The Girl In The Cellar (18 page)

He said he’d let us know.’

‘Then he will do so,’ said Miss Silver firmly.

Jim stood looking out into the street, his back to the room.

‘And if he has nothing to tell?’

Miss Silver was knitting. She looked compassionately across the football sweater destined for her niece Ethel Burkett’s eldest boy and said, ‘He will have something. I am sure of it.’

‘And if he has not?’

Miss Silver did not reply. The most trying moments in human experience were those in which there was nothing to be done except to wait. They were especially trying for a man whose previous training had been one of action. Her mind sought for something which would relieve this tension and give him something to do.

She said, ‘You were going to show me Anne’s bag.’

He half turned with an impatient jerk of the shoulders.

‘There’s nothing there.’

‘Nevertheless I should like to see it. You did bring it away, did you not?’

‘Oh, yes, I brought it away. There’s nothing in it—except the money.’

‘I should like to see it.’

‘I tell you there’s nothing in it.’

Miss Silver knitted in silence. At a less hazardous moment she would have implied some reproof, but this was not the time for reproof, and what had begun by being a mere distraction to relieve a most trying time of waiting had now assumed an importance which she could neither justify nor abandon. When she was quite sure that she could speak in her usual controlled manner she said, ‘Mr Fancourt, I do not wish to be troublesome, but I would greatly appreciate it if you would show me that bag.’

He turned from the window to face her.

‘There’s nothing in it.’

‘Will you let me see that for myself? I do not wish to be tiresome, or to give you extra to do, but I would appreciate it—’

All at once he was as anxious to go as he had been obstinately fixed to stay. Anything was better than to count the moments whilst they prolonged themselves into endless time.

Miss Silver continued to knit. It would take him an hour to go to his rooms and get the bag—at least an hour. It would be much better for him than counting the moments and eating his heart out.

It was just over the hour when Emma Meadows let him in. He certainly looked better, and Miss Silver congratulated herself. Even if there were no other result, the expedition would have been well worth while. He was holding the bag loose and unwrapped. Emma Meadows had barely shut the door upon him before he said, “There’s nothing there—nothing at all. I knew there wasn’t.’

Miss Silver put down the almost finished sweater and held out her hand.

‘May I see?’

He repeated, ‘There’s nothing,’ handed the bag over, and flung himself down in the chair with its back to the window.

Miss Silver took the bag and opened it. She told herself that she expected nothing, but as her hands touched the clasp she knew that she was going to find something. She couldn’t say how she knew it, but she did know it. Yet when she opened the bag it seemed to be quite empty. Jim had taken out the notes and the little change that was left in the purse and put them away. The bag was empty—a black bag with a grey lining, and in the middle an inner compartment divided down the centre, one half grey, and one white kid for a powder-puff. The little purse at the side was quite empty. It had held coppers and silver. Miss Silver remembered that she had seen Anne looking amongst notes and change for something that would tell her who she was, where she came from, and where she was going. There had been a letter between the side purse and the one in the middle. Now there wasn’t anything there at all.

Miss Silver felt an acute disappointment as she let the bag fall into her lap. And then in that very moment she knew that her premonition had been real, for as the bag dropped she was aware of something faint but quite unmistakable.

Jim said impatiently, “There’s nothing there. I’ve looked.’

But Miss Silver picked up the bag again. ‘I am not so sure,’ she said.

She began to turn the bag inside out. There was a little dust and a shred or two of paper. And then, down at the bottom where the side seam ended, there was a little hole. It wasn’t a hole in the stuff. It was just a careless bit of work in a new bag, a fold pressed over and not stitched down. You could have looked in the bag a hundred times and not have seen it, but it was just the place where a little twist of paper might stick and hide itself.

There was a little twist of paper there. Jim got up from his chair and watched while Miss Silver fished for it with one of her knitting-needles and finally brought it out. It was quite a small piece. It had on it two addresses, one stamped and the other written. The stamped address said ‘The Hood Hotel’, Mayville Street, and a telephone number. The written name was in Anne’s handwriting—Miss Anne Forest, Yew Tree Cottage, Swan Eaton, Sussex.

Jim said, ‘How on earth—’ and then stopped.

Miss Silver went on looking at the address. Anne Forest, Yew Tree Cottage, Swan Eaton—That was her name and her address, then. But how did it come to be here in the other girl’s bag? This was the other girl’s bag—the dead girl’s bag— the girl who had been murdered in the empty house. What had Anne’s name and Anne’s address to do with her?

She lifted her eyes very gravely to Jim’s face and said, ‘I think we must ring up the hotel.’

Jim said in a stumbling voice, ‘What does it mean?’

Miss Silver said, ‘It means we have Anne’s name and, I think, her address.’

‘You think that is her name?’

‘I should say so. It looks to me as if the murdered girl was staying in the same hotel, and as if Anne Forest had given her this address.’

‘I don’t see how that could have been.’

‘We cannot expect to see plainly all at once. We shall know more when we have rung up the hotel.’ She crossed over to the writing-table, took up the telephone, and gave the number of the Hood Hotel.

Jim came to stand beside her. He could not hear what was said at the desk of the hotel. There was a running murmur of sound, and every now and then Miss Silver’s voice intervening to ask a question. The questions were what he could have asked himself. It was maddening not to be able to distinguish the answers.

‘You had a Miss Anne Forest staying with you about a fortnight ago?’ That was the first question.

Miss Silver gave him a nod. Yes, they had had a Miss Anne Forest staying there. They still had her luggage. She had gone out and had not returned. They were much concerned, but she had been talking of going to visit friends, and they hadn’t liked to take any action. All the same—

Miss Silver continued, ‘Did you also have a Mrs Fancourt staying in the hotel?’

No, there had been no Mrs Fancourt.

It was a blow. If she had not been staying at the same hotel, how had the two girls met? There was just one more chance. Miss Silver took it. She had not a great deal of hope, but she would ask the question. She asked it. ‘Did you perhaps have a Miss Anne Borrowdale staying with you?’

More to her surprise than she would have been ready to admit, the voice at the other end of the line immediately replied in quite an animated manner.

‘Oh, yes, she was here. And she left on the same day as Miss Forest did. That was one reason why we did not think very seriously about Miss Forest leaving us. She had made friends with Miss Borrowdale, and we took it for granted that they had gone away together. I hope there is nothing wrong?’

Miss Silver replied in a grave voice.

‘I hope not. I am ringing up for Mr Fancourt.’

She put a few more questions, then replaced the receiver and turned round.

‘They were both staying at the Hood.’

‘How? Why?’

‘I do not know. There are several ways that it could have happened. Anne, the one who is dead, was here. Anne, the one who is alive, had landed from America. She had just landed. That would account for her not being missed here. The girl at the hotel said she had been round the world with a friend who had married and had stayed in America. They would have been more concerned if she had not left all her boxes—there were a good many of them. And then the maid who had waited on her had met with an accident and been taken to hospital. They thought it possible that Anne Forest had told her something that would account for her absence. It could happen quite easily. As regards the other Anne, the girl who was killed, she had very little luggage.’

‘I can’t think how she came to be in the hotel at all. I sent her to the Birdstocks to wait until she heard from Lilian.’

Miss Silver was silent for a moment. Then she said, ‘If she was the girl who visited Mrs Birdstock and received your aunt’s letter—and I think she must have been—she was a free agent then. Had she a foreign accent?’

Jim considered.

‘No—not noticeably.’

There were a few minutes’ silence. Then Miss Silver took up the telephone again.

‘I think we should let Inspector Abbott know,’ she said.

Anne felt her head go round and clear. She knew everything now. She had remembered everything. She was thankful for the chair which had been handy. She might have fallen. She had not fallen. The chair held her up. Her head would settle in a moment. Ross didn’t look at her or speak to her. He was ashamed. And the other man had gone to the fire, and stood with his back to her and prodded sausages with a fork.

She remembered everything with astonishing clarity. Coming to the hotel. The chambermaid who came to her room—a pale girl, rather pretty. She remembered what she had for dinner, and that she had been tired and had gone up early to bed, but she had not slept well. It had been a curious night. She couldn’t remember one just like it—rushing images, dreams that came and went, and went and came again. And then the morning—the girl. It was all quite clear in her mind. She came into the dining-room for breakfast and looked for a table, and there over by the window there was a table for two, and there was a girl sitting at it. There was something in her face like a lost kitten. Anne found herself walking towards her. She pulled out the other chair and said, ‘Do you mind if I sit here?’ and the girl’s face had lighted up, ‘Yes, do,’ she said. ‘Oh, do!’

It was extraordinary how clear it all was. The girl who was dead in the cellar was alive again. Her voice rang in Anne’s ears—a pretty voice with something that was not quite an accent. She got up from her chair and crossed to the door. She couldn’t sit here and remember—she couldn’t

Just as she reached the door Ross turned round. He said,

‘Where are you off to? Breakfast will be ready in five minutes.’ Anne answered him steadily. ‘I won’t be long. Don’t wait.’ She heard the other man laugh as she went out of the door and up the stairs.

In her room she sat down on her bed and went on remembering. That poor child—her ignorance, her folly, and the last glimpse she had of her lying dead at the foot of the steps in a strange house. She had poured the whole thing out. ‘My name is Anne Borrowdale. Well, I don’t know whether it is or not. Perhaps it’s Anne Fancourt. That sounds funny, doesn’t it?’ And she had laughed as if it was all a joke. And then more of that tumbling speech with the something that was not quite an accent running through it. ‘You see, I don’t know whether I’m really married or not. My father, he was killed.’ Her voice went suddenly into tears and she put out her two hands to clasp Anne’s strange ones that didn’t seem strange any longer. ‘They were blasting, and a great stone hit him. Jim said he had run forward. I don’t know how it happened, but it did happen. The stone crushed him, and when he knew that he would die he wanted Jim to marry me, and the priest came and we were married. And he died.’ Her tone lightened. It flung away the past. ‘And the aeroplane came down.’ She clapped her hands together. ‘An American plane that was off its course and must come down. We watched it come nearer and nearer. You don’t know how exciting it was! And when it was down there were two young men in it, and Jim asked them would they take me with them. At first they said no, and then they said yes. That was after Jim talked to them. He told them he had married me, and that it was a matter of life and death to get me out of the country—a matter of life or death. The Russians are very particular about their nationals not going to other countries, and a Russian woman’s child is a Russian, no matter what the father may be. They would not let me go, and Jim had promised my father.’ The two hands were clapped together and she concluded, ‘So you see he persuaded those Americans to bring me with them. And they did.’

Anne remembered her own puzzled frown. She could hear the tone of voice in which she said, ‘And what are you doing here?’ The girl laughed. It came back to Anne how easily she had laughed, and come near to weeping. Now it was the turn of laughter. ‘Well, I thought’—her face screwed up in the funniest way like a little cat—‘I thought all my life I will have to do what Jim says. He is my husband. But I have money here—a lot of money from my father. Why should I not spend a little? Why must I go to that parlourmaid’s house? And I think I will not go. I will go to the hotel my father always talked about, and I will amuse myself. I am a married lady— it is all quite proper. So I post Jim’s letter to his Aunt Lilian who lives at Chantreys, Haleycott. And then I think what I will do to amuse myself.’

That was how it had gone—gay, inconsequent chatter—in the middle of it all something struggling up in her own mind, until quite suddenly she came out with ‘What did you say your father’s name was?’

The girl stopped.

‘My father?’ Tragedy swept across her mood. ‘Oh, my poor father—such a terrible way to die! What did you want to know?’

‘His name.’

‘I told you—Borrowdale.’

‘His Christian names?’ She could see the girl’s sudden suspicious state.

She said, ‘Why?’

And her own answer, ‘Because I think—I think we may be related.’

‘Oh—’

‘I shall know if you tell me his names.’

‘Leonard Maurice Forest Borrowdale.’

Anne said, ‘I am Anne Forest. I think we are cousins.’

It hurt still—the girl’s pleasure, her excitement. She was like flashing water—there were tears—smiles. It all hurt too much to remember.

From down below came the sound of a man’s footsteps.

‘What are you doing? Aren’t you coming down to breakfast?’

It went through her mind that they didn’t trust her. When you had done murder you couldn’t trust anyone. That was one of the ways in which evil punished itself. She called back, ‘I will come when I have finished what I am doing.’ She was remembering. When she had finished remembering she would go down. She couldn’t remember under the eyes of those two men. Were they both murderers? She didn’t know.

Ross called back and said, ‘Your bacon will be cold.’ Then he went into the dining-room. But he didn’t shut the door when he went in. He left it open so that he would hear when she came down the stairs. They didn’t trust her. There was no reason why they should trust her. There was murder between them. She went on thinking. The girl had stopped her excited chatter. A look of guilt came over her face. She put a hand to her lips, looked at Anne, and said, ‘Oh—’

‘What is it?’

‘I forgot’

‘What did you forget?’

‘I wasn’t to tell anyone—I wasn’t to speak of anything. What shall I do?’

Anne remembered that she had laughed, and she had said quite lightly, ‘Well, it’s too late now. And if we’re cousins it doesn’t matter.’

How had they known she would be a danger to them? It wasn’t a thing you could guess. How did they know? The poor child would have talked to anyone. She was utterly innocent, utterly unprotected. But how did they know that she needed protection?

And then there was the child telling her—‘I am married you know, but here I thought I would be Miss Borrowdale.’ She went into a little rippling laugh. ‘So I wrote all my names in the register—I wrote Anne Forest Borrowdale. It looked nice!’ And she laughed again.

It was heartbreaking to remember, but she had to go on. Anne Forest Borrowdale—she saw it all in one horrid searing flash. Ross Forest Cranston—her cousin—this poor girl’s cousin. Her own name—Anne Forest. The three names wove together in her mind. For a moment she lost herself in the giddy whirl of realisation. Then it all cleared to a deadly cold certainty. She sat in that cold certainty and looked at the facts that faced her there.

She was coming home after three years’ absence. She had written to say she was coming. She had written to the hotel and to her cousins the Cranstons—to Ross’s cousins. So he had known. She didn’t know where the other man came in— the man Maxton. He would be someone Ross knew. He was evil through and through. And Ross? She didn’t know. He had always been difficult. Aunt Letty had troubled about him a lot—Aunt Letty who would have been heartbroken if she had lived. Aunt Letty hadn’t lived. For the first time the dreadful idea came to her that Ross might know why Aunt Letty had died—and how. And she knew when the thought came that it had been there for a long, long time. She wouldn’t look at it, she wouldn’t think of it. She had put it away, but now it came out of the shadows in her mind and stood there plain to see. She made herself look at it, and then turned back.

She was herself, asking the little cousin how she had come to the Hood, and she had the answer bubbling up between tears and laughter. ‘Oh, my father—he always spoke of the Hood. We made such wonderful plans, he and I. How we would come to London and stay at the Hood, and go to the theatre, and see everything!’

She had it all. The only part she didn’t know was the end. She didn’t know how they had persuaded her little cousin to steal a march on her and go round to the house where she had been found dead. She didn’t know why her death had been decided on. She could guess that it had been precipitated by her own arrival. Only why—why—why?

She went over what she had done herself on that morning. She had been out all day—to the bank, shopping. And then she remembered that she had been very tired, so tired that she had… What had she done? Try as she would, she couldn’t remember.

And then quite suddenly it was there, just when she turned away and thought, ‘I won’t go on. It doesn’t matter.’ She saw herself walking down the passage, putting in the key, and opening the door. And there was the note on her dressing-table: ‘I’m going round to see someone. I’m going with—I won’t say who. I’ll tell you in the evening. It’s all very exciting. I’m going to number 109 Greyville Road. Anne.’ She saw herself reading it through—reading it three times. The note must have been given to that nice girl the chamber-maid. She saw herself standing, turning the note round, and then seeing the little squiggle of writing in the corner: ‘Perhaps I’ll tell you now. One of them is a man called Maxton. I don’t like him very much. The other is our cousin Ross Cranston. I’m meeting them there.’

She had met them, and she had met her death. She saw herself in front of the dressing-table, reading the words.

What had she done with the letter? She remembered putting it somewhere. Where? It wasn’t on her after her visit to Greyville Road. But she had dropped her bag there. That was how they had known that she had followed Anne. That was how Maxton had come on her track to Haleycott. It wasn’t in the bag that she had dropped, she felt quite sure about that. And then she remembered that she had put the letter into her handkerchief-case. She didn’t know why she had done that, but she had. She could see herself standing there with the drawer open, putting the letter away. She didn’t know why she had put it away so carefully, she only knew that she had. And then, tired as she was, she had gone downstairs again and walked to the corner and taken a taxi. She even remembered that she had asked the driver whether he knew Greyville Road, and when he said he did she asked to be put down at the corner. Why had she done that? It seemed quite a rational thing to do at the time. She remembered that. Well, then she ought to be able to remember why it had seemed so sensible. She thought it was because she didn’t want to be too obviously following her little cousin. Yes, that was it. She had paid off her taxi at the corner and walked along to number 109, and she had gone up the steps and found the door unlatched. Why was it unlatched? And the answer to that came too. It was because her cousin Anne lay dead in the cellar. It was the last, cruellest trick. It was the trap to involve whoever came next to this door, honest man or thief.

And she herself had walked into the trap.