The Scandal at 23 Mount Street (An Angela Marchmont Mystery Book 9) by Clara Benson Page A

fondly and with a smile. She could not say whether his attempt to pursue the straight and narrow path would be successful, but if it were not she was unlikely ever to find out about it and be disappointed. Now all that remained was for her to be firm with herself and suppress any awkward feelings for him that might remain. She was confident of her own strength and was certain it would not take too long.
    She stifled a yawn, for it had been a long night. It was not quite seven o’clock, however, and she had no plans for Sunday, so she decided that there was no harm in trying to get a few hours’ sleep. She was heading towards her bedroom when she caught sight of something out of the corner of her eye and turned her head to glance at it. It seemed to be a shoe, and it was protruding from behind the sofa at a very strange angle.
    ‘How odd,’ thought Angela, and paused. She looked at it more closely, still not understanding what it was she had seen. Then realization stole across her and she froze. For several seconds she stood there, quite immobile, while her heart began to beat rapidly. At last she took a deep breath and approached the sofa very slowly, although she already knew perfectly well what she would find, for she had seen it often in the past—often enough, certainly, to recognize it when she saw it.
    There it was, just as she had known it would be: the body of Davie Marchmont, lying behind the sofa in a pool of blood, barely recognizable—although who else could it be? Briefly, she knelt down by him and reached out for his wrist as though to look for a pulse, but then in an instant she drew back, for of course there was no pulse; a single glance at him was enough to tell that. She stood up again and moved away and for a long moment stared down at him—at the thing which had once been her husband. Anyone observing her would have said that she was in shock—and perhaps she was, although it had not deprived her of the ability to think, for her mind was working rapidly.
    At length she turned away from him, went into the bedroom and changed from her evening-dress into day clothes. The police would be here soon, and it would not do to greet them in silk and pearls. Then, after a moment’s thought, she went over to her bed and pulled the covers back. When she was ready, she returned to the sitting-room and lifted the telephone-receiver to call Scotland Yard. After that, she sat down in a chair to wait. Angela Marchmont was by no means a stupid woman. She had no idea what her husband was doing in her flat or who had killed him, but one thing she did know was that she was in very great trouble.

SEVEN
    ‘Mrs. Marchmont?’ said Sergeant Willis of Scotland Yard. ‘Are you quite sure, sir?’
    ‘Of course I’m sure,’ said Inspector Scott tetchily, still holding the telephone-receiver in his hand. ‘Do you take me for an idiot?’
    ‘No, sir,’ said Willis.
    ‘Well, then,’ said Scott. ‘I’ve never met the woman myself but I understand you know her. She says she found the body this morning. It’s her husband, apparently.’
    Inspector Scott was a compactly-built man of middle height and thinning hair, whose disposition was not improved by a tendency to dyspepsia. Sergeant Willis respected his abilities but found him slightly hard to take by comparison with the even-tempered Inspector Jameson, who was away on honeymoon at present. Scott also had an unfortunate love of writing reports, and Willis (who did not love writing reports) had been most put out at having been summoned to work early on a Sunday morning to catch up on his record-keeping. He had got no further than filling in his name at the top of a page, however, when a call had come in to say that a Mrs. Angela Marchmont had found a dead body in her flat. This was surprise enough, but the identity of the dead man was even more unexpected.
    ‘I didn’t even know she had a husband,’ said Willis.
    ‘Well, she hasn’t any more, by the sound of