XII

afternoon, and I will admit that, when I learnt that fact, I fell into a grievous error. I came to the conclusion that Mrs. Inglethorp’s determination to destroy her will arose as a direct consequence of the quarrel she had that afternoon, and that therefore the quarrel took place after, and not before the making of the will.

“Here, as we know, I was wrong, and I was forced to abandon that idea. I faced the problem from a new standpoint. Now, at 4 o’clock, Dorcas overheard her mistress saying angrily: ‘You need not think that any fear of publicity, or scandal between husband and wife will deter me.’ I conjectured, and conjectured rightly, that these words were addressed, not to her husband, but to Mr. John Cavendish. At 5 o’clock, an hour later, she uses almost the same words, but the standpoint is different. She admits to Dorcas, ‘I don’t know what to do; scandal between husband and wife is a dreadful thing.’ At 4 o’clock she has been angry, but completely mistress of herself. At 5 o’clock she is in violent distress, and speaks of having had a great shock.

“Looking at the matter psychologically, I drew one deduction which I was convinced was correct. The second ‘scandal’ she spoke of was not the same as the first⁠—and it concerned herself!

“Let us reconstruct. At 4 o’clock, Mrs. Inglethorp quarrels with her son, and threatens to denounce him to his wife⁠—who, by the way, overheard the greater part of the conversation. At 4:30, Mrs. Inglethorp, in consequence of a conversation on the validity of wills, makes a will in favour of her husband, which the two gardeners witness. At 5 o’clock, Dorcas finds her mistress in a state of considerable agitation, with a slip of paper⁠—‘a letter,’ Dorcas thinks⁠—in her hand, and it is then that she orders the fire in her room to be lighted. Presumably, then, between 4:30 and 5 o’clock, something has occurred to occasion a complete revolution of feeling, since she is now as anxious to destroy the will, as she was before to make it. What was that something?