Miss Silver Comes To Stay

by Patricia Wentworth

  Miss Silver’s eye did not pass. It dwelt upon her, calmly and thoughtfully exploring. A smile changed the small, neat features. It imparted confidence, it diffused reassurance, and above all it charmed. Then the whole astonishing experience was over. It was the little dowdy ex-governess who said,

  “How can I help you, Miss Cray?”

  Rietta had no answer ready. She found that she was being invited to sit down in her own house. A feeling of beneficent authority diffused itself. She leaned forward and said with a child’s simplicity,

  “We are in great trouble.”

  Miss Silver coughed gently.

  “I believe I know something about it.”

  “Everyone does. I suppose it is always like this, only you don’t think about it until it happens to yourself. Anyone can ask you anything. If you don’t answer, they make something up. There’s no privacy any more.”

  “Does that matter so much, Miss Cray?”

  “You mean have I got anything to hide? I suppose I have. I suppose everyone has things that they would rather not have trampled upon-” On the last words her voice went down into the depths.

  Miss Silver looked at her with concern. She saw painful evidences of a sleepless night and continuing strain. The fine eyes had marks like bruises under them. She said in her most practical voice,

  “What did you have for breakfast?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Miss Silver coughed.

  “It is just one o’clock. You have asked me to lunch, and I think we will defer our talk until we have had something to eat. Perhaps you will allow me to help you.”

  Rietta felt surprised and relieved. She wouldn’t have to talk about it yet. The thought of lunch was rather dreadful, but it deferred the moment when she would have to talk about James Lessiter. She said,

  “Everything is ready-Fancy will help me bring it in. That’s the girl who is staying here-Frances Bell. You will meet her, and Carr. I expect that’s a good thing.”

  In the course of her professional activities Miss Silver had become accustomed to the kind of meal in which she now participated. The general feeling of gloom and apprehension, the sporadic outbursts of conversation checked and impeded by the fear of saying something which would better have remained unsaid, the alternating patches of silence during which no one can think of anything to say-all these were perfectly familiar. She herself could always produce a small even trickle of talk, but she did not always choose to do so.

  She sometimes found it instructive to watch how people behaved under the stress of silence. Today she made it her concern to see that Miss Cray partook of a sufficient meal, and in this she ultimately succeeded. It became easier to eat something than to keep on saying no, and after the first few mouthfuls Rietta was aware of her own need for food.

  Observing Mr. Carr Robertson, Miss Silver could not fail to be aware of his disapproval. Men, she reflected, had so little power of hiding their feelings. From the earliest stage they presented their frame of mind to the world in a manner which was often sufficiently naif to be engaging. She could have no doubt at all that Mr. Carr thought her a meddling old maid. He reminded her of more than one little boy who considered himself affronted at having to share his sisters’ lessons. She regarded him with indulgence.

  For Fancy Bell in her scarlet suit she had a faint kind smile. A guileless creature, and an open book to a tactful and experienced questioner. She had no doubt that if Fancy knew anything, she herself would know it before very long. As to Mr. Carr-well, her immediate business was not with him.

  To Rietta the time passed at once slowly and too fast. Since Carr and Fancy volunteered to wash up, she could count on no more delays. She found herself in the sitting-room with Miss Silver, who had the air of being quite at home there. She had removed her tippet and laid aside her coat, revealing beneath it a dress of sage-green wool with some odd little bits of embroidery down the front. Her favourite brooch, a rose carved in a black bog-oak with an Irish pearl at the centre, fastened the neck of this garment and slightly dragged it down. A fine gold chain looped up on the left-hand side supported the pince-nez used for small print or in a bad light. The capacious black bag reposed on the floor beside her open, and served to confine the ball of pale blue wool from which she was knitting a cosy coat and knickers for her niece Ethel Burkett’s little Josephine. She kept her hands low in her lap, holding the needles after the Continental fashion as she and Cecilia had been taught by the German mistress, Fraulein Stein, when she was at school. It has the great advantage of making it almost impossible to watch either one’s hands or the work. Miss Silver rarely glanced at the rapidly clicking needles or the lengthening strip of blue. She gazed placidly at her hostess and said,

  “Before you tell me anything I must ask you in what way you think I may be able to help you.”

  Rietta felt the icy shock which she had been anticipating. She heard herself say in a lost voice,

  “I don’t know-” And then, “I hoped-”

  Miss Silver said in a grave manner,

  “I must ask you to think clearly about this. I can take no case with any other object than that of discovering the truth. I cannot undertake to prove anyone innocent, any more than I would undertake to prove anyone guilty. I feel obliged to make this perfectly clear to an intending client. Perhaps you would like a little more time to think it over.”

  Rietta’s shivering reluctance was gone. The plunge had been taken. She looked steadily at Miss Silver and said,

  “No-the truth is what I want.”

  The needles clicked, the pale blue strip revolved.

  “Then, Miss Cray, perhaps you will tell me just what happened last night.”

  Rietta put up a hand and pushed back her hair.

  “I don’t quite know where to begin… James Lessiter was an old friend-at one time we were engaged. I broke it off, and until the day before yesterday I hadn’t seen him for twenty-three years. I met him then in the evening after supper at Catherine Welby’s-she lives in the Gate House at the entrance to the drive of Melling House. James was perfectly easy and friendly. He walked home with me and discussed one or two things about which he thought I might have known his mother’s intentions. I couldn’t help him, but it was all quite easy and friendly. Then last night-”

  She broke off, because now she had to speak, not about herself; but about Carr. If he were to be left out of it, she might as well not speak at all. But if he were to be brought in, how could she be sure that she would not be bringing him into danger? The answer to that came flat and practical- “You can’t keep him out.”

  Her distress evoked a look of reassurance and a “Pray continue, Miss Cray.”

  She went on in short, bald sentences-things like “Mr. Ainger came in and left some papers… After he had gone I went to the telephone… When I came back Carr went out…”

  That wasn’t any good. She knew that it wasn’t.

  Miss Silver said gently,

  “I think you will have to tell me why he went out.” Then, after a pause, “Miss Cray, you will have to make up your mind whether you intend to trust me. Half measures are quite useless. As Lord Tennyson so beautifully says, ‘And trust me not at all, or all in all.’ ”

  “It isn’t-for myself-”

  Miss Silver coughed.

  “Consider what you imply. You can lay your own thoughts and motives bare to me because you know that you are innocent. When it comes to Mr. Carr, are you not so sure?”

  Rietta cried out. It was a sound without words, sharp with pain and protest.

  Miss Silver said with quiet authority,

  “You must make up your mind.”

  There was a silence. Rietta got up and went to the window. Standing there with her back to the room, she said,

  “When you’ve said a thing you can’t take it back. He didn’t do it. It’s not true to say that I’m not sure, but things can be made to look-as if-he had a motive.”

  Miss Silver knitted. After a little
while she said,

  “Come and sit down. Emotion is a distorting factor. We need to be practical and clear. Here is a point I would like you to consider. If Miss Bell was present when Mr. Carr left the house so suddenly, she as well as yourself is aware of why he did so.”

  “Yes.”

  “How long do you suppose she would withstand a cross-examination? You know her better than I do.”

  Rietta said, “No-you’re right-I had better tell you. Carr saw James Lessiter’s picture, and when he saw it he recognized the man who had seduced and deserted his wife. I suppose you have heard about that.”

  “Yes.”

  “I think there may have been extenuating circumstances. James says she left him and had been living with another man. It’s quite likely. But Carr didn’t know that. He rushed out, and I went up to Melling House to warn James.” She told the rest of the story simply and clearly. He had been burning her letters. He had shown her the old will made when they were engaged. She had scratched her wrist going through the wood. It had bled a good deal and stained the cuff of her raincoat. James had lent her his handkerchief to staunch the blood… No, she hadn’t brought it away with her. And she hadn’t brought the raincoat either. She had taken it off when she went in, and had forgotten it when she came away.

  Miss Silver listened with close attention. At this point she coughed.

  “How did you come to forget your coat, Miss Cray? It was surely a very cold night.”

  The fine grey eyes met hers with perfect candour.

  “I never thought about it.”

  “You came out into the cold and forgot that you had left your coat?”

  “Yes, I really did.”

  “I am not doubting that, but I should like to know what made it possible for you to forget. You left Mr. Lessiter and came out into the cold without noticing it. Did you leave him alive?”

  The angry colour came to Rietta’s face.

  “Of course I did!”

  “Did you part on friendly terms?”

  Rietta’s head was high.

  “No, we didn’t. I was angry. That’s how I came to forget my coat.”

  “What were you angry about?”

  “He made me angry. It was nothing to do-with this, or with Carr.”

  Miss Silver gazed at her with mild persistence.

  “Did he make love to you?”

  “No-no-it wasn’t anything like that. It was a business matter-not even my own business. It concerned a friend.”

  Miss Silver continued to gaze for a moment. Then she stooped down and unwound some lengths of pale blue wool from the ball lying beside her chair. Resuming her knitting, she enquired with the air of one who changes an unwelcome subject,

  “You say that you were called to the telephone while Mr. Carr and Miss Bell were looking at the papers left by Mr. Ainger. Since the question of time may be involved, perhaps the person who called you up could corroborate you on this point.”

  “Fancy says it was twenty past eight. She listens incessantly to the wireless, so she always knows the time. She says Carr and I went out at half past eight.”

  Miss Silver beamed.

  “Your caller could corroborate that. Who was it?”

  “It was Catherine Welby.”

  Miss Silver coughed.

  “And you were talking for ten minutes. Miss Cray-what were you talking about?”

  Rietta felt as if she had missed a step in the dark. There should have been something solid under her foot, but it wasn’t there. The colour drained away from her face. Concealment is an art which requires much practice. She had never acquired it. She looked helplessly at Miss Silver and beat about in her mind for something to say. She found nothing better than,

  “We were talking.”

  “On a matter of business?”

  “I suppose you might call it that.”

  “Connected with Mr. Lessiter?”

  Rietta said, “Oh-”

  She was so plainly taken aback that Miss Silver was answered. She knitted rapidly whilst a number of small circumstances came together in her mind-Catherine Welby’s pallor and her look of strain; the fact that James Lessiter had walked home from the Gate House with Rietta Cray and talked, not about old times, but about his mother’s intentions with regard presumably to some disposition of her effects; the ten minutes’ conversation with Mrs. Welby about business; the angry parting between Rietta Cray and James Lessiter after a conversation on business-business which involved a friend.

  From this train of thought the word business emerged with a good deal of emphasis-business connected with James Lessiter and his mother’s effects. Scraps of Cecilia Voycey’s gossip came back in an illuminating manner. Her needles clicked busily. When she spoke again it was to return to an earlier topic.

  “You say that you came away from Melling House and left your raincoat behind you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I presume that it is in the possession of the police.”

  Miss Cray’s hesitation in answering this question was so marked that when she did at last say, “Yes,” she encountered a look of the most stringent enquiry. With a hortatory cough Miss Silver said,

  “Just why did you find that question so difficult to answer? Are you not sure whether the police have the coat?”

  This time there was no hesitation. Rietta said,

  “Oh, yes, they have it.”

  “They informed you of that?”

  “They took it away-from here.”

  “Did you go back for it?”

  Rietta’s lips moved, but no sound came from them. She shook her head.

  Miss Silver stopped knitting for a moment and leaned forward.

  “Miss Cray, you possess information which is vital to your case. You can impart or withhold it, but if you do not trust me, I cannot help you.” Then, after a slight but significant pause, “If you did not bring the raincoat back, it is quite plain that it was Mr. Carr who did so.”

  Rietta turned as pale as if she had been struck. Then the colour rushed into her face.

  “Yes-you’re right. I must tell you. It’s no use thinking that everything won’t come out. Carr walked into Lenton. He went to see Elizabeth Moore. They were engaged before he met Marjory-his wife. I hoped they would make it up some day when they met again. They are really suited, and they cared very much. Marjory was a madness-a very tragic one for all three of them. Last night Carr went straight to Elizabeth. I think he was afraid of what he might do. I’m trusting you-I think he might have done something dreadful when he first rushed out of the house. But he didn’t, he went to Elizabeth. She has taken him back. Don’t you see he wouldn’t do anything violent after that? He was happy and satisfied. You don’t do murder when you’re feeling like that. All he wanted to do was to close that chapter of his life and have done with it. He went up to Melling House, and found James lying there dead.”

  “Why did he go to Melling House?”

  “I asked him that. He said it seemed the natural thing to do. He wanted to close the whole thing down and be done with it, and to do that he felt that he had to see James and tell him that he knew. Then they could avoid each other, as he put it, decently.”

  Miss Silver said, “I see.”

  Rietta put up her hand to her head. The long, beautifully shaped fingers pressed against her temple.

  “He went up there and found James. My raincoat was lying over a chair. It was most horribly stained. The right cuff and sleeve were soaked.” Her voice had become strained and toneless. “Miss Silver, you asked me if I was sure that Carr didn’t do it. I am quite, quite sure, and I can tell you why I am sure. He thought I had done it. He came down here with the raincoat and asked me why.” Her hand fell into her lap again. “I’m not sure-I’m really not sure-whether he thinks so still. I don’t think he does with his feelings, but I think he does with his mind. That’s why he tried to get the stains out of the coat.”

  Miss Silver said, “Dear me!” The words, mild in themse
lves, carried a considerable weight of disapproval.

  Rietta drew in her breath.

  “All the right side of the coat was wet when the police came this morning. They took it away.”

  Miss Silver coughed.

  “Unless the washing was extremely thorough, traces of blood will be found. You are quite clear that the stains were far more than could be accounted for by the fact that you had scratched your wrist?”

  Rietta shuddered. She said,

  “The sleeve was soaked.”

  CHAPTER 26

  Miss Silver stayed until after three o’clock. By the time she resumed her coat, her yellow fur tippet, and her warm black woollen gloves, one whole side of little Josephine Burkett’s woolly jacket had been completed and cast off. At least an inch of the second front had made its appearance as a pale blue frill. In her professional capacity it may be said that she now possessed quite an accurate picture of what had taken place the previous evening, in so far as this was known to Rietta Cray. A very short conversation with Fancy had elicited a few extra details. Fancy was, in fact, only too anxious to talk to someone who wasn’t the police and who was trying to help Carr and Miss Cray. In the circles of her origin there had been a wary feeling that however respectable you were you didn’t get matey with the police. When people live packed together in very crowded districts their lives and interests are closely knit. A touch upon one part of the fabric is felt throughout the whole-people hold together. It would never have occurred to Fancy that a friend might betray you to the police. She talked freely. Miss Silver came away with quite a factual impression of Carr Robertson’s behaviour when he had recognized James Lessiter’s photograph.

  “He did look dreadful-” Fancy thrilled in retrospect- “white as a sheet. I’m sure he could have gone on as a ghost without a bit of make-up. He regularly frightened me. Miss Cray came into the room, and she said, ‘Carr!’ She was frightened too, you know. He did look dreadful. And she put her hand on his arm, but he didn’t take a bit of notice, just went on pointing at the picture. And then he said, ‘Is that James Lessiter?’ and she said, ‘Yes.’ And he said, ‘He’s the man I’ve been looking for-he’s the man who took Marjory away.’ She was his wife, you know, and if you ask me, he was well rid of her, but that’s what he said-‘He’s the man who took Marjory away. I’ve got him now!’ and off out of the room and out of the house, and the doors banging. I knew he’d got a temper, but I’d never seen him like that before.”