The Benson Murder Case by S. S. Van Dine Page B

mightn’t it?” she parried.
    â€œHe was, in fact, much interested in you?” persisted Markham.
    She made a
moue
, and sighed.
    â€œAlas, yes! Too much for my peace of mind…. Have I been brought here to discuss the attentions this gentleman paid me?”
    Again Markham ignored her query.
    â€œWhere were you, Miss St. Clair, between the time you left the ‘Marseilles’ at midnight and the time you arrived home—which, I understand, was after one o’clock?”
    â€œYou are simply wonderful!” she exclaimed. “You seemto know everything…. Well, I can only say that during that time I was on my way home.”
    â€œDid it take you an hour to go from Fortieth Street to Eighty-first and Riverside Drive?”
    â€œJust about that, I should say—a few minutes more or less, perhaps.”
    â€œHow do you account for that?” Markham was becoming impatient.
    â€œI can’t account for it,” she said, “except by the passage of time. Time does fly, doesn’t it, Mr. Markham?”
    â€œBy your attitude you are only working detriment to yourself,” Markham warned her, with a show of irritation. “Can you not see the seriousness of your position? You are known to have dined with Mr. Benson, to have left the restaurant at midnight, and to have arrived at your own apartment after one o’clock. At twelve-thirty, Mr. Benson was shot; and your personal articles were found in the same room the morning after.”
    â€œIt looks terribly suspicious, I know,” she admitted, with whimsical seriousness. “And I’ll tell you this, Mr. Markham, if my thoughts could have killed Mr. Benson, he would have died long ago. I know I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead—there’s a saying about it beginning ‘
de mortuis
,’ isn’t there?—but the truth is, I had reason to dislike Mr. Benson exceedingly.”
    â€œThen why did you go to dinner with him?”
    â€œI’ve asked myself the same question a dozen times since,” she confessed dolefully. “We women are such impulsive creatures—always doing things we shouldn’t…. But I know what you’re thinking: if I had intended to shoot him, that would have been a natural preliminary. Isn’t that what’s in your mind? I suppose all murderesses do go to dinner with their victims first.”
    While she spoke she opened her vanity-case and looked at her reflection in its mirror. She daintily adjusted several imaginary stray ends of her abundant dark-brown hair, and touched her arched eye-brows gently with her little finger as if to rectify some infinitesimal disturbance in their pencilled contour. Then she tilted her head, regarded herself appraisingly, and returned her gaze to the District Attorney only as she came to the end of her speech. Her actions hadperfectly conveyed to her listeners the impression that the subject of the conversation was, in her scheme of things, of secondary importance to her personal appearance. No words could have expressed her indifference so convincingly as had her little pantomime.
    Markham was becoming exasperated. A different type of district attorney would no doubt have attempted to use the pressure of his office to force her into a more amenable frame of mind. But Markham shrank instinctively from the bludgeoning, threatening methods of the ordinary Public Prosecutor, especially in his dealings with women. In the present case, however, had it not been for Vance’s strictures at the Club, he would no doubt have taken a more aggressive stand. But it was evident he was labouring under a burden of uncertainty superinduced by Vance’s words and augmented by the evasive deportment of the woman herself.
    After a moment’s silence he asked grimly:
    â€œYou did considerable speculating through the firm of Benson and Benson, did you not?”
    A faint ring of musical laughter greeted this