Page 52 of Murder in Moonlight
“He was flirting with her—possibly to annoy her father, who had just refused to invest in his latest venture, or perhaps he fancied an heiress for a wife.”
“Sounds more like Davidson’s motive to me,” Flynn said. “She’s little more than a child.”
“True, but don’t be fooled. There is hidden steel behind that sweetness.”
“Thereissweetness?” Flynn asked in a slightly odd voice, as though he doubted it and believed it at the same time. Or wanted to.
“Oh yes. She is struggling and somewhat lost. I doubt you have seen her at her best.”
Harris pounced. “Meaning she’s protecting someone?”
“They’re all protecting someone,” Grey said broodingly. “Not necessarily the same someone, either.”
“Who’s your money on, then, sir?” Flynn asked, and received another scowl from Harris.
“I don’t have enough information,” Grey said.
“Evasion,” Constance accused him.
“What about you, ma’am?” Flynn asked.
“Davidson,” she said. “He’s still sucking up to one of the Winsom children. And you, inspector?”
Harris hesitated, turning his glass on the table. Then he said decisively, “Mrs. Bolton. She had the best motive and opportunity. She admitted being with him during the time he probably died.” He met Constance’s gaze. “You don’t agree with me?”
“I don’t think I do,” she replied. “The knife was stolen from the kitchen the night before, before Mrs. Winsom had delivered her congé. And besides, she didn’t return to the house over the flowerbed.”
The policemen looked baffled until Grey explained her theory of the trampled flowerbeds and the mud on the shoes of Davidson, Randolph, and Mrs. Winsom.
“The other reason I suspect Davidson,” she said.
“Not Randolph, who inherits everything?”
“He doesn’t really want to inherit the business,” Constance said, her voice just a little too defensive. She didn’t want the killer to be any of the Winsoms.
“I expect he’ll like the money, though,” Flynn said.
Grey looked at him. “Do you know much about the precise state of the bank and Winsom’s other businesses?”
“Do you?” Harris countered.
“Doing well, by all I could learn,” Grey said. “The bank—and Winsom himself—were well thought of.”
“But?” Harris asked with interest.
Grey shrugged. “But I’m going by hearsay, not by the books.”
“Flynn is going to the bank tomorrow to make general inquiries,” Harris said.
“Ask about a former employee who was dismissed for fraud,” Grey suggested. “Name of Framley. Apparently he bore a grudge,swore at Winsom in the street when he was in town with his family.”
“What for?” Flynn asked. “We’re looking at someone who was in the house at the time.”
“I know. It just nags at me.”
Flynn glanced at Harris, who nodded curtly.
“And what will you do tomorrow, inspector?” Constance asked.
