Page:The Black Camel (IA blackcamel0000earl).djvu/201

quaffing—ah, yes—you did not travel on to property of Shelah Fane?”

“I’ve just told you,” replied Jaynes, “that I went only as far as the Moana. As I say, I sat down there to try to figure things out. When I had grown a bit calmer, it occurred to me that perhaps I was making a big row about nothing. A woman who could be so easily influenced by a silly fortune-teller—I asked myself whether she would, after all, make a satisfactory wife. Her life was far removed from mine—I began to feel that the whole affair might turn out to have been a mere passing infatuation with both of us. I resolved to take the boat at midnight and, if possible, forget the entire business. After that was decided, I felt better. I came back here, past the Outrigger Club, and just outside the hotel Martino met me with the appalling news of the poor girl’s murder.”

“No one noted you at Moana under banyan tree?”

“I fancy not. I sat in a dark corner.”

“Were you ever in pavilion where Shelah Fane encountered finish?”

“No—I never saw the place.”

“Then you could not have been in the neighborhood at any time? Hovering about window, for example?”

“Well, hardly.” Without prompting, Jaynes took up his glass and drained it. Suddenly he stared at Charlie. “I say—why do you ask me that?”

“I seek only to narrow search,” Chan explained.

“That will be all, thank you. Can you name hour of next boat to mainland?”

“I certainly can,’ answered the Britisher. “There’s one to-morrow at noon, I hope to heaven——”