Free Poisoned Chocolates Case by Anthony Berkeley Page B

character is already shown in a strong enough light by her willingness to accept the bribe of the will as an inducement to divorce. She is obviously a grasping woman, greedy for money. Murder is only another step for such a woman to take. And murder is her only hope. I do not think,” concluded Sir Charles, “that I need to labour the point any further.” His glasses swung deliberately.
    “It's uncommonly convincing,” Roger said, with a little sigh. “Are you going to hand this information over to the police, Sir Charles?”
    “I conceive that failure to do so would be a gross dereliction of my duty as a citizen,” Sir Charles replied, with a pomposity that in no way concealed how pleased he was with himself.
    “Humph!” observed Mr. Bradley, who evidently was not going to be so pleased with Sir Charles as Sir Charles was. “What about the chocolates? Is it part of your case that she prepared them over here, or brought them with her?”
    Sir Charles waved an airy hand. “Is that material?”
    “I should say that it would be very material to connect her at any rate with the poison.”
    “Nitrobenzene? One might as well try to connect her with the purchase of the chocolates. She would have no difficulty in getting hold of that. I regard her choice of poison, in fact, as on a par with the ingenuity she has displayed in all the other particulars.”
    “I see.” Mr. Bradley stroked his little moustache and eyed Sir Charles combatively. “Come to think of it, you know, Sir Charles, you haven't really proved a case against Lady Pennefather at all. All you've proved is motive and opportunity.”
    An unexpected ally ranged herself beside Mr. Bradley. “Exactly!” cried Mrs. Fielder - Flemming. “That's just what I was about to point out myself. If you hand over the information you've collected to the police, Sir Charles, I don't think they'll thank you for it. As Mr. Bradley says, you haven't proved that Lady Pennefather's guilty, or anything like it. I'm quite sure you're altogether mistaken.”
    Sir Charles was so taken aback that for a moment he could only stare. “Mistaken!” he managed to ejaculate. It was clear that such a possibility had never entered Sir Charles's orbit.
    “Well, perhaps I'd better say - wrong,” amended Mrs. Fielder - Flemming, quite drily.
    “But my dear madam - - ” For once words did not come to Sir Charles. “But why?” he fell back upon, feebly.
    “Because I'm sure of it,” retorted Mrs. Fielder - Flemming, most unsatisfactorily.
    Roger had been watching this exchange with a gradual change of feeling. From being hypnotised by Sir Charles's persuasiveness and self - confidence into something like reluctant agreement, he was swinging round now in reaction to the other extreme. Dash it all, this fellow Bradley had kept a clearer head after all. And he was perfectly right. There were gaps in Sir Charles's case that Sir Charles himself, as counsel for Lady Pennefather's defence, could have driven a coach - and - six through.
    “Of course,” he said thoughtfully, “the fact that before she went abroad Lady Pennefather may have had an account at Mason's isn't surprising in the least. Nor is the fact that Mason's send out a complimentary chit with their receipts. As Sir Charles himself said, very many old - fashioned firms of good repute do. And the fact that the sheet of paper on which the letter was written had been used previously for some such purpose is not only not surprising, when one comes to consider; it's even obvious. Whoever the murderer, the same problem of getting hold of the piece of notepaper would arise. Yes, really, that Sir Charles's three initial questions should have happened to find affirmative answers does seem little more than a coincidence.”
    Sir Charles turned on this new antagonist like a wounded bull. “But the odds were enormous against it!” he roared. “If it was a coincidence, it was the most incredible one in the whole course of my