Dead or Alive

by Patricia Wentworth

  Quite unexpectedly, Meg said, “Yes.”

  “When?”

  “He got a typewriter about a month before he—went. It was a new toy, and he was typing everything.”

  “He didn’t take it with him?”

  “No—I sold it the other day. But you see, he might have typed this letter. And if he didn’t, who did, Bill? That’s what I keep asking myself. Who sent me that paper? Who has been into the flat—twice,-and each time left something to make me think Robin is alive? Who is it, if it isn’t Robin?”

  She was so pale that he put his hand on her arm.

  “We’re going to have lunch. We can’t talk like this in the street. It’s early still, so we’ll get a quiet table if we come in here. Then I’ll tell you what I think.”

  She followed him into one of those small lunch-rooms which have multiplied during the last few years. It was painted in primrose and green—green walls, green floor, green ceiling; primrose linen, primrose china; and waitresses in primrose smocked with green, pretty girls with the air of amateurs at a charity bazaar. There was a table in an alcove which promised privacy.

  The prettiest waitress brought them soup in porringers and withdrew. The soup was good and hot. Meg was very glad of it. She felt shaken and bewildered. She waited for Bill to tell her what he thought, and Bill waited to see her colour come back, because just now in the street he had been afraid that she was going to faint.

  When the porringers had been taken away, and a chicken and mushroom stew had been set before them in a primrose casserole, he said,

  “You’ve got to eat before we talk, and when we’ve talked I’m going to put it across you, so you’d better brace up and have a good lunch, because you’re going to want it. I’m feeling pretty fierce.”

  He got a smile which shook him a little. Meg said aloud,

  “You’re frightfully good to me, Bill.”

  In her heart she felt, “Why have we got to go on like this? It’s been so long—I’m so tired. Why have we got to go on talking about Robin? I’m too tired to go on. He was cruel. I’m young—I want to be happy. Perhaps Bill doesn’t love me any more—perhaps he does.…” The thoughts went to and fro in her mind while she listened to Bill talking about Ledstow, and the Professor, and Miss Cannock. She was glad that he didn’t want to go on talking about Robin until she had eaten something and got rid of that muzzy feeling in her head. You ought to be able to live on dry bread, but when you are not used to it you get an uncomfortable sort of feeling of being too light. Ever since yesterday she had felt as if there wasn’t anything really to prevent her floating slowly up into the air. It was difficult to think clearly when you had this sort of feeling.

  She ate her stew, and the law of gravity resumed its normal action. Bill insisted on cheese, biscuits, and coffee. By the time they had come to the coffee Meg had herself in hand again. It wasn’t any use being a coward and not wanting to talk about Robin, because they’d got to. And it wasn’t any use saying “I can’t go on,” because whatever happened you had to go on, and if you had a scrap of decent feeling, you kept your head up and tried not to make things hard for other people. There was no point, for instance, in harrowing Bill. With all her professed uncertainty as to the state of his affections, Meg was sure that it would be terribly easy to harrow Bill. She must therefore be sensible, practical, and a number of other things all rather difficult. What she didn’t guess was that her strained courage tried Bill Coverdale higher than her tears would have done. It was so obvious that she was holding on to it with every bit of her strength, and he wanted so terribly to take her in his arms and let her cry there.

  “Perhaps we’d better talk now,” he said. “Now, Meg—we’ve got to talk quite plainly or it’s no good talking at all. Let’s start with the packet. I’ve got a hunch about that packet—I’ve got a feeling that it’s very important. Just listen a minute. You say, who sent you the marked newspaper with the letters spelling out ‘I am alive’? You say, who’s been twice in the flat and each time left something there to make you think that Robin is alive? The first time it was the word ‘alive’ laid out with slips of paper on the hearth-rug. The second time it was one of Robin’s visiting-cards. Now I want you to cast your mind back to what was going on when those things happened. The first thing, the newspaper, was in January, wasn’t it? And when you told me about it you said Garratt had been urging you to see a lawyer. I asked you if you had seen one, and you said no, because things had begun to happen, things that made you believe that Robin was alive. Garratt had been telling you he was dead, and then this marked newspaper came along and made you think what the person who put it in at your letter-box wanted you to think—that Robin wasn’t dead. And you didn’t go to your lawyer.”

  Meg looked at him with startled eyes.

  “You mean—”

  “Wait a minute. The next thing was someone coming into your flat and laying out the word ‘Alive’ on your hearth-rug in slips of writing-paper. That was in February, and it happened just after you made up your mind to go and see Mr Pincott after all. You had written to the Professor and been told that he wasn’t attending to his personal letters, so you got desperate and made an appointment with Mr Pincott—and right there you came home and found those letters on the hearth-rug. And you didn’t go and see the lawyer that time either.”

  “I couldn’t,” said Meg. “Bill, I couldn’t.”

  Bill put out a hand and drew it back again.

  “That is exactly what you were meant to feel. Then in July you lost your job, had another shot at the Professor, failed, and once more screwed yourself up to seeing Mr Pincott. You didn’t get as far as making an appointment with him that time—did you?”

  “No—I hadn’t time.”

  “And before you had time someone put what might have been one of your own envelopes in at your letter-box. There was nothing inside except a leaf—a maple leaf—and on this leaf someone had pricked out the word ‘Alive.’ And you gave up the idea of going to see Mr Pincott.”

  “Bill—”

  “Wait a minute. Now we come down to the present day. I come along, and I urge you to see Pincott. Garratt urges you to see Pincott, and says his people will back you up in an application to presume Robin’s death. What’s the result? Someone walks into your flat in the middle of the night and leaves Robin’s visiting-card on a polished table which has been carefully cleared and put bang under the light where you can’t miss it—all very melodramatic and impressive. Now, Meg, think—think hard! What’s at the back of all this? Someone who doesn’t want you to get proof of Robin’s death. Why? What happens when you get your proof—what is the first thing you do? You go the the bank with it, and you and the manager open the packet which Robin tied up with such very strict conditions. That’s where we get down to brass tacks. I don’t know what’s in the packet, and you don’t know what’s in the packet—but someone does, and that someone is prepared to go to pretty dangerous lengths to prevent its being opened.”

  Meg looked at him with tired, steady eyes.

  “But don’t you see, it all points to Robin. You say it’s someone who knows what’s in the packet. Robin knows. You say someone doesn’t want the packet to be opened. Robin wouldn’t want anyone to know his affairs as long as he was alive. The person who came into the flat had a key—Robin’s key. He had Robin’s card—an old card that had been carried about in a wallet. Don’t you see that it points to Robin all the time?”

  “Wait, Meg—I haven’t finished. You’ve got to take today’s attempt to get hold of the packet. Now it may have been a serious attempt, or it may not. That would depend on how much was known about the conditions. If the conditions of surrender were known, no one could have hoped to get away with it on the strength of a signature to a typewritten letter presented by a messenger-boy. But the conditions may not have been known—I don’t believe this, but I feel bound to put it in as a possibility—or there was no serious expectation of getting hold of the papers, the real object b
eing to strengthen your belief that Robin was still alive, and to make the bank manager sit up and start thinking along the same lines. In other words, it was a try-on of the same kind as the others.”

  “And doesn’t that point to Robin?” said Meg. “It does—you must see that it does.”

  “No, it doesn’t,” said Bill bluntly. “If it was Robin who was nervous about the packet and wanted to make sure it wasn’t handed over to anyone else while he was alive, he’d only got to walk into the manager’s office and show himself. That’s one absolutely solid reason why I don’t believe it was Robin.”

  Meg said in a voice so low that the words only just reached him,

  “He wanted me—not to be sure—”

  “Meg, why?”

  She leaned her head on her hand. It had not seemed possible that any words could be fainter, but what she said now had so little breath behind it that it seemed to Bill as if he were hearing her thoughts.

  “He was angry—because I said—I would divorce him. He said—I wouldn’t find it so easy—”

  Bill looked at her. Because her eyes were hidden, he could just for that space let all his passion of love and anger have free course. Was it possible that the truth was behind Meg’s whispered words? That Robin O’Hara was capable of a cruel revenge he had no doubt. There was a devilish ingenuity about the man which would have fitted him into a plot like this. Meg had threatened to divorce him, and he had told her that she would not find it so easy—and by gum, he was right. As long as his fate was uncertain, he had Meg tied to him. If she could prove that he was alive, she could divorce him. If she could prove that he was dead, she would be free. It would be most entirely like Robin O’Hara to keep her in a torturing uncertainty. He said,

  “Meg, don’t! We’ve got to think straight, and we’ve got to talk it out. If it was Robin who wanted the packet, he could have gone to the manager, and if he wanted him to keep his mouth shut he could have bound him to secrecy. I don’t believe Robin was behind today’s attempt. There isn’t any earthly reason why he should have typed a letter that he could just as easily have written with his own hand. No—it was a try-on, and it was meant to make you and the bank manager feel shaky about assuming that Robin was dead.”

  Meg dropped her hand and looked at him.

  “And do you think that anyone who was playing a trick like that would have dared come right up to the bank to meet the messenger-boy and take the answer from him? No—it was Robin—it was Robin.’”

  How horrible to be afraid that it was Robin—to be afraid that Robin was alive. If anyone had said to her two years ago, “You’ll be afraid to know that he is alive,” it would have seemed the maddest lie in the world.

  Bill shook his head.

  “That’s bad reasoning, Meg. Why on earth should Robin have sent a messenger-boy at all if he could come to the bank himself? It’s arguable that he might have sent for the packet if for some reason he couldn’t come, but if he could come right up to the bank, he could walk in and get the packet. As for its being a risk for anyone who was playing a trick, I don’t see that at all. The manager took a very unusual course in having the messenger-boy followed, and supposing this man had thought of that possibility, why, the very safest place for him to meet the boy and take the answer would be just as he came out of the bank, because that’s just what nobody would be expecting, and if the boy was being followed, it would be certain to be at some little distance—he would be able to count on that.”

  “Robin would be able to count on that,” said Meg. “It’s no use, Bill. I think you’re right in nearly everything you say. I don’t think it was a serious attempt to get hold of the packet. I think it was a try-on, but I think it was Robin’s try-on. He wants to make sure that the packet won’t be opened, and he wants to keep me from being sure whether he’s alive or dead. It’s a trick, but it’s Robin’s trick. It’s no good going on talking about it. You’d better start scolding me—you said you were going to, but you didn’t say why.”

  Bill’s expression changed. She was right, it was no good their going on talking about it, and meanwhile he’d got to stop her starving herself. He said bluntly,

  “I should think you could guess why. This starving business has got to stop. You’ve got to have some money to go on with. Call it a loan or anything you like, and if it makes you any happier, I’ll swear to dun the Professor for it.”

  Meg smiled at him with a sudden bewildering sweetness.

  “All right,” she said in rather a shaky voice. “And don’t scold me any more, because I was going to ask you—I really was. Will you lend me five pounds? And you shall get it out of Uncle Henry if you can, but I warn you that it will be a tough job. I sometimes think there’s a method about Uncle Henry’s vagueness, because it always comes on extra bad the minute anyone starts talking about money—especially if it’s his money and they want some of it.”

  Bill frowned.

  “Five pounds is all nonsense!”

  She shook her head.

  “Bill, you’re a lamb, and I know you’d produce fifty without a murmur and never bother whether Uncle Henry paid you back or not. But I don’t want more than five pounds, because I’ve made up my mind to go down to Ledstow. I wouldn’t borrow at all, only to be quite honest, I’m down to my last half-crown and that wouldn’t get me there, so I’ll take the five pounds and say thank you kindly.”

  “I don’t like your going to Ledstow,” said Bill.

  “Nor do I,” said Meg.

  “Then don’t go.”

  Meg laughed a little sadly.

  “Needs must when necessity drives.”

  XIII

  “Well, that’s where we are,” said Bill Coverdale. He addressed Colonel Garratt, who was sitting with his back to him rummaging in one of the drawers of his writing-table.

  There was a pause, during which Garratt dragged a file from the recesses of the drawer, dumped it on the floor, and then rummaged again.

  “I suppose you haven’t been listening by any chance?” said Bill presently.

  Garratt turned a grinning face over his shoulder. The grin was a malevolent one.

  “Every word. And if you want to know what I think about it—poppy-cock!”

  “Why?” said Bill from the depths of the least uncomfortable chair.

  Garratt spun his chair round and tipped it back at a dangerous angle against the table.

  “Why? Because it is poppy-cock. And if you weren’t in a besotted frame of mind about this young woman, you’d know it was poppy-cock. Good Lord! Marked newspapers slipped into letter-boxes and then vanishing into thin air—visiting-cards at midnight—leaves with mysterious messages pricked on ’em—letters on the hearth-rug! Your young woman wants a husband to look after her, and you’d better marry her and take her away for a change of air. I hope for your sake she’ll lay off the hysteric stunt, because if she don’t you’ll have your work cut out.”

  Bill kept his temper. He said:

  “Are you suggesting that she was the gentleman in the nice blue suit and bowler hat who sent the messenger-boy to the bank this morning? She’s got an alibi for that, you know, because I was talking to her when the manager rang up. Oh are you going to prove that she was the thug who followed me into Minnett’s Row and blew off the top of my ear? I’m afraid that’s no go either, because there really wasn’t time for her to get into trousers and pursue me—and I’m prepared to swear to the trousers. Of course she might have had ’em on under her evening dress all the time she was dining with me and going to the theatre—there’s such a lot of room under the sort of skirts girls are wearing that no one would notice a flimsy little extra like a pair of trousers!”

  Garratt made the most hideous grimace.

  “I thought you said it was dark?”

  “So it was. But when he legged it he legged it good and proper, and I’m prepared to swear the legs were in trousers. No one could have run like that in a long flapping chiffon skirt and high-heeled shoes.”


  “Meaning Mrs O’Hara had a long flapping skirt and high-heeled shoes? Well, you can have all that, because I didn’t think she’d been shooting at you. Why should she?” He shrugged his shoulders. “You may have annoyed someone else who was keen on her, or it may have been a playful drunk, or—” He looked maliciously at Bill, rolled his eyes, brought his chair down with a thump, and swung round again to the table.

  Bill came over and sat on the corner of it facing him.

  “Meaning that I’d caught a touch of Meg’s complaint—hysteria being well known to be catching. All right, have it your way, but I’d like to know why it is your way. You don’t really believe that I faked the top off my own ear, so I would like to know why you’re stunting that you do? However, if you don’t want to tell me you won’t. I notice you haven’t put up any theory about the bank business. To my mind that packet’s the crux of the whole business.”

  Garratt looked up suddenly and sharply, nodded, and looked down again. After waiting for a moment to see if he would speak Bill went on.

  “I don’t suppose you want to know what I think, but I’m going to tell you. O’Hara deposited that packet a week before he disappeared.”

  Garratt looked up again.

  “Sure?”

  “Dead sure. According to you he thought he’d got on the track of something pretty big. He dropped hints, but he wasn’t giving anything away—wanted to scoop all the honour and glory for himself, I should say. But I think he wrote down what he’d got hold of up to date, and I think that packet has got his notes in it, and any bits of evidence he may have come across. Now is there any way of getting that packet handed over?”

  Garratt shook his head.

  “Only by getting leave to presume O’Hara’s death. Has she been to her lawyer?”

  “She won’t,” said Bill.

  Garratt swore, not noisily, but with concentrated bitterness.