The Deep Lake Mystery. Wells Carolyn

yesterday, Tuesday, that would be. I have not been here since, until this morning.”

      My heart almost stopped beating. I had seen her come in her canoe – but stay, that was at one-thirty or thereabouts. Perhaps she salved her conscience for the lie by telling herself that was this morning.

      “You mean, when you came over here perhaps half an hour ago?”

      “Yes.” Alma looked at him in some surprise. “What else could I mean?”

      A finished actress, surely. I was amazed at her coolness and her pretty air of inquiry.

      “Who summoned you?”

      “Mrs. Fenn. She had been asked to do so by Mr. Ames.”

      “What was her message?”

      “That Uncle Sampson had died of apoplexy and I’d better come right over.”

      “So you came?”

      “Yes, as soon as I could get here.”

      “Have you seen – er – Mr. Tracy?”

      “No; Mr. Ames advised against it.”

      “Well, Miss Remsen, I think we want no information from you, except a formal statement of your relationship to the dead man and your standing with him.”

      “Standing?”

      “Yes. Were you good friends?”

      “The best. I loved Uncle Sampson and he loved me, I know. I am his only living relative, except some distant cousins. I am the daughter of his sister, of whom he was very fond.”

      The girl was a bit of an enigma. She seemed straightforward and sincere, yet I was somehow conscious of a reservation in her talk, a glibness of speech that carried the idea of a prearranged story.

      Why I should mistrust her I couldn’t say, at first. Then I remembered that I had seen her canoeing over to Pleasure Dome in the night, and now she was saying she had not done so.

      “Are you his heiress?” The question came sharply.

      “So far as I know,” she replied with perfect equanimity. “My uncle has told me that his will leaves the bulk of his estate to me, but he also told me that when he married Mrs. Dallas, he would revise that will, and make different arrangements.”

      “Did you resent this?”

      “Not at all. I knew my uncle would leave me a proper portion of his wealth, and that as long as he lived he would take care of his sister’s child.”

      “You are an only child of your parents?”

      “I had a twin sister. She died fourteen years ago.”

      “And she is buried on this estate?”

      “Her grave is in a small cemetery which also contains the graves of my parents and five or six other relatives of my uncle’s family.”

      “How did it come about that the cemetery is on the grounds of the estate? It is, I believe, a New England custom.”

      “It was my mother’s wish. She was devoted to the little girl who died and wanted to have the grave where she could visit it often. My uncle humoured her and also had the remains of my father sent here to be buried beside the child. Then, when my mother died, about a year ago, naturally she was buried there, too.”

      “I see. What did your sister die of?”

      “Scarlet fever. There was an epidemic of it. We both had it, but I pulled through, though it left me with a slight deafness in one ear.”

      “Then, after your mother’s death, you went to live by yourself on the island. Why did you do this?”

      “Because my uncle was to marry Mrs. Dallas.”

      “And you don’t like Mrs. Dallas?”

      “I don’t dislike her at all, but I am not of an easy-going disposition. I felt sure there would be clashes, and I told uncle I’d rather live by myself. He understood and agreed. So after some looking about, we decided on the island of Whistling Reeds as the most attractive site for a home.”

      “And he built a house for you there?”

      “Oh, no, the house was already there. He bought the whole island, house and all.”

      “You like it as a home?”

      “I love it. I am happier there than I could be anywhere else.”

      “Are you not lonely?”

      “No more than I would be anywhere. I have capable and devoted servants, and I have tennis courts and an archery field and I have many boats and can get any place I wish to go in them. No, I am not so lonely as I sometimes was here in this great house. Of course, since my mother’s death, I haven’t gone much in society but I am thinking of going out more in the future.”

      Keeley Moore listened to the girl with the deepest interest. I wondered what he would say if he knew what I knew of her midnight canoe trip!

      But I vowed to myself then and there that I should never tell of that. I knew I might be doing wrong, withholding such an important bit of information, but I was determined to keep my secret.

      I tried to make myself think it was some other girl I had seen, but the alert figure before me and the white costume said plainly that I was making no mistake in recognizing the girl of the canoe.

      From beneath her little white felt hat strayed a few golden curls, and I well remembered the bare head that had looked silvery in the moonlight.

      I said to myself, by way of placating my conscience, that when the time came I would tell Kee about it, but I certainly did not propose to give the Coroner a chance to suspect this lovely girl of crime.

      Apparently, the Coroner had no slightest suspicion of Alma, but you can’t tell. He may have been drawing her out in order to prove her complete innocence or he may have felt that she had motive and must be closely questioned.