The moist black eyes rolled uneasily. “Aw, gee it was only a gag. I spoke the last line, and they all got mad at me. It’s supposed to be bad luck. The guy who was gonna play
Basil’s voice came into the silence quietly. “How much did you get for that?”
“Ten bucks.” The boy kept his eyes on the ground.
“From whom?” cried Foyle eagerly.
“Don’t you know?” The boy looked up in surprise. “From Adeane himself. He
The Inspector was disappointed.
“All right, you can go,” said Basil.
The boy scuttled through the wings to the stage door.
“Why on earth did Adeane want to play
“Nothing so impersonal and disinterested,” returned Basil. “He did it to attract Milhau’s attention to himself and his plays, and he succeeded. He actually got Milhau to say he’d read the stuff.”
“And then—just as he got his first real chance—he was murdered.” Foyle brooded. “If only he’d given us a hint of what he knew—”
“He wasn’t interested in helping us. Adeane was never interested in anything but Adeane.”
Foyle turned back to the knife on the table as if he greatly preferred a tangible clue to all these tenuous suppositions. A new idea came to him. “Did Rodney Tait carry that surgical bag on stage tonight?”
“Yes, but the bag was empty. This afternoon all the remaining knives were left in Milhau’s office safe.”
“Were they counted first?”
“No. Rod just dumped them on Milhau’s desk in a heap. Anyone in the theater could have helped himself to a knife before they were put in the safe.”
“They should have been counted. I’ll have to ask Tait a thing or two about that.” Foyle rose grimly. “I’m going to question the whole bunch now in Milhau’s office. Want to come?”
“No, I think I’ll look around here a bit.”
The plywood door at left quivered after Foyle’s departure. Alone, Basil prowled restlessly around the stage. He had little faith in the sort of inquisition going on now in Milhau’s office. Official questions put people on guard. They only let slip the important things in their unguarded moments when everything was casual and spontaneous. Foyle had left Adeane’s copy of Dr. Heiser’s autobiography on the table. Apparently he thought it of no importance. Again Basil turned the pages. Why had Adeane bought the book when it was available at the medical library? A passage on native medical diagnosis in India caught Basil’s eyes. He read it with growing interest. . . .
A light footstep distracted him. He turned and saw Margot through the gap in the wings at left. She paused. “It’s all right, Dr. Willing. The Inspector questioned me first and said I could go.”
He waited as if he expected something more of her. She came through the wings onto the stage. She was carrying the white hat; the smooth brown hair was slightly disordered, the black and white linen dress crumpled. She looked tired. As they were on the stage, he gave her a cigarette and lighted it.
She sank into
“I haven’t said so.”
“But you’ve looked it.”
“I’m more responsible than you,” he replied soberly. “I felt it was all wrong this morning at rehearsal, but I didn’t put a stop to it because it was only a feeling—nothing positive.”
“I don’t think either of us is responsible,” she answered. “People make their own lives and their own deaths. Adeane made his. He was the sort of fool who would think it smart to bait a murderer.”
Basil held out his hand. “Will you give me the staples you took from his manuscript?”
She looked at him astonished and indignant. “I don’t know what you mean!”
“Will you let me see your bag?”
She hesitated. Gently he took it from her—the same patent leather bag she had carried yesterday. He opened it. There were all the usual things—coin purse, handkerchief, lipstick. He opened the zipper compartment. There were a pair of brass staples, and other things—a diamond ring, a bright new paper clip, a tin bottle top, a small pair of gold nail scissors, a shining new copper penny, a glass clip from some Woolworth store, and a scrap of tin foil.
“How did you know?” she asked him.
