Plot It Yourself

“When did you know?” She might have been in a trance.

“Last evening. Alice Porter gave me the hint, unwittingly. When I showed her that her position was untenable and told her that I would advise you to prosecute, she was not concerned, she said you wouldn’t dare, but when I added that I would also advise Mr Imhof to prosecute she took alarm. That was highly suggestive. Upon consideration I sent her home, and I did something I might have done much sooner if there had been the faintest reason to suspect you. I read your book. Knock at My Door, or enough of it to conclude that you had written the stories on which the first three claims had been based. That was manifest from the characteristics of your style.”

Her head moved, slowly, from side to side. “No,” she said. “You knew before that. You knew the third time we were here. You said it was possible it was one of us.”

“That was only talk. At that point anything was possible.”

“I was sure you knew,” she insisted. “I was sure you had read my book. That was what I’d been afraid of since the second time we came, when you told us about comparing the stories. That was when I realized how stupid I had been not to write them in a different style, but you see I didn’t really know I had a style. I thought only good writers had a style. But I was stupid. That was my big mistake. Wasn’t it?”

They were all staring at her, and no wonder. From her tone and her expression you might have thought Wolfe was conducting a class in the technique of writing and she was anxious to learn. “I doubt if it could properly be called a mistake,” he said. “A little thoughtless, perhaps. After all, no one had ever compared the stories before I did, and I wouldn’t have compared them with your book if I hadn’t got that hint from Miss Porter. Indeed, Miss Wynn, I wouldn’t say that you made any mistakes at all.”

“Of course I did.” She was quietly indignant. “You’re just being polite. All my life I’ve been making mistakes. The biggest one was when I decided I was going to be a writer, but of course I was young then. You don’t mind if I talk about it? I want to.”

“Go ahead. But fourteen people are listening.”