CHAPTER 27The curtains were drawn in Miss Fane’s study. They were of a handsome golden brown damask, a shade lighter than the woodwork. In combination with the glowing fire—the police are always handy with a fire—they made the room a good many degrees less bleak. Light came from a bowl in the ceiling. It showed Superintendent March, pleasant but official, at the writing-table, and Carey Desborough facing him across it in as easy an attitude as a hard and upright chair allowed. March had just said,
“I believe you and Miss Lyle were engaged.”
The statement was a little disingenuous. Or perhaps that is putting it too politely, since he believed no such thing. He merely wished to observe Mr. Desborough’s reactions. They were displayed in a lifted eyebrow and a faint stiffening of manner as h
