‘No truth whatever.’
‘Thank you.’
Dinny drew a long breath and braced herself against the pause and the slow rich voice to the right behind her.
‘You, a married woman, would not call inviting a young man to your cabin, entertaining him alone in your room at half-past eleven at night, spending a night with him in a car, and going about with him continually in the absence of your husband, misconduct?’
‘Not in itself.’
‘Very well. You have said that until you saw him on the ship you had never seen the co-respondent. Could you explain how it was that from, I think, the second day at sea you were so thick with him?’
‘I was not thick with him at first.’
‘Oh, come! Always together, weren’t you?’
‘Often, not always.’
‘Often, not always – from the second day?’
‘Yes, a ship is a ship.’
‘Quite true, Lady Corven. And you had never seen him before?’
‘Not to my knowledge.’
‘Ceylon is not a large place, is it, from a society point of view?’
‘It is not.’
‘Lots of polo matches, cricket matches, other functions where you are constantly meeting the same people.’
‘Yes.’
‘And yet you never met Mr Croom? Odd, wasn’t it?’
‘Not at all. Mr Croom was on a plantation.’
‘But he played polo, I think?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you are a horsewoman, very interested in all that sort of thing?’
‘Yes.’
‘And yet you never met Mr Croom?’
‘I have said I never did. If you ask me till tomorrow I shall say the same.’
Dinny drew in her breath. Before her sprang up a mental snapshot of Clare as a little girl being questioned about Oliver Cromwell.
The slow rich voice went on:
‘You never missed a polo match at Kandy, did you?’
‘Never, if I could help it.’
‘And on one occasion you entertained the players?’
Dinny could see a frown on her sister’s brow.
‘Yes.’
‘When was that?’
‘I believe it was last June.’
‘Mr Croom was one of the players, wasn’t he?’
‘If he was, I didn’t see him.’
‘You entertained him but you did not see him?’
‘I did not.’
‘Is that usual with hostesses in Kandy?’
‘There were quite a lot of people, if I remember.’
‘Come now, Lady Corven, here is the programme of the match – just take a look at it to refresh your memory.’
‘I remember the match perfectly.’
‘But you don’t remember Mr Croom, either on the ground, or afterwards at your house?’
‘I don’t. I was interested in the play of the Kandy team, and afterwards there too many people. If I remembered him I should say so at once.’
It seemed to Dinny an immense time before the next question came.
‘I am suggesting, you know, that you did not meet as strangers on the boat?’
‘You may suggest what you like, but we did.’
‘So you say.’
Catching her father’s muttered: ‘Damn the fellow!’ Dinny touched his arm with her own.
‘You heard the stewardess give her evidence? Was that the only time the co-respondent came to your state-room?’
‘The only time he came for more than a minute.’
‘Oh! He did come at other times?’
‘Once or twice to borrow or return a book.’
‘On the occasion when he came and spent – what was it? – half an hour there –’
‘Twenty minutes, I should say.’
‘Twenty minutes – what were you doing?’
‘Showing him photographs.’
‘Oh! Why not on deck?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Didn’t it occur to you that it was indiscreet?’
‘I didn’t think about it. There were a lot of photos – snapshots and photos of my family.’
‘But nothing that you couldn’t have shown him perfectly in the saloon or on deck?’
‘I suppose not.’
‘I take it you imagined he wouldn’t be seen?’
‘I tell you I didn’t think about it.’
‘Who proposed that he should come?’
‘I did.’
‘You knew you were in a very dubious position?’
‘Yes, but other people didn’t.’
‘You could have shown him those photographs anywhere? Looking back on it, don’t you think it was singular of you to do such a compromising thing for no reason at all?’
‘It was less trouble to show them to him in the cabin; besides, they were private photos.’
‘Now, Lady Corven, do you mean to say that nothing whatever took place between you during those twenty minutes?’