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Page 98
Mary glanced at an open summer-house which stood beneath the
beech trees on one side of the garden. She moved towards it
and sat down there, and Bryce followed her and seated himself.
"Well--" she said.
Bryce realized that his moment had arrived. He paused,
endeavouring to remember the careful preparations he had made
for putting his case. Somehow, he was not so clear as to his
line of attack as he had been ten minutes previously--he
realized that he had to deal with a young woman who was not
likely to be taken in nor easily deceived. And suddenly he
plunged into what he felt to be the thick of things.
"Whether you, or whether Ransford--whether both or either of
you, know it or not," he said, "the police have been on to
Ransford ever since that Collishaw affair! Underground work,
you know. Mitchington has been digging into things ever since
then, and lately he's had a London detective helping him."
Mary, who had carried her work into the garden, had now
resumed it, and as Bryce began to talk she bent over it
steadily stitching.
"Well?" she said.
"Look here!" continued Bryce. "Has it never struck you--it
must have done!--that there's considerable mystery about
Ransford? But whether it has struck you or not, it's there,
and it's struck the police forcibly. Mystery connected with
him before--long before--he ever came here. And associated,
in some way, with that man Braden. Not of late--in years
past. And, naturally, the police have tried to find out what
that was."
"What have they found out?" asked Mary quietly.
"That I'm not at liberty to tell," replied Bryce. "But I can
tell you this--they know, Mitchington and the London man, that
there were passages between Ransford and Braden years ago."
"How many years ago?" interrupted Mary.
Bryce hesitated a moment. He had a suspicion that this
self-possessed young woman who was taking everything more
quietly than he had anticipated, might possibly know more than
he gave her credit for knowing. He had been watching her
fingers since they sat down in the summer-house, and his sharp
eyes saw that they were as steady as the spire of the
cathedral above the trees--he knew from that that she was
neither frightened nor anxious.
"Oh, well--seventeen to twenty years ago," he answered.
"About that time. There were passages, I say, and they were
of a nature which suggests that the re-appearance of Braden on
Ransford's present stage of life would be, extremely
unpleasant and unwelcome to Ransford."
"Vague!" murmured Mary. "Extremely vague!"
"But quite enough," retorted Bryce, "to give the police the
suggestion of motive. I tell you the police know quite enough
to know that Braden was, of all men in the world, the last man
Ransford desired to see cross his path again. And--on that
morning on which the Paradise affair occurred--Braden did
cross his path. Therefore, in the conventional police way of
thinking and looking at things, there's motive."
"Motive for what?" asked Mary.
Bryce arrived here at one of his critical stages, and he
paused a moment in order to choose his words.
"Don't get any false ideas or impressions," he said at last.
"I'm not accusing Ransford of anything. I'm only telling you
what I know the police think and are on the very edge of
accusing him of. To put it plainly--of murder. They say
he'd a motive for murdering Braden--and with them motive is
everything. It's the first thing they seem to think of; they
first question they ask themselves. 'Why should this man have
murdered that man?'--do you see! 'What motive had he?--that's
the point. And they think--these chaps like Mitchington and
the London man--that Ransford certainly had a motive for
getting rid of Braden when they met."
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