A Murder is Arranged by Basil Thomson

disparagingly…”
    â€œWhy? Has he been making good behind my back?”
    â€œWell, I’ll tell you something and you can judge for yourselves. Now we are free from interruption by the servants let me say that I’ve recovered a very valuable thing that was pinched by someone in the house no longer ago than three or four days and this was done entirely by Dallas. You remember that uncut emerald I showed you all? Well, to the best of my belief I locked it up in the drawer, meaning to put it back in the safe as soon as I had a moment to spare, but when I went to the drawer I found that it had disappeared and yet I could swear that I locked it up.”
    â€œYou mean that the lock on the drawer was picked?” asked Huskisson.
    â€œIt must have been.”
    â€œYou don’t suspect any of your guests, I hope?” asked Oborn with a grin.
    Forge dismissed the joke with a gesture. “You must keep this entirely to yourselves. Obviously the theft must have been committed by someone in the house and all my servants are more or less new. The police are looking up the characters they brought with them but have warned me not to alarm them and so I hope you will both keep your mouths shut about the theft.”
    The butler came in and, addressing Forge, said, “I’m sorry to disturb you, sir, but there’s a lady on the telephone asking for Miss Gask.”
    â€œDid you tell her what had happened?” asked Forge.
    â€œNo sir; I said that I would call you to speak to the lady.”
    Forge made a gesture of resignation. “You’ll excuse me,” he said to his guests as he went out to the instrument in the hall.
    He took up the receiver and listened to a voice with a strong foreign accent.
    â€œWho is speaking?” he asked.
    â€œMademoiselle Coulon. I wish to speak to Miss Gask; she told me she would be there, so will you call her, please.”
    Forge clasped and unclasped the fingers of his free hand, wondering how one broke bad news gently. Through his brain—never of the brightest—there flashed the thought that to temporise would only put off the evil day and might possibly involve him in a suspicion of foul play. He must temporise, nevertheless. “I’m sorry to tell you that there has been an accident.”
    The voice at the other end rose almost to a scream. “An accident to Margaret? Is she hurt very badly, yes?”
    â€œYes, very badly.”
    â€œOh, where is she? I must go to see her at once.”
    â€œI’m afraid it’s too late.” Forge quickly abandoned all hope of temporising. It was safer to blurt out the truth. “The fact is we attended her funeral this morning.” There was a silence at the other end of the wire; Forge began to fear that the speaker had collapsed in a faint with the instrument in her hand. At last came the words in a faint voice: “Margaret dead: it is not possible; and so suddenly. Then what am I to do? I come from arriving in London just half an hour ago. Margaret wrote to me that her friends would be pleased if I came to stay with them, so I came, but if she is dead…”
    The voice was a pleasant one, the accent that of an educated woman; Forge forgot his resolution never again to invite to his house chance acquaintances—and if this lady at the other end of the wire was not a chance acquaintance what was she? But he could not keep her waiting.
    â€œCome all the same,” he said, “and I can tell you all about it when you come.”
    â€œBut how shall I get there?”
    â€œWhere are you now?”
    â€œI am speaking from Waterloo Station.”
    â€œNothing could be better. Ask for the platform for the next train to Kingston and I will send the car to meet you there. The chauffeur will be told to ask for Mademoiselle Coulon.”
    â€œBut that sounds very easy. I ask for Kingston, is it not so? And you will tell your chauffeur to look for a lady all