'I'm sorry to have kept you waiting. You've been up all night, haven't you?'
'Quite,' he answered quietly, letting his fatigue show, and for the first time, smiled at her. 'Do you feel up to answering any questions, now?'
Pamela nodded, and she followed him and two of his officers into the library.
They no sooner sat down than Ellie stuck her head in the door.
'Would you like some tea, Chief Inspector? Pamela hasn't so much as eaten breakfast yet, so I'm sure she'd love some.'
'That'ud be lovely,' the Chief Inspector replied with a forgiving smile.
'Now, young lady,' he said, turning his attention to Pamela when Ellie had left, 'let's get down to business. What exactly did you see? Tell me everything. And leave nothing out, no matter how inconsequential or trivial it might seem.'
The interrogation went on for almost three hours and in that time Pamela wondered if the police were learning anything useful or if they were just going to go on like this forever. They recorded every word she said, went over and over certain parts of her story, sometimes asking her things that made little sense, at least to her, but which seemed to possess a great deal of significance to them. In the end, however, they actually seemed satisfied.
'Well,' chief inspector Matthews said, pushing back his chair, rising to his feet, and taking her hand, which practically disappeared into his own, 'I think that should do it. Thank you, Miss Dee, you've been of great service.'
Feeling a bit baffled, she said, 'I don't see how.'
Smiling benevolently, like a great bear, he said, 'Let's just say that you've told us a great deal without meaning to. That there are certain . . . things . . . that we're looking for; things that you yourself have just verified for us.'
As she went with them back to the living room her thoughts were dragged back to a realisation she had being trying to force from her mind for good, that Albert Askrigg was still at large, possibly somewhere nearby, and that he was still intent on killing her. Inextricably bound to this revelation were her newly awakened feelings towards Theo, her love for him and the damnable indifference of the man. Accompanying this was the almost mad wish that Theo would pay her half the attention that Albert Askrigg did, but in a good way. 'Theo is a good man,' she tried telling herself. And in the same breath discovered that she wasn't sure of anything.