

“Who says so?”

“I am told that you had a conversation with this man, Rudi Scherz, andthat he asked you where he could hide and you replied that you wouldshow him, and that a time, a quarter past six, was definitely mentioned. Itwould be a quarter past six, roughly, when Scherz would get here fromthe bus stop on the evening of the hold-up.”

There was a moment’s silence. Then Phillipa gave a short scornfullaugh. She looked amused.

“I don’t know who told you that,” she said. “At least I can guess. It’s avery silly, clumsy story—spiteful, of course. For some reason Mitzi dislikesme even more than she dislikes the rest of us.”

“You deny it?”

“Of course it’s not true … I never met or saw Rudi Scherz in my life, andI was nowhere near the house that morning. I was over here, working.”

Inspector Craddock said very gently:

“Which morning?”

There was a momentary⁴ pause. Her eyelids⁵ flickered⁶.

“Every morning. I’m here every morning. I don’t get away until oneo’clock.”

She added scornfully:

“It’s no good listening to what Mitzi tells you. She tells lies all the time.”

 

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