“Brenda may have been expected and not have arrived,” he explained, condescending, at last, to point out all the obvious inferences I had missed.  “In which case, my friend, Miss Banks’s suppressio veri was, in my judgment, quite venial.  Indeed, she was, if the facts are, as I suppose, perfectly honest in her surprise.  Let us assume that she had arranged to let Brenda in, at say twelve-thirty, and having her father and mother under her thumb, had warned them to take no notice if Racquet started his cursed shindy in the middle of the night.  The servant may have been told that Mr. Arthur might be coming.  You will notice, also, that Miss Banks had not, at one-thirty, gone to bed, although we may infer that she had undressed.  Furthermore, it is a fair assumption that she saw us coming, and having, by then given up, it may be, any hope of seeing Brenda, she was, no doubt, considerably at a loss to account for our presence.  Now, does that or does it not cover the facts, and does it acquit Miss Banks of the charge of perjury?”

I was forced, something reluctantly, to concede an element of probability in his inferences, although his argument following the legal tradition was based on a kind of average law of human motive and took no account of personal peculiarities.  He did not try to consider what Anne would do in certain circumstances, but what would be done by that vaguely-conceived hermaphrodite who figures in the Law Courts and elsewhere as “Anyone.”  I could hear Jervaise saying, “I ask you, gentlemen, what would you have done, what would Anyone have done in such a case as this?”

“Hm!” I commented, and added, “It still makes Miss Banks appear rather—­double-faced.”

“Can’t see it,” Jervaise replied.  “Put yourself in her place and see how it works!”

“Oh!  Lord!” I murmured, struck by the grotesque idea of Jervaise attempting to see life through the eyes of Anne.  Imagine a rhinoceros thinking itself into the experiences of a skylark!

Jervaise bored ahead, taking no notice of my interruption.  “Assuming for the moment the general probability of my theory,” he said, “mayn’t we hazard the further assumption that Brenda was going to the farm in the first instance to meet Banks?  His sister, we will suppose, being willing to sanction such a more or less chaperoned assignation.  Then, when the pair didn’t turn up, she guesses that the meeting is off for some reason or another, but obviously her friendship for Brenda—­to say nothing of loyalty to her brother—­would make her conceal the fact of the proposed assignation from us.  Would you call that being ‘double-faced’?  I shouldn’t.”

“Oh! yes; it’s all very reasonable,” I agreed petulantly.  “But how does it affect the immediate situation?  Do you, for instance, expect to find your sister at home when we get back?”

“I do,” assented Jervaise definitely.  “I believe that Miss Banks had some good reason for being so sure that we should find her there.”