“You didn’t leave Liam with her, did you?” Gus asked.
“Of course not. He’s with the baker’s wife, across the street. She’s an absolute dear, although she’s been stuffing him too full of food.”
The attempt to brighten up the atmosphere failed like a slowly deflating balloon. “So you’ll have to stay put for now, won’t you?” I asked.
Sid sighed. “It all seems so hopeless, Molly. I’m so glad you are here. You’re a real detective. You’ll know what to do.”
“I don’t really see what I can do to help in a strange city,” I said hesitantly. “It seems to me that your only hope is to find the real killer.”
“Exactly what I said,” Gus exclaimed with enthusiasm.
“But wait a minute,” I said. “When I was at the house they were dusting everything for fingerprints. Surely that will exonerate you, Sid.”
She shook her head. “No, it won’t. When he was trying to remove the knife and I tried to stop him I know I must have touched it as well as his hand. I had blood on my hands afterward. My fingerprints will be on that knife.”
“Oh, dear. That’s not good,” I said. “Now the fact that strikes me is that he wasn’t dead when you arrived and the front door was open. That indicates to me that he had just been stabbed before you got there and that maybe the killer slipped out as you went into the studio.”
“You mean he was in the house at the same time?” Sid shuddered. “How awful. I might have been his next victim.”
“He probably only had one knife,” I said. “I suspect he did what he came to do and then all he wanted was to get away. You are absolutely sure that there was nobody else in the room? Was there anywhere one could hide?”
Sid frowned. “There was a red velvet curtain hanging as a backdrop for the painting he was working on. I suppose someone could have hidden behind that,” she shuddered.
“Now think, Sid. Sometimes we take in more details than we realize. Was there anything about that room that struck you as different, odd, unusual? No bulge behind the drapes? No sixth sense that somebody else was breathing?”
Sid closed her eyes, then shook her head. “It all happened so fast, Molly. I came in, went straight up to him, and saw he was dying. I didn’t have time to look at my surroundings. When I did, afterward, it was only to look for an escape route. I saw the open window and made for it.”
“Never mind,” I said. “Perhaps by now the police have identified a fingerprint on that knife that matches a known criminal. And even if they have your fingerprints, they wouldn’t know how to start looking for you, especially if they think you are a young man.”
Sid clutched at my hand. “Molly, you are so calm and wonderful and efficient,” she said. “I know you’ll be able to help me prove my innocence.”
“I’ll do my best,” I said. “It seems to me we have to establish who would want to see Mr. Bryce dead. Either it was an unplanned murder—he surprised a burglar who thought the house was empty—or someone came with the intention of killing Mr. Bryce.”
I felt Sid shudder. “He was a horrible, rude, and prejudiced man,” she said. “But nobody deserves to die in that manner.”
My brain was working rapidly, trying to think how a good detective would tackle this, what Daniel might do in these circumstances, and whether Inspector Henri, whom I had met at the scene, would know how to carry out a thorough investigation. My gaze moved around the elegant room, taking in the heavy swags of drapery, the paintings on the walls, the little cakes on the silver salver. It was the height of cultured living and it seemed so strange to be sitting here and discussing murder. “I think the fact that he was sitting in his chair is important,” I began slowly. “That indicates he probably knew the person who was in the room and was comfortable with him, or her. Perhaps he had been sitting chatting before he was stabbed. If it had been a burglar or someone had surprised him he would have jumped to his feet, turned to confront them, and then fallen to the floor. There would have been some signs of a struggle and the inspector said there weren’t.”
“Unless he did stand up but slumped back into his chair after he was stabbed,” Sid pointed out.
“I don’t know how you two can discuss this so calmly,” Gus said. “Murder is so terrible, and the fact that your life might be in danger, Sid…”
“We’ll get through this somehow,” Sid said. “Not the welcome we planned to give poor Molly, is it? And after what she had just been through in New York, and the awful rough crossing too. We had so many exciting things planned for you, Molly. If only you hadn’t become ill on the ship and had arrived on time none of this would have happened.”
“You can’t say that,” Gus said. “Don’t go blaming poor Molly.”
“Of course I’m not blaming her. I’m just saying the timing would have been different. We wouldn’t have gone to tea with Mary, would we?”