The Listening Eye (18 page)

MISS SILVER had a short interview with Inspector Abbott. It took place in the small room which they had occupied on a prevous occasion. Her message having been conveyed to him, he found her very comfortably seated on a low armless chair with her knitting in her lap. At the moment of his entrance she was counting stitches and did not immediately look up. When she did so, it was to give him a welcoming smile and to say,

“I believe there is now no need to attempt any concealment as to the reason for my presence at Merefields, since Miss Foster informs me that Mr. Wilfrid Gaunt is perfectly well aware of it.”

His colourless eyebrows rose.

“A tolerably efficient broadcaster, I should imagine.”

“He has a malicious tongue. I have no doubt that the situation here has given him an opportunity of exercising it at my expense.”

“He has certainly exercised it. At least I suppose it was not Mr. Bellingdon who informed Mrs. Herne that you were what she politely stigmatized as a police spy.”

Miss Silver pressed her lips together for a moment before saying,

“She is an exceedingly ill-bred young woman. I fear she may be something worse than that. I have been having a conversation with Miss Foster which I do not feel justified in keeping to myself. I would like to preface my account of it by telling you how reluctant Miss Foster was to tell me what she did, and how certain I am that she was both truthful and careful in what she told me. It was not until I imparted my conviction that Mr. Bellingdon’s life was actually in danger that her resistance broke down.”

“And just why did you suppose that she had anything to tell?”

Miss Silver pulled at her ball of wool, releasing two or three of the pale blue strands.

“You would not have needed to ask me that if you had been present when Mr. Bellingdon opened the parcel containing the necklace.”

He said, “Oh, yes, I was going to ask you about that. He opened it at breakfast, didn’t he? Was everybody there?”

“Yes, Frank.”

“And what did Sally Foster do to make you think that she knew something?”

“She leaned back in her chair and turned so pale that I thought she was going to faint. Mr. Moray thought so too. He got her some coffee and took her hand under the table.”

Frank Abbott laughed.

“That, my dear ma’am, has been done even when there was no risk of the girl fainting! But go on—you have me intrigued. Why did Sally swoon?”

Miss Silver told him, repeating the story as it had been told to her. When she had finished, he was interested but critical.

“Well, you know, on the face of it it’s a fairly compromising story, but not in a direction which has anything to do with the police. When girl meets boy in a dark room at an empty lodge it isn’t usually to discuss stolen necklaces or attempts at murder. As to what Sally heard Moira say—what was it again?”

Miss Silver repeated the words with prim accuracy. “ ‘You’re sure it will come tomorrow—absolutely sure? Because I won’t go on until it does—I can tell you that.’ ”

He nodded.

“Well, there you are. What does it amount to—something, or nothing? There’s a lot of I-dotting and T-crossing to be done before you can make it mean anything at all. When the necklace turned up at breakfast next morning Sally Foster did a quick job of dotting and crossing and was very nearly shocked into a swoon. But suppose I put it to Moira Herne that she was overheard at the lodge and what about it, she’s got quite a choice of perfectly good explanations open to her. ‘You’re sure it will come tomorrow? Because I won’t go on until it does.’ Well, that could mean an engagement ring or any other fribble the lady fancied. If she’s short of money and not too particular how she picks some up it could be a cheque. Anyhow you may be sure that she’ll have something up her sleeve.”

Miss Silver knitted placidly.

“My dear Frank, I think you are overlooking a quite important point. If Mrs. Herne has a reasonable explanation to offer, it must reasonably include the identity of her companion at the lodge. If she refuses this, you would inevitably suspect that she could not rely upon him to corroborate the explanation which she offers.”

He laughed.

“If she liked to keep the boy friend anonymous she would have a perfect right to, you know. If she is carrying on an affair—well, it isn’t our business, and she won’t hesitate to say so. Come—you didn’t suppose that a bit of hearsay like this could be used as evidence!”

She continued to knit, and had now arrived at the last rows of the bootee. It passed through her mind that nature had provided pretty, idle young women with a corrective to lightness of conduct. The bearing and the rearing of a succession of infants had perhaps been overdone in the past, but the modern discovery of how to escape from it altogether did not always serve the ends of morality. It was merely a passing thought, checked by the timely recollection that Moira Herne was a widow. Or was she? St. Paul however, himself a confirmed bachelor, had recommended that the younger widows should marry and have children. A truly great and wise man. But if he had known Moira Herne, would he have considered her a suitable influence in the home? She feared not. Her answer to Frank Abbott’s question was not sensibly delayed. She had thought disapprovingly of certain modern tendencies, considered St. Paul’s attitude towards widows, and Moira’s suitability for motherhood, while he was still speaking. When he stopped, her mind moved quickly to the point which he had raised.

“I do not believe that I had got as far as the question of evidence. I was thinking of how we could best arrive at the truth. In this connection the identity of Mrs. Herne’s companion at the lodge would seem to be important. If he was with her in that front room, it should be possible to obtain his fingerprints.”

“Oh, yes, that could be done.”

“Then Sally Foster thinks that they drove away in a car which may have been in the lane or just inside the drive. Someone may possibly have noticed it.”

His hand rose and fell on the arm of his chair.

“Dusk, and a thunderstorm going on? Not very likely, you know, but we’ll see what can be done. Well, I must be getting on, or Crisp will suspect me of dalliance.”

She said,

“One moment, Frank. I feel sure that Mr. Garratt knows something.”

“What! Did he also swoon at the breakfast table?”

Her look reproved him.

“I will not go as far as that, but he certainly received a shock. I am convinced that he has some knowledge which is causing him distress.”

“He certainly looks ill.”

“He has something on his mind. I have felt increasingly certain on this point. In fact—” She laid down her knitting and rested her hands upon it. “Frank, I am extremely uneasy.”

He was struck by the gravity of her expression.

“On what account?”

“On Mr. Bellingdon’s account. I feel I should tell you that he has determined upon a course of action which may have serious consequences.”

“Such as?”

“Another and immediate attempt upon his life.”

“You really think his life has been attempted?”

“I feel more and more sure of it as the case goes on. The return of the necklace—”

He broke in before she could complete her sentence.

“Well now, why was it returned? And if it was going to be returned, why was it taken?”

“I believe that it was taken as a blind, the real object of the crime being the death of Mr. Bellingdon who it was believed would fetch the necklace himself if Mr. Garratt could be got out of the way. He was got out of the way, but Mr. Hughes was sent instead, and as he recognized his assailant he had to be shot.”

Frank Abbott said,

“Well, you know that doesn’t agree with one of the very few bits of evidence we’ve got —Miss Paine’s account of what the murderer said to the man whom he was meeting at the Masters gallery and who in all probability was the fence who was going to get the necklace out of the country. I can’t give you his words verbatim, but they certainly did not give any hint that there was anything in the job beyond the theft of a famous and valuable bit of jewellery.”

“And would you expect there to be such a hint? As I see it, this crime was planned from within the family circle. It was to be camouflaged as an ordinary jewel robbery. The man who played the principal part was someone equally at home in the family and in criminal circles. He was—he is—a man of bold and reckless character, willing to take a high risk for a high prize. He must be in a position to ensure that he will have his share in the prize. To speak plainly, I consider that he has a hold upon some member of Mr. Bellingdon’s family and can be sure of his or her co-operation.”

Frank leaned back in his chair.

“Well, it’s a theory. Putting it on one side for the moment, what has Bellingdon done, or what is he going to do, that you think will send the balloon up?”

Miss Silver said,

“He is going to inform his household that he proposes to marry Mrs. Scott and alter his will.”

Frank whistled.

“A very sporting effort! I suppose it hadn’t your encouragement?”

Miss Silver coughed.

“I told him that in my opinion it would provoke another attempt, to which he replied that he would rather take the risk and get it over. He said that he was an impatient man and did not like to sit and wait for things to happen.”

“Oh, well, I am with him there.”

“So you see that the next few days may be critical. He has had an interview with Mrs. Herne, and I think it probable that he has informed her of his intentions both with regard to Mrs. Scott and to his will. She is not likely to keep them to herself. If Mr. Bellingdon dies before his marriage, the beneficiaries under his existing will must profit. If he makes a new will in contemplation of marriage, or if he marries Mrs. Scott, the old will ceases to be operative. The person whose interests are most likely to be affected is Mrs. Herne. The return of the necklace also points in her direction. If you take the words overheard by Sally Foster as referring to the Queen’s Necklace, it would mean a determination on her part to secure it, and a refusal to go any farther unless she did so. I have no doubt that it is left to her under Mr. Bellingdon’s present will. Now I ask you to consider the part played by the unknown man whom we have been speaking of as the murderer. He has a bold and reckless character and contacts in two widely different circles. His interests are so much identified with those of Mrs. Herne as to enable him to feel sure that he will participate in whatever she may inherit from Mr. Bellingdon. It seems to me that there can be only one person to whom these considerations would apply, and that person is Mrs. Herne’s husband.”

“My dear ma’am!”

She said,

“Oliver Herne was killed in a motor accident on the continent. He was a racing motorist and of a bold and reckless character. He may have taken one risk too many, or it may have suited him to disappear. According to Miss Bray he was heavily in debt. The car was burnt out. Mrs. Herne identified her husband’s cigarette-case and signet-ring. I merely advance all this as a speculation. There is, as you know, another possibility. Meanwhile I think that every precaution should be taken.”

IT was not a day upon which anyone cared to look back. Visits from the police are not apt to leave a happy atmosphere behind them. Hilton went about with the air of one who has been tried almost past bearing and reported to Annabel Scott, for whom he cherished a considerable regard, that Mrs, Hilton was very much disturbed in her mind—the impression conveyed being that a severe social stigma had been placed upon them, and that they were in doubt as to how long it could be endured. The various women who came in to help opined gloomily over more than the usual number of cups of tea that once that sort of thing started in a house you never knew where it was going to end, supporting this theory with shattering tales of disaster.

Lucius Bellingdon disappeared at midday accompanied by Annabel Scott. They took her car, but not before Parker had practically gone over it with a magnifying glass.

David Moray made a first sketch for Medusa. If Moira had imagined that the sittings would provide a pleasant distraction culminating as and when she pleased in a more or less serious affair with David Moray, she was to be disappointed. He couldn’t have been more impersonal if he had been painting a house. The way in which what he was pleased to call the planes of her face were constructed, the exact angle at which she was to turn her head, were a great deal more important than the fact that she had allowed her blank stare to melt into a beckoning one—a change which usually produced most gratifying results. When she followed it up by saying in an interested drawl, “You know, I’m not at all sure that I shouldn’t like you to do me with snakes in my hair,” he told her briefly that they weren’t necessary, and that talking put him off. Even Sally Foster wouldn’t really have considered a chaperone to be necessary. The mousetrap and the cheese might be there, but David’s mind was entirely occupied by Medusa who had been a myth for three thousand years or so.

It was impossible to say what was the state of mind of Hubert Garratt or of Arnold Bray. Unquiet certainly, and apprehensive of what was still to come.

Miss Bray darned house linen and hardly ever stopped talking—her theme the shortcomings of the domestic staff, Mrs. Hilton having undercooked the joint at lunch and sent up pancakes which resembled scorched leather.

“Really, the least thing upsets them, and I shouldn’t be at all surprised if they gave notice. Mrs. Hilton had just that kind of look in her eye when I ordered the pancakes this morning. She said we only had shop eggs and she couldn’t guarantee them, which is quite ridiculous, because there must be plenty of eggs in the village, and anyhow their being grocer’s eggs wouldn’t make them burn!”

Miss Silver supposed not. Miss Bray sighed heavily.

“It was really a good thing that Lucius and Annabel weren’t here—he does so dislike anything scorched. I suppose he has gone over to Emberley to see about his car. I hope he will be careful on the hill.”

Miss Silver hoped so too.

Wilfrid, still clinging, compared Merefields unfavourably with the Morgue. Upon Sally protesting that they were, after all, still alive he replied that it was just this that put the lid on it.

“If we were dead, darling, each on our quiet marble slab, we shouldn’t even know that we were being murdered one by one and the police visiting us from dawn to midnight. As it is, only the fact that for all I know you may be marked out as the next victim prevents me from sending myself a telegram to say ‘Fly—all is discovered!’ ”

Sally looked at him ungratefully.

“I do wish you would go away and stop talking nonsense!”

“And leave you to the homicidal maniac who haunts these groves? Certainly not! Of course none of us really knows who the homicidal maniac is, which does add a spice of interest to an otherwise banal situation. I might be thinking that it may even be you, and you may be thinking that it might, strangely and impossibly, be me. How do you think I should look in the dock? Should one aim at an air of buoyant innocence, or wring the jury’s heart, if it has one, by appearing to be crushed by ‘man’s inhumanity to man’ as the poem says? If it makes all the ages mourn it might do the trick with the jury. Or do you think just plain straws in the hair and an impressive row of psychiatric experts to swear that my grandmother crossed me in my cradle?”

The day dragged on. It dragged worse than Sunday had done, because there was a horrid feeling of tension. Sunday had been boring but it hadn’t been tense, at least not until most of it had been got through, but Monday managed to combine dullness and tension to a really remarkable extent. Humanity has done the best for itself that it knows how by arranging its time on an ingenious pattern of so many seconds to the minute, minutes to the hour, hours to the day, and so on and so forth through the weeks, the months, and the years, but the something which laughs at time and its measurements steps in and makes havoc of the careful plan by stretching the unendurable second to an endless length or leaping the intervening day, week, month, or year at breakneck speed.

For no one at Merefields was there any hint of breakneck speed. Lucius and Annabel, it is true, found the hours slip away with smoothness and ease, but then they were not at Merefields, and they delayed returning there for as long as it was decently possible. As they turned in at the south drive she said,

“Lucius, why do we have to go back? We could just go on past the house and out of the other gate and up to town. I can always go to Monica Bewley, and you have got your flat. We could get married in a day or two, and then whatever happens we should be together.”

She was aware that he shook his head.

“I’ve got to get this business cleared up first. I’m not dragging you into it the way things are.”

She wanted to say, “I’m in it, I’m in it, I’m in it.” And what then? He would only try and get her to go away from him, and that she would not do.

They walked up from the garage together, and just before they came to the house he put his arms about her and held her close. They did not kiss, they only stood like that, holding one another with a feeling of nearness quite beyond the physical embrace. If this was for all the years to come, what wonderful years they were going to be. If this was their one moment never to be repeated, it must be savoured to the full.

They went in, and the tension in the house took them sharp and hard, as if they had walked into a stretched wire.