Silence in Court (29 page)

He had his back to the door, so that he had time to say, “Is that you, Nora?” before she crossed his line of vision.

She said “No” in a quiet voice and took the chair on the other side of the hearth. Now they were sitting where they had sat on the first evening, a long, long time ago. She was even wearing the same dress, and the brooch that had been Julia's which Honoria Maquisten had given her to wear with it. Julia had been dead for fifty years, but the big pale sapphire with its ring of grey rose-diamonds hadn't changed. The stuff of her dress was as soft and blue as it had been before she stood her trial for murder. Things that mattered more than a stone and a frock had perished—things which ought to have endured, but once they were gone you couldn't bring them back again. She met Dennis Harland's eyes and said,

“Why did you think I did it?”

He looked away.

“It's over—better let it go.”

Carey shook her head.

“No—I want to know—I've got to know.”

He gave the old slight shrug of the shoulder which she remembered.

“I don't like post-mortems myself—women love them. Have it your own way. I thought it was you because as far as I could make out it was a choice between you and me, and I knew it wasn't me. And Ellen said she saw you in the bathroom.”

Carey drew a quick breath.

“When?”

“After she left you in the bedroom with Aunt Honoria. She went along the passage to the landing and stood there waiting for Honor to come down. The bathroom door was in sight, and she said you opened it and looked out.”

Carey said scornfully, “She didn't say that at the trial.”

“She promised she wouldn't unless she was asked point-blank.”

“It wasn't true. Why did you make her promise?”

“Because it would have hanged you.”

“Am I supposed to thank you for that?”

“I don't think you've got very much to thank me for.”

Carey said, “Nor do I.”

All at once he was leaning forward, his hands between his knees.

“Do you suppose I wanted to think it was you? Do you suppose I haven't been through hell thinking it? What do you suppose it was like? I'd loved her all my life, and I was in love with you, and I thought you had killed her to get yourself out of a jam. What did you expect me to do? Ellen swore it was you. I shut her mouth on the one thing which would certainly have hanged you.”

Carey looked at him curiously.

“Why should I look out into the passage?”

An eyebrow rose.

“To see if anyone was coming of course. You had to know if there was time for you to add the extra dope.”

“I see. And you never thought that the person who had all the time in the world to dope that draught was Ellen herself?”

Without quite knowing how it had happened, their tongues were free. The old quick give-and-take was there again. He said,

“No, I didn't—nobody did. Stupid of us perhaps—damned stupid if you like—but, you see, we couldn't any of us get past the positive fact that she did love Aunt Honoria.”

Carey said soberly, “She killed her.”

“Because she loved somebody else better. But then, you see, we didn't know about that. Ernest was just Aylwin's clerk, sucking up to Honor—something to make a family joke of. I expect Ellen heard us. She didn't love us much before, and she must have fairly hated us all before she was through. And I think that in a sort of crazy way the whole of that hatred got focussed on you. Of course she was as jealous as fury about Aunt Honoria falling for you the way she did.”

Carey gave a grave little nod.

“Why did she let you shut her mouth? She'd made up that story about my looking out into the passage—she did make it up, you know. I never went near the bathroom. Well, when she'd got that all made up and ready, why did she let you stop her? Why didn't she come out with it at the trial?”

“I imagine because Ernest told her not to. He knows his stuff all right. I've thought a lot about their evidence, and I believe they stuck very closely to the truth. That's what made it so dangerous. I believe all those conversations with Aunt Honoria were absolutely true. I don't think either of them could have invented anything so like the way she talked, but all that about the rocket and the stick and ‘those that go up quick can come down quick'—well it wasn't meant for you, it was meant for Ernest. So I think he wouldn't let Ellen embark on anything which she had made up. There were to be no unnecessary lies. I am sure she was very carefully coached. Think back over their evidence. They were both careful not to swear that Aunt Honoria had mentioned you by name. I can see Ernest there. Left to herself, Ellen would have gone the whole hog, but Ernest is a cautious soul. He thinks Miss Gwent is out of the way for six months, and that means that the trial will be over and done with and out of mind before she gets to hear about it. Everyone knows what mails to the Middle East have been like, and she was going to be moving about. Besides, who was going to write? None of her own friends had ever heard of Aunt Honoria. If by any chance Mr. Aylwin were to write, nothing would be easier than for Ernest to suppress the letter. By the time Miss Gwent got back the whole thing would have been past history. But just in case it wasn't past enough and Miss Gwent ever came out with why that letter must have been one her mother wrote—well, he and Ellen would still be quite all right even it Miss Gwent knew that it was Honor who was going to be cut out of the will. They thought Aunt Honoria was talking about you—they were honestly convinced that she was—but of course she hadn't mentioned your name, and if they had made a mistake it was very regrettable, but they could only say what they thought at the time. What they didn't know was that Aunt Honoria had told Mrs. Gwent all about Ellen having a baby about thirty-five years before, and that Mrs. Gwent had passed the information on to her daughter. Miss Gwent even knew where to send Mordaunt for the birth-certificate. Aunt Honoria apparently wouldn't stand for any hankypanky about the registration. He's down as Ernest Hood Bridling all right, but he was brought up as Ernest Hood.”

Carey said quick and low, “It's horrible.”

An eyebrow jerked.

“Middling,” he said drily. “I gather the police are having a headache over getting enough evidence to run him in. They've arrested Ellen, but so far there isn't a shred of evidence that she didn't do it off her own bat just to save Honor's fifty thousand for her darling son.”

“Do you—think—they planned it—between them?”

“Don't you? Remember Ellen's door just opposite Aunt Honoria's and nearly always open. She knew there was an unholy row brewing because everyone in the house knew that, and she'd know that Ernest had been sent for, because Molly had orders to bring him up as soon as he came. Don't you think she'd have been waiting to have a word with him when he came out?”

“Do you think they planned it then?”

“No, I don't. It would have been too dangerous. I don't believe he'd have risked it. I think he told her to meet him somewhere when he got away from the office, which he did at half past five. I checked up on that myself because I wanted to be sure that he couldn't have met Honor, and that was all right. He was back in the office before she left her parcels place, and she was back here before he left the office—they couldn't have met. But Ellen went out ‘to the post' at twenty past five, and I don't mind betting that ‘the post' was Ernest, and that she got her instructions then—she simply hadn't got the brains to work it out for herself. But she has got the most phenomenal memory. She'll repeat a long conversation and get it word-perfect, or tell some interminable story a dozen times and never vary a syllable. I've heard her doing it since I was a child.” He stopped dead, and then said slowly and painfully, “That's why I believed her evidence, Carey.”

The tears stung in Carey's eyes. She bit her lip and nodded.

He went on.

“I think he told her just what she was to do. Look what a careful alibi was provided for Honor. If she had been even slightly under suspicion it would have, been too dangerous for Ernest to marry her. She had to be kept absolutely clear, and it was very cleverly and plausibly done.”

Carey said suddenly,

“But Aunt Honoria wasn't angry with Ellen. If she knew that Ernest had been making love to Honor and she was furious with them; then why wasn't she furious with Ellen too?”

Dennis looked grim.

“That's the nastiest part of it, my dear. There's only one way of accounting for it. Ellen must have absolutely convinced Aunt Honoria that she hadn't known anything about what was going on, and that she was just as much shocked and horrified as she was herself. And once she was convinced of that, don't you see what a strong position Ellen was in? She knew from previous experience that Aunt Honoria would be given a sleeping-draught—she always had one after an upset, and this was a bad one. She knew that it was Magda's evening off, and she would know just how to make sure that Aunt Honoria would insist on Magda going out. A suggestion of eavesdropping would have done it all right, and after that everything was easy. She came away and left you alone with Aunt Honoria after dinner so as to provide time for you to go into the bathroom and tamper with the draught, and if Honor or I had come along too soon she would have delayed us on the landing. It's all so beautifully clear now that one has the key.” His tone was very bitter as he ended.

Carey looked at him.

“Dennis—don't mind so much.” She saw his face change, and went on quickly, “Please—
please
don't! Let's just wipe it all out and be friends again.”

“Can we?”

“I don't see why we can't.”

“Don't you, darling?” It was the old light tone, but the bitterness ran underneath.

Carey said, “No, I don't. You see, I never really had any family before, and it wasn't easy to have friends of my own age when I was at the Andrews'. He was a darling, and she was very kind to me, only she took quirks about things and nearly everything shocked her.”

“I can't imagine how you stood it.”

“Oh, she isn't as bad as she sounds. She was having an aggravated attack of conscience in the witness-box—she gets them sometimes. But he was a lamb, and I met a lot of interesting people—only not young. And then I came here, and you were all so nice to me. And Jeff wanted me to say I would marry him, but I didn't want to be rushed. I wanted to play about a bit and not be in a hurry, and you were the very nicest playfellow.”

“No more than that?”

“Now, Den, you know perfectly well you didn't want to be anything more.”

“Didn't I?”

“No, you didn't,” said Carey firmly. “Nor did I.”

He looked right into her eyes for a moment, his own very bright and rather cynical. Then he burst out laughing.

“Are you refusing me, darling?”

Carey's colour rose.

“I don't think there was anything to refuse.”

“That wouldn't matter, would it? Did you never hear of Jenny Baxter, who refused the man before he axed her?”

“Den, do be good! We can't go on playing, but I want to be friends.”

His mouth twisted.

“Do you want to be a sister to me, darling?”

She laughed, but her eyes were full of tears.

“I wouldn't mind. I want to be friends, like you are with Nora. You see, I know just what it's been like for you.”

“Do you? I wonder. I hope you don't.”

Carey went on steadily.

“You loved Cousin Honoria, and you were getting to be just a little bit in love with me. Then you thought I'd killed her, and you were afraid I'd make you forget what she'd done for you and what you felt about her, so you rather piled everything up against me to make yourself do what you thought you ought to do, and the more it hurt, the more you had to do it. That's true—isn't it?”

He looked at her for one direct moment and said, “Yes.” Then he got up, reached for the cigarette-case lying open on the mantelpiece, and busied himself with lighting a cigarette. When he had got it going he said over his shoulder,

“Going to marry Jeff?”

Carey didn't answer, because the door opened suddenly and Nora and Jeff came in.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

It appeared that they had met on the doorstep, and that they each had news. Nora got hers out first, throwing off her coat, her cap, her gloves, and talking all the time.

“I went to try and see Honor, and I got Chief Inspector McGillivray. He says they've just about finished with her for the moment and she can come home. They've asked her millions of questions, and I expect she'll be in a flat spin, but thank goodness they don't seem to be going to arrest her. I told McGillivray that he ought to have more brains than to imagine that Honor would do anything but sit down and moan if she thought she was going to be cut out of a will, and he said, ‘I'm inclined to agree with ye.' Very growly and Scotch, but with rather a twinkle in the eye. So I suppose she'll be back any moment now—only what we're going to do with her, I don't know.”

Dennis gave her his charming smile.

“She will continue to be our little ray of sunshine, darling. It's a glad prospect. Why didn't you bring her with you?”

“McGillivray said I'd better not. He said she was hysterical, and they'd send her back with a policewoman in a taxi. He patted my shoulder and told me to run along and put a hot-water bottle in her bed. He's rather a pet.”

The door opened again and Molly came in with the tea. As she set down the tray, Nora said easily,

“Miss Honor will be back any time now. You'd better put two hot-water bottles in her bed please, Molly.”

Molly made eyes like saucers.

“Miss Honor?”