She shook her head. “Sorry, but I can't. We haven't been on speaking terms for months.”

“Excuse me, miss, but if that's so, how do you come to be in Mr Vereker's house now?”

“Oh, that's easy,” she replied. “He wrote me a letter which made me see red, so I came down to have it out with him.”

“May I ask if you have that letter, miss?”

“Yes, but I don't propose to show it to you, if that's what you're after. Purely personal.”

“I take it the matter was very pressing? Mr Vereker would have been in London again on Monday?”

“Well, I didn't feel like waiting till Monday,” retorted Antonia. “He wasn't in Eaton Place when I rang up, so I took a chance on his being here. He wasn't, but the beds were made up, and there was some milk and butter and eggs and things in the larder, which made it look fairly certain that he was expected, so I waited for him. When he didn't turn up at midnight I went to bed, because it seemed to be a bit late to go home again then.”

“I see. And you haven't been out of the house since - I think you said it was about seven o'clock - last night?”

“Yes, of course I've been out of the house since then,” she said impatiently. “I took the dog for a run just before I turned in. That's when he had the fight. A mangy looking retriever set on him about half a mile from here. Blood and fur all over the place. However, there was no real damage done.”

The Constable was surveying the bull-terrier, lying watchfully by the door. “You dog wasn't hurt then, miss?” he ventured.

She looked contemptous. “Hardly at all. He's a bull terrier.”

“I was only thinking, miss,” said the Constable, with a deprecating glance towards the Inspector, “that it was odd your dog wasn't bitten too.”

“You don't seem to know much about bull-terriers,” said Antonia.

“That'll do, Dickenson,” intervened the Inspector. He addressed Antonia again. “I shall have to ask you, miss, if you would come back to the Police Station with me. You'll understand that you being a relative, and in Mr Vereker's house at the time, the Chief Constable would like to have your statement, and any particulars you can give of the deceased's -”