Leo.
"You never know, Mr. Argyle. You realise, I suppose, one of the oddest things about the whole business?"
"I? I'm not quite sure that I follow you."
"The money," said Huish. "The money Mrs. Argyle drew from the bank including that fiver with Mrs. Bottleberry, 17 Bangor Road written on the back of it. A strong part of the case was that that fiver and others were found on Jack Argyle when he was arrested. He swore he got the
money from Mrs. Argyle, but Mrs. Argyle definitely told you and Miss Vaughan that she didn't give Jacko any money - so how did he get that fifty pounds? He couldn't have come back here -Dr. Calgary's evidence makes that quite clear. So he must have had it with him when he left here. Who gave it to him? Did you?"
He turned squarely on Kirsten Lindstrom, who flushed indignantly.
"Me? No, of course not. How could I?"
"Where was the money kept that Mrs. Argyle had drawn from the bank?"
"She usually kept it in a drawer of her bureau," said Kirsten.
"Locked?"
Kirsten considered.
"She would probably lock the drawer before she went up to bed."
Huish looked at Hester.
"Did you take the money from the drawer and give it to your brother?"
"I didn't even know he was there. And how could I take it without Mother knowing?"
"You could have taken it quite easily when your mother went up to the library
to consult your father," Huish suggested.
He wondered whether she would see and avoid the trap. She fell straight into it.
"But Jacko had already left by then. I -" She stopped, dismayed. "I see you do know when your brother left," said Huish. Hester said quickly and vehemently.
"I -1 - know now -1 didn't then. I was up in my room, I tell you. I didn't hear anything at all. And anyway I wouldn't have wanted to give Jacko any money."
"And I tell you this," said Kirsten. Her face was red and indignant. "If I had given Jacko money - it would have been my own money! I would not have stolen it!"
"I'm sure you wouldn't," said Huish. "But you see where that leads us. Mrs. Argyle, in spite of what she told you," he looked at Leo, "must have given him that money herself."
"I can't believe it. Why not tell me if she had done so?"
"She wouldn't be the first mother to be softer about her son than she wanted to admit"
"You're wrong, Huish. My wife never indulged in evasion."
"I think she did this time," said Gwenda Vaughan. "In fact she must have done as the superintendent says, it's the only answer."
"After all," said Huish softly. "We've got to look at the whole thing from a different point of view now. At the time of the arrest we thought Jack Argyle was lying. But now we find he spoke the truth about the hitch- hike he had from Calgary, so presumably he was speaking the truth about the money too. He said that his mother gave it to him. Therefore presumably she did."
There was silence - an uncomfortable silence.
Huish got up. "Well, thank you. I'm afraid the trail is pretty cold by now, but you never know."
Leo escorted him to the door. When he came back he said with a sigh,
"Well, that's over. For the present."
"For always," said Kirsten. "They will never know." "What's the good of that to us?" cried Hester.
"My dear." Her father went over to her. "Calm down, child. Don't be so strung up. Time heals everything."
"Not some things. What shall we do? Oh, what shall we do?" "Hester, come with me." Kirsten put a hand on her shoulder.
"I don't want anybody." Hester ran out of the room. A moment later they heard the front door bang.
Kirsten said: "All this! It is not good for her."
"I don't think it's really true, either," said Philip Durrant thoughtfully.
"What isn't true?" asked Gwenda.
"That we shall never know the truth. I feel a kind of pricking in my thumbs."
His face, faun-like and almost mischievous, lit up with a queer smile.
"Please, Philip, be careful," said Tina.
He looked at her in surprise.
"Little Tina. And what do you know about it all?"
"I hope," said Tina very clearly and distinctly, "that I do not know anything."
Chapter 14
"Don't suppose you got anything?" said the Chief Constable.
"Nothing definite, sir," said Huish. "And yet - the time wasn't altogether wasted."
"Let's hear about it all."
"Well, our main times and premises are the same. Mrs. Argyle was alive just before seven, talked with her husband and Gwenda Vaughan,