"I'm quite sure you didn't!" replied Rhona, with a satirical laugh. "You're under some queer mistaken impression, Mr. Matherfield. Lady Riversreade was in her own house, here, with me at 9.30 yesterday morning. That's a fact that I can vouch for!"
The two men looked at each other. Each seemed to be asking the other a silent question. But Matherfield suddenly voiced his, in tones full of wonder and of chagrin.
"Then who on earth is that woman that I followed to Southampton?"
Matherfield's question went without answer. Rhona, who had no idea of what he was talking about, turned a surprised and inquiring look on Hetherwick. And Hetherwick saw that the time had come for a lot of explanation.
"Look here!" he said. "We've got to do some talking, and we can't keep Miss Hannaford standing in the street. Come into the hotel--we'll get a private room for lunch, and then we can discuss matters all to ourselves. You're a bit puzzled by all this," he continued a few minutes later, turning to Rhona when all three were safely closeted together, and lunch had been ordered. "And no wonder! But I'd better tell you what Matherfield and I were after on Monday night, and what Matherfield was doing all yesterday. You see," he concluded, after giving Rhona an epitomised account of the recent proceedings, "I was absolutely certain that the woman whom we saw coming out of Vivian's on Monday night was the woman you pointed out to me on Sunday morning at Victoria as Lady Riversreade--she was dressed in just the same things, I'm positive!--in short I'm convinced it was Lady Riversreade. Then, Matherfield and I are both equally sure that that was the same woman we saw coming out of St. Mary's Mansions shortly before five o'clock yesterday morning, and whom Matherfield followed to Southampton, Up to now, we've never had a doubt that it was Lady Riversreade--not a doubt!"
"Well," said Rhona, with an incredulous laugh, "I can't say, of course, that you didn't see Lady Riversreade come out of Vivian's on Monday night. Lady Riversreade was certainly in town from Sunday noon to yesterday morning, and she may have gone to Vivian's on Monday night for purposes of her own. I know nothing about that. But I do know that she was not in Southampton yesterday, for, as I told you, she was back home at Riversreade Court, about half-past nine in the morning, and she's never left the house since. That's plain fact!"