I said I didn’t think marriage was being discussed at the moment, and got away, having learnt what I’d come for. It seemed to me impossible for Hilary to have written that letter, which must have been posted in Feltham (for Peters had spoken of its bearing the Feltham postmark) between half-past nine and twelve-thirty. Now Hilary had gone upstairs to put on her hat soon after nine, and we’d left the house before half-past. We had spent the morning buying her ridiculous bear and what she called “chicken fixings” for her party get-up, and it had been one o’clock when we came back. She hadn’t posted a letter in Feltham, coming or going, so that seemed to me to let her out. Then I remembered seeing a number of letters in Nunn’s writing on the hall-table, and cursed myself for a fool for not having glanced at the envelopes, though, as Jeremy pointed out later, you would hardly expect your host to be a first-class criminal, and there are even people who might take the view that the ideal guest does not pry among his host’s correspondence.
I came away from the Peters feeling pretty pleased with what I had learned, though we still had to prove who had written the letter. As Jeremy had remarked, there didn’t seem much likelihood of our being able to lay hands on the letter at this stage of the proceedings. Coming through the outskirts of Ravensend, where old Peters had lived since his last two children left the home and forced them into smaller quarters, I bethought me suddenly of a plea Eleanor had made me a couple of days ago. “If you’re ever that way, Tony,” she said, “I wish you’d go in and see old Nanny Finch. She’s asked after you so often, and you know you used to be a great favourite of hers. This is the first time you’ve been at the Abbey, as she has reproachfully reminded me, that you haven’t taken the trouble to go over and have a chat. She’s such a dear old thing, and she doesn’t see many people these days. Her own contemporaries are falling off, and she does so enjoy a chat. Luckily, Mrs. Gray and her family still keep up with the old thing, and a visit there is about the only excitement she has. You won’t forget, will you?”
And now here I was within three minutes of the old dame’s cottage, and not an inclination in the world to go near her. I wanted to get back and tell Jeremy what I had learned. On the other hand, it was too late for us to do anything else tonight and here was the opportunity ready to my hand. And the old lady had been very good to me years ago, making me cakes and buying me cornets of sweets. Moreover, she had a racy tongue and was excellent company. She hadn’t, as so many people of her age do, fallen into decrepitude. Eleanor told me she could still walk, read and sew, that her memory was excellent, and no one enjoyed a long chat better. My steps took me up to the door of her cottage, and there I hesitated again. But while I debated within myself what I should do, a figure came to the window, carrying a lamp, and I saw it was Nanny herself. I was less sure whether she had recognised me, but I didn’t want to hurt the old dear’s feelings, so I pushed open the gate with my stick and walked up the narrow path, with its scrupulously neat border and its three bare little rose-trees in their circular beds in the lawn.
The old lady opened the door herself, delighted at her visitor.
“Come in, my dear,” she said. “I’ll make you a cup of tea in a moment. And how are you after all your travelling in foreign parts? Let me have a glimpse at you. Eh, and you’re as lame as ever. The pity of it. Her ladyship’s told you to come, I suppose? Aye, that’s about the size of it.” And so, with many exclamations and admonitions, she pushed me into the little front parlour, where a small fire burned, throwing its gay reflection on tall glass covers that shrouded pink and blue china figures, on sideboards decked with glass plates, and shelves edged with stiff white paper, cut into shapes, and where the round table was covered by a velvet cloth, edged with pom-poms, and there was an enlargement over the mantelpiece of the late Mr. Finch, a patriarchal old man, photographed in his best clothes, holding a black hat, as if asking for pence. The frame was ebony, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and there were various beautifully penned inscriptions, in Indian ink and old English lettering, testifying to the virtues of the deceased. As a boy, this picture had fascinated me, as had also a reproduction of the Passion and Crucifixion, the three Figures miraculously inserted, on their crosses, in a green glass bottle. The bottle was still there, but the central figure had lost His Head, and one of the arms of His companions was broken. Otherwise, I could detect little change in twenty years.
“Now you didn’t come over here specially to see an old woman?” Nanny began archly, and I said that I’d had to be in the neighbourhood on business, and thought I wouldn’t postpone my visit.
“Eh, and I’m glad to see you,” she sighed. “And which way did you come? Not by the short cut, surely?”
I said I certainly had come by the short cut; I’d always used it.
“Ah, but things are different now,” she said, “with the poor Captain not dead above two weeks, and his murderer still roaming the countryside.” No one about the place believed in the accident or suicide theory. “And a nasty man to meet on a dark night too. You never know what people like that won’t do to you, if they get the chance. You take my advice, my dear, and stick to the high road.”
I laughed. “This is the first crime we’ve ever heard of in connection with the right-of-way,” I protested. “You mustn’t regard it as a precedent.”
“Things go in cycles,” she returned, in oracular tones. “Anyway, you should keep to the high road till that dreadful man has been caught.”
I said, “You couldn’t be more in earnest, Nanny, if you’d seen him yourself.”
She bent forward. “I have, my dear, and that’s the truth. Though I don’t say anything, because there’s nothing I could do, and I’m sure I don’t want a pack of interfering policemen bustling round my little house at my time of life.”
“But how do you know it was the man?” I demanded.
She said, with serene assurance, “I know a wicked face when I see one, my dear. Besides, what was he doing wandering about in the dark like that? Honest men are in their homes at that hour.”
“What hour was this?”
“Quite late it was, much later than I had any right to be. Though, for that matter, if I hadn’t dropped off in front of the fire, I’d have been going over in the bus, and not walking at all.”
“Do tell me,” I invited her. “He didn’t try and hurt you?”
“He might have done if I hadn’t given him me half-crown, me beautiful new half-crown that I’d been keeping for Miss Isobel’s Cathleen. You remember Mrs. Gray’s Miss Isobel, her that I brought up as a little girl? Of course, I don’t go out nursing now; ways have changed and they wouldn’t let me have my way in the nursery. But in the old days I had a lot of little girls, but none sweeter than Miss Isobel. I always liked Mrs. Gray, too. One of those ladies that consider their servants. And now Miss Isobel’s got a little girl of her own, they still let me come over to their parties, though it isn’t the fun it used to be,” she added, mournfully. “I don’t understand the servants they have now. Such hoity-toity misses, all in silk stockings, that no good servant would have worn when I was in service, and silk underclothes and the pictures over at Munford every week. Still, I like to go for Miss Isobel, and Mrs. Gray, she comes to Miss Cathleen’s parties and she’s never too busy to have a word or two with me. Well, I’d been looking forward to this party for a matter of three weeks, and I’d got a nice bright half-crown for Miss Cathleen. I know when I was a little girl I got more fun out of a bit of money to spend than any kind of present. I was dressed good and early, so early I thought I’d rest a little before I started. Parties began at half-past three in the old days, and the Nannies came round at half-past six at latest. Now they don’t begin till six or after, and it’s ten o’clock before the children start going home. Even in a house like Miss Isobel’s, which I shouldn’t call new-fangled, they do that. Well, I didn’t want to start till half-past five and I was dressed near an hour too soon, so I sat down by
me little fire, thinking I’d rest, for I’m an old woman now, my dear, and I get tired easily. And it means stooping, putting on your best cashmere stockings and tying your shoes and so on. Well I must have dozed off for when I woke, goodness gracious me, the party had begun a long time ago. Eight o’clock it was. I could have cried. Me lovely party I’d looked forward to so. I jumped up as quick as I could, and tied on me bonnet and off I went. Nigh half an hour it takes me to get to the Grays’ house by the road, and I’d missed the bus, that only comes by every hour. Then I remembered the short cut. I never have been by that short cut of a night before. I always say it’s asking for trouble going out in the dark, and young women that do that kind of thing have only themselves to thank if they don’t come back with a whole skin. But that day, being all flustered and so late, I determined I’d chance it. It was a clear night, and I thought I’d take the little lamp that Mr. Frank gave me two years gone, and my stick. So off I went, and I hadn’t got very far before I wished myself back in me own house. For there, coming along the road towards me, was a man. And the last kind of man you’d wish to meet when you’re alone and not so active as you were. I looked around, and there wasn’t a soul in sight. Well, I couldn’t do anything but stare straight ahead, and pretend not to see him. But as he got nearer, I knew he was going to speak to me. Don’t ask me how, because I can’t tell you, but all women that have their wits about them know when a strange man’s going to make advances. I went on just as if he wasn’t there, but he stopped me, and asked for some money. Said he wanted a night’s shelter, and some food. I thought, You’re as well-fed as I am, but I dursen’t say so. You never can tell with these wild, rough men what they won’t do. And it isn’t as if it’s only the young, pretty ones that gets set upon. There was that poor soul in the train, not many months back. There was her picture in the paper, and—well, my dear, goodness knows I’ve nothing to be vain about, now most of me teeth are gone, and I have this affliction growing beside me nose, but if I’d had a face like that poor body, I’d have hidden it behind a veil. And she hadn’t any money neither. But she was set on and murdered, and all for no reason at all, from what the papers say. An inoffensive body, I’ve no doubt. So what with one thing and another, I was all of a shake, and I pulled out my purse and gave him what I thought was a penny. It wasn’t till I got to the other end, hurrying all I could, for fear he’d come after me, I found that instead of a penny, I’d given him Miss Cathleen’s beautiful new half-crown. I was upset, I can tell you. I hadn’t another, and I had to make shift with a shilling, not a new one or anything, and I hadn’t time to scratch her initials on it, like I’d done on the half-crown.”
I said, “What was he like, this man who frightened you so?”
“He was a big tall man, dark, with a sort of beard from not shaving, dressed very ragged, with one shoulder higher than the other, and his hair was long and dark and all blown about.” Then she described his clothes and as she spoke, word for word, she was drawing a picture of Ralph Feltham as we had found him on that fatal morning of the 16th.
“And what time was this?” I asked her.
“Oh, ’twas a quarter to nine when I got to Miss Isobel’s, and would you believe it, the new-fangled servants they have there these days never so much as offered me a cup of tea or a bite to eat. All I got was some lemonade and a sandwich, made with some nasty stuff like liver. If I was head of a nursery I wouldn’t have that kind of food on my table. No goodness in it, there isn’t. Well, it must have been half-past eight or thereabouts that I met this murdering fellow, and he was making for the Abbey so far as I could see. Coming along the road he was, anyway, and as soon as I heard of the poor Captain, I thought to myself, So that nasty black murdering villain did it, after all. But, of course, I never said anything. And, after all,” she added miserably, “I never see Miss Isobel at all. Gone out, she had, and it was her I’d gone for. Well, that’s how life is, I suppose. I oughtn’t to go on expecting at my age. But, you take my advice, my dear, and keep away from that dangerous road till they’ve got that man safe under lock and key.”
She talked a good deal more, asking questions and giving me scraps of local gossip, but none of it was relevant to our case. I came away as soon as I could, and hurried back, by the right-of-way, of course, wondering how we could trace that half-crown. I found Jeremy pottering about in the front garden.
“Well, you’ve been a time,” he said cheerfully. “Solved the mystery yet?”
I told him what I had heard. “By gum,” he exclaimed, “the plot thickens, Watson, the plot thickens. That old lady’s story is a bit of luck we couldn’t have looked for. And what do we do now? The local police won’t thank us for stepping in and teaching them their business. Besides, for all we know they’re on the same track as we are.”
“They haven’t begun asking questions about the half-crown, so far as we can tell,” I reminded him. “They might be glad to hear the story.”
“Uncommonly glad,” Jeremy agreed. “Shall you run down to the station and tell them at once?”
I said, “It seems to me we might take Dennis into our confidence at this stage. After all, we’re down here in a sense as Philpotts’ representatives, and he’s his arch-representative, and Philpotts may not be too pleased if he finds we’ve been working quite independently. We aren’t precisely the big noise at Scotland Yard—yet.”
“Nor is Dennis—yet—so far as I can gather. Still, you may be right. We don’t want to put friend Philpotts’ back up, and it would be a thousand pities to lose another job of this nature on account of swelled head. Come and look for the chap.”
Chapter XII
1
Dennis was writing letters in the library. He was so much engrossed that he didn’t appear to notice our arrival, and we stood for a minute watching his fine-pointed pen travel rapidly over the smooth grey sheets. He wrote a very personal hand, small, clear and characteristic.
Suddenly he looked up. “I beg your pardon!”
“Some chaps are lucky being taught to write when they’re young,” remarked Jeremy, with some envy in his voice. “Any spider can beat me when it comes to handling a pen. Look here, we don’t want to butt in or poach on your particular preserves or anything of that kind, but we’re interested in that affair on our own account, and we’ve managed to pick up some backchat that may be of some use to you, if you’d care to hear it. Besides, we want you to exert your influence,” he added, candidly. “Tony and I haven’t got any.”
“If you can fill in any of the g-gaps I shall be infernally grateful,” said Dennis, with that rather attractive deference of manner that I had noticed before. “I’m most horribly hung up. It isn’t the s-solution that’s baffling me. I’ve been p-pretty sure about that from the beginning, but I c-can’t prove my theories. P-please be as detailed as you can, and go slow. These clever chaps never fail in the broad outline, but s-sometimes in quite trivial things they get let down. It isn’t even their f-fault always, but something they c-could not possibly foresee.”
2
I told my story and Jeremy listened, putting in a word now and again. Dennis occasionally asked a question, but though he had a pencil in his hand he made no notes. He drew a lot of designs on the writing-pad in front of him, regardless of the fact that the sheet was part of a letter. A castle he drew, and a row of cats with their backs to the audience, and a ship on some curly waves and various spherical diagrams. He was very particular as to the exact expressions my informants had used, and would ask me to stop and think twice. “You’re sure he said thus-and-thus?” he would say. And I’d think and say Yes, I was sure, puzzling my brain to see why it should be of importance anyway. I cast surreptitious glances at Jeremy from time to time to see if he realised the way the wind was blowing, but Jeremy’s eyes were fixed on Dennis, and he paid no attention to me, except to supplement something I had said, or query a precise remark. At last I finished. Dennis twiddled the pencil round and
round in his fingers. Then he jumped to his feet.
“Do you think Lady Nunn will m-mind my using her telephone?” he asked. “I want to p-put through a trunk call.”
I said I was sure she wouldn’t, and he nodded and said, “Well, th-thank you awfully. You’ve dotted all my i’s for me and crossed my t’s. I c-couldn’t have settled anything without you.” And he went out of the room.
“He’s a cool devil,” remarked Jeremy, “what’s the position now? Is he going to denounce the murderer or what?”
“I suppose he’ll do something about Nanny’s half-crown,” I suggested dubiously, for Dennis had left me as much in the dark as Jeremy. “That point ought to be cleared up next.”
“Perhaps he’s going to make arrangements with the local bobby. Anyhow, let’s wait.”
Dennis was away for several minutes in the little lobby-like apartment across the hall, where the telephone was kept. Presently we heard the door swing to, and Dennis emerge. A moment later Eleanor said, “Oh, I’ve been meaning to come and talk to you. It’s about Hilary. She’s looking shockingly ill, and eating nothing. What can we do for the child?”
Dennis’s voice replied, “It’s the anxiety and strain. It seems to m-me quite natural. I’d be inclined to think her heartless if she could have a c-cousin murdered on the premises and not t-turn a hair.”
“And she’s to go on looking like this, and starving herself till the strain’s over?” Eleanor’s voice sounded tart.
“It w-won’t be long now,” Dennis promised her. “By the way, a friend of m-mine, perhaps two, is c-coming over to see me to-night. He’s just been t-talking to me on the telephone. I hope I’m not taking t-too many liberties, but it might be important.”
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