Page 48 of Murder in Moonlight

“I beg your pardon?”

Harris took from his pocket the handkerchief Grey had found and spread it on the desk. “Do you recognize this, Mrs. Bolton?”

“It looks like mine,” she replied without much interest. “It has my initials on it.”

“Can you remember when you last saw it?”

She regarded him as though he had sprouted horns. “Of course I can’t. I have a dozen like it.”

“Then you didn’t lose one?”

“Clearly I must have, since it is in your possession, inspector, but I was not aware of having done so.”

“Would it surprise you to know that it was found in the hand of the late Mr. Winsom?”

It obviously did surprise her, for she stared at it in silence for several seconds. Color seeped into her face, which had been almost unnaturally pale, mottling her neck and leaving red spots on her cheeks.

“Of course it surprises me,” she said at last. “What on earth was it doing there?”

“I was hoping you could tell me.”

She shrugged elegantly. “Clearly, I must have dropped it somewhere. He found it and picked it up to return to me.”

“In the garden at midnight?”

“He could have found it at any time,” she said impatiently.

“And kept it clutched in his hand?”

She was glaring at him now. “What exactly are you implying, inspector?”

“I am asking if you met with Mr. Winsom that night after the household had retired.”

“No, I did not, and I resent—”

“Mrs. Bolton, were you and Mr. Winsom conducting an affair?”

For the tiniest instant, fear stared out of her eyes, quickly veiled. He had his answer. But almost at once she sat back in her chair, her lips curled in contempt. “You nasty, grubby little man—how dare you? My husband has friends among your superiors who will see that your insolence is curtailed.” She rose to her feet, causing both Harris and Flynn to stand also. “This interview is at an end. If you object, you may take that up with my husband too.”

She swung away from him and marched to the door.

“Does he know about the affair?” Harris asked.

Her back remained rigid. She neither answered nor hesitated in her step. At the last moment Flynn reached the door ahead of her and opened it for her. She did not so much as glance at him.

“Go and find the husband, Flynn,” Harris said, “before she gets to him first.”

*

Constance had stationedherself in the library beside the study, so that she could see those who emerged from Harris’s interviews. Alice Bolton stalked out in high dudgeon, but more than that, she was trembling, and something glistened at the corner of her eye. She marched blindly down the hall to the side door and let herself out.

Constance sprinted to catch the door before she closed it behind her. “Are you well, ma’am?” she asked.

“I’m fine,” Alice gasped. “I just need some air.”

Constance had never really cared for the superior Mrs. Bolton, but she suddenly felt a wave of genuine sympathy for the woman’s distress. Her breath came quick and shallow, and sheseemed to be holding herself together only by a precarious effort of will.

“Please…” Alice gasped.Please leave mewas the clear command, but Constance could no more abandon her to her torment than she could one of her own girls.