Free Elk 02 The Joker by Edgar Wallace Page B

date-stamp at some time or other.’
    But she swore she hadn’t; she was not inquisitive, indeed regarded inquisitiveness as one of the vices which had come into existence with reading newspapers. She did not explain the connection between the popular press and the inquiring mind, though it was there plain to be seen.
    The local police inspector had cleared the wardrobe and drawers of all portable articles, including the bag.
    ‘I told him you found a paper in the bag, but he couldn’t see it, sir, though he searched high and low for it.’
    ‘There wasn’t a paper to find,’ said Jim untruthfully.
    His position was a delicate one. He had withdrawn important evidence from what might perhaps be a very serious case. There was only one course to take and this he followed.
    Returning to Scotland Yard, he requested an interview with the Commissioners, explained what he had done, told them frankly his suspicions and asked for the suppression of the evidence he held. The consultation was postponed for the attendance of a representative of the Public Prosecutor, but in the end he had his way, and when the inquest was held on Annie Maud Gibbins the jury returned an open verdict, which meant that they were content with the statement that the deceased woman had been ‘found dead’, and expressed no opinion as to how she met her fate - a laudable verdict, since no member of the jury, not even the coroner, nor the doctors who testified with so many reservations, had the slightest idea how the life of Mrs Gibbins, the charlady, had gone out.

    CHAPTER 9

    AILEEN RIVERS was annoyed, and since the object of her annoyance lived in the same room, and to use a vulgar idiom, under the same hat as herself, a highly unsatisfactory state of affairs was produced. She was annoyed because she had not seen Mr James Carlton for a week. But she was furious with herself that she was annoyed at all. Mr Stebbings, that stout lawyer, had reached an age when he was no longer susceptible to atmosphere, yet even he was conscious that his favourite employee had departed in some degree from the normal. He asked her if she was not well; and suggested that she should take a week off and go to Margate. The suggestion of Margate was purely mechanical; he invariably prescribed Margate for all disorders of body and mind, having been once in the remote past cured of the whooping cough in that delightful town. It was not Margate weather, and Aileen was not Margate-minded.
    ‘I remember’ - Mr Stebbings unfolded several of his heavy chins to gaze meditatively at the ceiling - ‘many years ago suggesting to Miss Mercy Harlow - ahem! - ’
    It occurred to him that the girl would not know Miss Mercy Harlow and that the name would be without significance; for the great heights to which the living Harlow had risen were outside his comprehension.
    ‘You used to act for the Harlows once, didn’t you; Mr Stebbings?’
    ‘Yes,’ said Mr Stebbings carefully. ‘It was - er - a great responsibility. I was not sorry when young Mr Stratford went elsewhere.’
    He said no more than this, which was quite a lot for Mr Stebbings, but by one of those coincidences which are a daily feature of life she came again into contact with the Harlow family.
    Mr Stebbings was dealing with a probate case. A will had been propounded in the court, and was being opposed by a distant relative of the legator. The question turned on whether, in the spring of a certain year the legator had advanced certain money to one of the numerous beneficiaries under the will with the object of taking him out of the country.
    Aileen was sent to inspect the cash book, since it was alleged the money had been paid through the lawyers. She found the entry without a great deal of difficulty, and, running down the index to discover if she had missed any further reference, her finger stopped at the words:
    ‘Harlow - Mercy Mildred. Harlow-Stratford Selwyn Mortimer.’
    She would not have been human if she had not