Poison in the Pen (The Miss Silver Mysteries Book 29)

by Patricia Wentworth

  Miss Silver had seated herself in the corner of the leather-covered couch which she had occupied at that interview. Then Scilla Repton in her tartan skirt and emerald jersey had been sitting by the writing-table. An excellent memory recalled the naive manner in which Scilla had stumbled over the very word. It had been ‘Cya what? – Cya stuff.’ As she opened her flowered knitting-bag and took out little Josephine’s now almost completed cardigan she said gravely, ‘I do not feel that too much attention should be paid to that. She is not a young woman of any education. She practically never opens a book, and her knowledge of current events is obtained from the more sensational headlines in the papers, a brief glance at the pictures, and the newsreel at the cinema. I think it more than possible that an unfamiliar word like cyanide would leave her mind as casually as it had entered it. It was, in any case, the possibility of a plague of wasps which she had found interesting and alarming. The cyanide would only come into it as a means of averting that threat.’

  March had taken the opposite sofa corner. He said grimly, ‘Unless it occurred to her that it could be used to remove an inconvenient husband as well as a wasps’ nest.’ Then, with half a laugh, ‘She is everything you don’t like, but you’ll put the case for her with scrupulous fairness, won’t you?’

  She smiled.

  ‘Naturally, my dear Randal.’

  ‘Well, now that you have discharged your conscience, suppose you tell me what you really think.’

  She knitted for a while in silence.

  ‘I suppose,’ she said, ‘that you can see what is on the surface as well as I can. Her looks have been cultivated to the utmost, her mind has not been cultivated at all. I do not know what her parentage may have been, but I think she has had to fend for herself from an early age. Miss Maggie tells me that no relations have ever been mentioned, no old friends have ever been asked to stay. She has been a show girl and a mannequin, a precarious and intermittent form of employment and a very bad preparation for life in the country as the wife of an impoverished landowner nearly double her age. She may well have felt that she had made a disastrous mistake, especially if she was attracted by Mr Gilbert Earle. I do not think she had any affection for her husband, or for his family. Miss Maggie tells me that Colonel Repton made a settlement on her at the time of the marriage. It amounted to about two hundred a year. She may have felt two hundred a year and her freedom preferable to a continuance of her life at the Manor, where she had no ties either of affection or interest. All this is arguable, but in all of us there are certain factors which set a barrier between what we would prefer and what we are prepared to do in order to obtain that preference. A young woman might wish to be free and independent, and yet be quite incapable of murder as a means to that end.’

  He nodded, and said, ‘As to the settlement, I’ve been seeing Repton’s solicitors this morning. They are an old Ledlington firm, Morson, Padwick, and Morson. I had an extremely interesting talk with Mr James Morson, the head of the firm. Scilla Repton would have forfeited her settlement if she had been divorced for adultery. Asked whether she were aware of this fact, Mr Morson looked down his nose and said he had personally made it his business to explain it to her at the time the settlement was made, pointing out the words dum casta and telling her what they meant. He had been a good deal scandalized by the fact that she had immediately burst out laughing and said in a drawling voice, “Oh, then, if I get bored with Roger and run away with somebody else I don’t get a bean. What a shame!” So you see she was perfectly well aware that she would be left penniless if he divorced her. And he had not only told her that he was going to divorce her, but he had informed his sister and his solicitor. I gather that she had been meeting Earle in the flat of a complaisant friend, of which evidence would probably have been forthcoming. Now so far everything rather adds up against her, but yesterday morning Roger Repton went to Ledlington and altered his will.’

  Miss Silver knitted placidly.

  ‘Indeed, Randal?’

  He could not believe her to have missed the implication, but he proceeded to put it into words.

  ‘He altered his will and cut her right out of it. He insisted on doing it then and there in what Mr Morson had obviously considered a very precipitate manner. Now – point one – it might be argued that this is evidence of an intention to commit suicide. And – point two – when he saw his wife in the study some time within an hour of his death and Florrie heard them quarrelling, did he, or did he not, tell her that he had altered his will? Because if he did, and she knew he had cut her out of it, her interest in his death would be considerably reduced, whereas if she only thought he was going to alter it, it would be very much enhanced.’

  Miss Silver coughed.

  ‘There is, of course, no evidence upon either point. But suppose him to have informed her of the change in his will. She would certainly have been extremely angry. It must by then have been after four o’clock. The cyanide was, in all probability, already in the stoppered decanter. If it was added to the contents by Mrs Repton, this may have been done much earlier in the afternoon, or during that very interview at some moment when Colonel Repton’s attention had been diverted. His death had in either case already been resolved upon, and the means were to hand. Would an angry young woman who had planned her husband’s death be in any state to weigh the alternative advantages of pursuing this plan or changing it? If he lived to divorce her, she would lose her settlement. If he died now, she might, or might not, be able to keep the settlement. That, I suppose, would depend upon the line taken by the family and the amount of evidence as to her infidelity. I think it would probably appear to her that she would keep it, because if he were dead he couldn’t divorce her. As to the will, had he any considerable amount to leave?’

  March said, ‘Very little. Since there is now no male heir, the estate including the farms from which practically all his income was derived, passes under the entail to Valentine Grey. Indeed, if it hadn’t been for her very generous contributions, the place would have had to be sold long ago. Scilla Repton probably knew all this.’

  Miss Silver pulled upon the ball of blue wool. She said, ‘It is common knowledge, Randal. I had not been here twenty-four hours before Miss Wayne had told me very much what you have told me now.’

  ‘Then you think she did it?’

  ‘I think we may say that there was a good deal of motive. She was threatened with divorce and with the loss of her settlement. She was also threatened with the loss of her lover. I do not know to what extent her feelings were involved, but Mr Earle is an attractive young man who is said to have a career before him, and he is the heir to a title. Even nowadays he could not afford to marry a woman about whom there had been a serious scandal. As Roger Repton’s widow she would be in a much more eligible position.’

  ‘Yes, that is true.’

  ‘So much for the motive. As to the opportunity, it would of course have been easier for her than for anyone else to add cyanide to the contents of the decanter. It could have been done in the morning when Colonel Repton was out, or at any time during the afternoon when he was absent from the study for a few minutes. This is also true about anyone else in the house, but nobody else appears to have any motive. Apart from the household, two other people would have had the opportunity required.’

  He raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Two?’

  ‘Mr Barton and Miss Eccles.’

  He shook his head.

  ‘Well, doesn’t the same thing apply? What motive could either of them have had?’

  Miss Silver’s needles clicked.

  ‘The one which we have not touched upon, the one which I believe to have been the real motive for the deaths of both Colonel Repton and Connie Brooke. Each was believed to have identified the author of the poison-pen letters. In the case of Colonel Repton there may have been contributory motives. If it was his wife who poisoned him, there certainly were. He told her he knew who had written the letters, and he said, “Perhaps you wrote them
yourself. It would be one way out of Valentine’s marriage and of your own.” This was at the height of a violent quarrel, and may not have been very seriously meant. He did not repeat it to Miss Maggie when he told her that his wife had been unfaithful to him. In the meanwhile Florrie’s story of the quarrel had gone all round the village, and it was being repeated everywhere that Colonel Repton knew who had written the letters. His death followed, just as Connie Brooke’s death followed upon the rumour that she possessed the same knowledge. I find it difficult to dissociate the two cases. Therefore, unless Mrs Repton was the writer of the letters, I am disinclined to believe that it was she who poisoned her husband.’

  ‘According to Florrie he accused her of having written them.’

  ‘Not quite in that way, I think, Randal. What she put in her statement was that Colonel Repton had received one of the anonymous letters, and that it had accused Mrs Repton of having been unfaithful to him. She then continued, “Mrs Repton said it was all lies, and the Colonel said it was a filthy letter about a filthy thing, and he knew who wrote it. And Mrs Repton said who was it then? And the Colonel said wouldn’t she like to know, and perhaps she had done it herself, because that would be one way of breaking off Miss Valentine’s marriage and getting out of her own.” You see, it was more of a taunt than a direct accusation, and he did not repeat it to his sister.’

  ‘I don’t know that that proves anything. His personal reaction to her infidelity could very well have been uppermost in his mind, with the anonymous letters a good deal in the background. And if it wasn’t Scilla Repton who poisoned her, who was it?’

  She said soberly, ‘We were talking of Mr Barton and Miss Eccles, both of whom are to some extent linked with the deaths of Connie Brooke and Colonel Repton. I do not say that either of them is guilty, but in each case there was opportunity.’

  ‘Barton?’ His tone was one of surprise. ‘Well, he certainly saw Repton within a very short time of his death, but he was, according to Florrie, received on the friendliest terms, and there is no evidence of a quarrel or of any other motive. He had every reason to feel grateful to Repton, who had been a very good friend to him. I believe he was devoted to him. I saw him after I left here last night, and I am sure that the news of Repton’s death was a severe shock. And what possible connection could he have with Connie Brooke?’

  ‘None, unless he was the writer of the anonymous letters. A very strong one if he was. And there is this slight connection. As I told you before, on the Wednesday night – that is, the night on which Connie Brooke met her death – I had put out the light and I was opening my bedroom window. The party at the Manor was breaking up. I saw two or three cars go away, and I saw Mr Barton come home from one of his nocturnal rambles. He had his cats with him, and he came from the far end of the Green – that is, from the direction of Connie Brooke’s house. It proved no more than that he was in the neighbourhood at a time when, provided he had access to the house, he could have drugged her cocoa.’

  Randal smiled.

  ‘It is scarcely evidence.’

  She continued to knit.

  ‘I do not advance it as such. I have mentioned it because I do not wish to keep anything back. I think, however, that with regard to Mr Barton you have by no means told me all you know about him.’

  He nodded.

  ‘No, I haven’t. And I am in two minds whether to tell you now. If I were not a good deal more sure of your discretion than I am my own, I would hold my tongue. As it is, I am going to tell you. Barton isn’t the chap’s real name. There isn’t any need to tell you what it is, but you will probably remember the case. I think we’ll just go on calling him Barton. He got a commission from the ranks of the battalion in which Repton was. A year or two later they were on foreign service in the Far East, a gruelling sort of job. Barton got a nasty face wound which left him badly scarred. Then he had sunstroke and was invalided home. He found his wife living with another man, and he killed them both – pitched the man out of the window and strangled the woman. There is no doubt that he was not sane at the time. They sent him to the Criminal Asylum at Broad-moor, and after some years he was released. Repton let him have this cottage at a peppercorn rent and has befriended him in every way. He could have no reason to destroy his benefactor.’

  Miss Silver regarded him in a manner which recalled his schoolroom days. It suggested a conviction that he could do better than this if he tried. She said firmly, ‘Where there is a history of insanity it is possible that there may be a recurrence. The writing of what are commonly called poison-pen letters points to a mind not truly in balance. In the case of a man who has had so serious a breakdown as you have described, and who has for years been living the life of a complete recluse, is there not at least the possibility that, deprived of all normal companionship, he might seek this abnormal means of contact with his neighbours? It is generally attributed to some form of frustration, and few lives can have been more painfully frustrated than that of this unfortunate man.’

  March’s mind went back with discomfort to the date which had presented itself during his interview with James Barton. He said in a lowered voice, ‘When I asked him why he had gone to see Repton in the afternoon instead of waiting as he usually did till after dark, he said, “I’d been thinking of things, and they had got to a point where they didn’t bear thinking about, so it came to me that I’d go up and see him.” And when he said that, it came up in my mind that it was somewhere about the middle of October that he had come home and found his wife with the other man. And I think it was on the thirteenth – in fact I’m pretty sure about that. I read up the case in the file of The Times when I came here, because I had it passed on to me that the chap was living here under the name of Barton. The date stuck, because I remember thinking it had been an unlucky thirteenth for him.’

  There was silence between them for a little before he spoke again.

  ‘I suppose you are right, and that he might have done it. If he had been sitting there brooding over the old tragedy, and then came up here to find himself taxed with the writing of those anonymous letters, I suppose he might have gone off the deep end. Only if it was like that – where did he get the cyanide? It’s not the sort of stuff you have knocking about in your pockets. No, if Barton was going to do anyone in, I should expect something more on the lines of the previous affair – a blow, or an attempt to strangle. There is a noticeable tendency amongst the insane to stick to a pattern of murder.’

  Miss Silver inclined her head.

  ‘That is very true, Randal. There is also another point in Mr Barton’s favour. As you say, if it was he who poisoned Colonel Repton, he must have gone there provided with the means of doing so. Florrie’s story must have reached him, and he must therefore have been aware that Colonel Repton had said he knew who had written the letters. But how did the story reach him? He went nowhere, and he saw no one. He did not go to the George, and his door was locked against everyone. It is difficult to see how he can have heard what was common gossip to everyone else in Tilling Green, and unless he knew that he was suspected he would not have gone up to the Manor provided with the means of poisoning Colonel Repton. I do not wish you to think that I suspect Mr Barton of the crime. I only feel that he cannot as a suspect be lightly dismissed from it.’

  ‘Which brings us to Mettie Eccles. And what have you got to say about her? Everyone says she was devoted to Repton.’

  ‘Yes, that is undoubtedly true. She was in an agony of distress after she had found his body, and she immediately accused Mrs Repton of having killed him. In neither case was she acting a part. But consider for a moment. Jealousy and jealous resentment are amongst the most frequent causes of violent crime. Miss Eccles had always cared deeply for this distant cousin. She undoubtedly hoped to marry him. And then he comes back suddenly with the least suitable wife in the world. There is a complete disparity of age, of breeding, of tastes. The marriage took place two years ago. About a year later the poison-pen letters began. As we have agree
d, this sort of thing almost invariably springs from some painful frustration. But in this case Miss Eccles continued to be the centre of all the village activities. She played the organ, she visited the sick, she was active in the Village Institute. She would not seem to have had much time for the morbid brooding which must have preceded the production of those letters. But as to opportunity, it is she who, in both cases, had enough of it and to spare. She could have gone all the way home with Connie Brooke and drugged the cocoa which was waiting for her on the stove. As I told you, I have just a faint impression that I heard them saying good-night, but even if I could swear to it, there would have been nothing to prevent Miss Eccles from appearing to change her mind. It would have been quite easy to catch poor Connie up and say that she would like to see her all the way home. It would be a perfectly natural gesture from an older woman to a girl who had been looking desperately ill and tired. In the case of Roger Repton, we would have to suppose that she had heard Florrie’s story and believed that she might be accused. Consider for a moment what a disaster that accusation would have been. If it had been brought and proved, or if it had only been believed, she would have been utterly and irretrievably ruined. There would have been nothing left for her at all. Is it impossible to believe that she would provide herself with a means of escape? The cyanide could in the last resort have been intended for herself. But she is of a bold and managing temperament. She has the courage to seek an interview with Colonel Repton. The Work Party offers her an opportunity. She knows that he is in the study. She says Florrie told her he was there, which means that she had asked where he was. She goes in, ostensibly to take him his tea. She stops beside Miss Repton and myself to announce that she is doing so. Now suppose Colonel Repton took advantage of their being alone to accuse her of having written the letters. He could have done so, and he could have been prepared to go to extremities by making the matter public. She had known him all her life, and she would know whether this was likely to be his course of action, in which case she might have been desperate enough to silence him. She could, no doubt, have found an opportunity of adding the cyanide to the contents of the decanter.’