Later in the day Brendon returned to his hotel and introduced himself to Miss Reed and her family to find that her brother, Robert Redmayne’s friend, had returned to London.  She and her parents were sitting together in the lounge when he joined them.  All three appeared to be much shocked and painfully mystified.  None could throw any light.  Mr. and Mrs. Reed were quiet, elderly people who kept a draper shop in London; their daughter revealed more character.  She was a head taller than her father and cast in a generous mould.  She exhibited a good deal of manner and less actual sorrow than might have been expected; but Brendon discovered that she had only known Robert Redmayne for half a year and their actual engagement was not of much more than a month’s duration.  Miss Reed was dark, animated, and commonplace of mind.  Her ambition had been to go upon the stage and she had acted on tour in the country; but she declared that theatrical life wearied her and she had promised her future husband to abandon the art.

“Did you ever hear Captain Redmayne speak of his niece and her husband?” Brendon inquired, and Flora Reed answered: 

“He did; and he always said that Michael Pendean was a ‘shirker’ and a coward.  He also assured me that he had done with his niece and should never forgive her for marrying her husband.  But that was before Bob went to Princetown, six days ago.  From there he wrote quite a different story.  He had met them by chance and he found that Mr. Pendean had not shirked but done good work in the war and got the O.B.E.  After that discovery, Bob changed and he was certainly on the best of terms with the Pendeans before this awful thing happened.  He had already made them promise to come here for the regattas.”

“You have neither seen nor heard of the captain since?”

“Indeed, no.  My last letter, which you can see, came three days ago.  In it he merely said he would be back yesterday and meet me to bathe as usual.  I went to bathe and looked out for him, but of course he didn’t come.”

“Tell me a little about him, Miss Reed,” said Mark.  “It is good of you to give me this interview, for we are up against a curious problem and the situation, as it appears at present, may be illusive and quite unlike the real facts.  Captain Redmayne, I hear, had suffered from shell shock and a breath of poison gas also.  Did you ever notice any signs that these troubles had left any mark upon him?”

“Yes,” she answered.  “We all did.  My mother was the first to point out that Bob often repeated himself.  He was a man of great good temper, but the war had made him rough and cynical in some respects.  He was impatient, yet, after he quarrelled or had a difference with anybody, he would be quickly sorry; and he was never ashamed to apologize.”

“Did he quarrel often?”

“He was very opinionated and, of course, he had seen a good deal of actual war.  It had made him a little callous and he would sometimes say things that shocked civilians.  Then they would protest and make him angry.”