Miss Silver Comes To Stay (4 page)

On the morning following her arrival Mrs. Voycey took her friend Miss Silver shopping. Melling had a butcher, a baker who also sold buns, cake, biscuits, fruit preserved in glass bottles and sweets, and a grocer whose groceries merged by tactful degrees into the appurtenances of a general shop. You could, for example, start at the left-hand side of the counter and buy bacon, coffee and semolina, and work gradually to the right through apples, potatoes and root vegetables, till you arrived at twine, garden implements, shopping-bags, and boots and shoes hanging like strings of onions from a nail high up on the wall. Somewhere midway there was a stand of picture-post cards and a blotting-pad, the latter an advertisement of the fact that the shop was also a branch post office, and that stamps and telegraph forms could be obtained.

With so many different attractions, it was naturally a very general meeting-place. Miss Silver was introduced to Miss Ainger, the Vicar’s sister, a formidable lady with iron-grey hair, a Roman nose, and the sort of tweeds which suggest armour-plating. It might have been the size of the check, black and white upon a ground of clerical grey, or it might have been something about Miss Ainger’s figure, but the suggestion was certainly there. She was scolding Mrs. Grover about the bacon, and detached herself with difficulty.

“Yes, much too thick, and with far too much fat—Did you say a school friend? Oh, how do you do?—Don’t let it happen again or I shall have to tell the Vicar.”

Mrs. Grover’s colour rose. She pressed her lips together and restrained herself. Mrs. Voycey moved a step nearer the post cards and caught Miss Cray by the arm.

“Rietta, I want to introduce you to my friend Miss Silver. We were at school together.”

Rietta said, “Oh—” She was in a hurry, but, with twenty years’ experience, she knew that it wasn’t any use being in a hurry with Mrs. Voycey. The large, firm hand upon her arm would remain there until she had done her social duty. She said, “How do you do?” to Miss Maud Silver, and was invited to tea that afternoon.

“And it’s no use saying you can’t come, Rietta, because I know perfectly well that Carr and Miss Bell have gone up to town for the day. The baker saw them start. He mentioned it when he called, because there was a very black cloud overhead at the time and he noticed that Miss Bell hadn’t got an umbrella so he hoped she wouldn’t get wet. He said he told her she’d better take one, but she only laughed. How long are they staying with you?”

“I don’t quite know. Carr has brought down some manuscripts to read.”

“He looks as if he needed a good long holiday. Then you’ll come to tea this afternoon? I’ll ring Catherine up and ask her too. I want Maud Silver to meet you both.” She leaned closer and said in a throaty whisper, “She’s quite a famous detective.”

Miss Silver was examining the stand of post cards. She looked so much less like a detective than anything Rietta could have imagined that she was startled into saying,

“What does she detect?”

“Crime,” said Mrs. Voycey right into her ear. She then let go of the arm she had been holding and stepped back. “I’ll expect you at half past four. I must really have a word with Mrs. Mayhew.”

Mrs. Mayhew was buying onions, and a stone of potatoes.

“I’m sure I never thought I’d come to having to get either from anywhere else except the garden, but it’s all Mr. Andrews can do to keep the place tidy, and that’s the truth, Mr. Grover—indeed he can’t, and there’s no getting from it. So if Sam can bring them up after school—” She turned, a little meek woman with a plaintive manner, and was immediately cornered by Mrs. Voycey.

“Ah, Mrs. Mayhew—I suppose you’re very busy with Mr. Lessiter back. Quite unexpected, wasn’t it? Only last week I said to the Vicar, ‘There doesn’t seem to be any word of Melling House being opened up again,’ and I said it was a pity. Well, now he’s back I hope he isn’t going to run away again.”

“I don’t know, I’m sure.”

Mrs. Voycey gave her hearty laugh.

“We must all be very nice to him, and then perhaps he’ll stay.” She came a step nearer and dropped her voice. “Good news of your son, I hope.”

Mrs. Mayhew darted a frightened glance to the right and to the left. It was no good. She was in the angle between the counter and the wall, and get past Mrs. Voycey she couldn’t. Her own tone was almost inaudible as she murmured,

“He’s doing all right.”

Mrs. Voycey patted her kindly on the shoulder.

“I was sure he would—you can tell him I said so. Things are different to what they used to be thirty or forty years ago. There wasn’t any second chance then, whether it was a boy or a girl, but it’s all quite different now. He’ll be coming down to see you, I expect.”

Mrs. Mayhew had turned dreadfully pale. Mrs. Voycey meant well—everyone in Melling knew how kind she was— but Mrs. Mayhew couldn’t bear to talk about Cyril, not right here in the shop with people listening. It made her feel as if she was in a trap and couldn’t get out. And then the little lady who looked like a governess coughed and touched Mrs. Voycey’s arm—“Pray, Cecilia, tell me something about these views. I should like to send a card to my niece, Ethel Burkett”—and she was free. Her heart was beating so hard that it confused her, and she was half-way up the drive before she remembered that she had meant to buy peppermint flavouring.

When the two ladies came out of the shop and were walking home across the Green, Mrs. Voycey said,

“That was Mrs. Mayhew. She and her husband are cook and butler at Melling House. Their son has been a sad trouble to them.”

Miss Silver coughed and said,

“She did not like your talking about him, Cecilia.”

Mrs. Voycey said in her hearty way,

“It’s no good her being so sensitive. Everyone knows, and everyone feels kindly about it and hopes that Cyril has made a fresh start. He was their only one and they spoilt him—a dreadful mistake. Of course it makes it hard for Mrs. Mayhew the Grover boy having turned out so well—that was Mrs. Grover serving Dagmar Ainger at the end of the counter. Allan and Cyril used to be friends. They both took scholarships, and Allan went into Mr. Holderness’s office—a very good opening. But Cyril took a job in London, and that’s what did the mischief. He isn’t a bad boy, but he’s weak and they spoilt him. He ought to have been where he could keep in touch with his home. It’s terribly lonely for boys like that when they first go out into the world, and the only company they can get is just the sort that isn’t likely to do them any good. You know, Maud, I used to be dreadfully disappointed about not having children, and I dare say I missed a great deal, but it’s a tremendous responsibility—isn’t it?”

Miss Silver coughed and said it was.

“Even a satisfactory boy like Allan Grover,” pursued Mrs. Voycey. “Well, I wouldn’t say it to anyone but you, and of course it’s too silly for words, to say nothing of being exceedingly presumptuous—”

“My dear Cecilia!”

“I was really shocked. And I can’t—no, I really can’t believe that she gave him any encouragement. Of course at that age they don’t need any, and she is a very pretty woman—”

“My dear Cecilia!”

Mrs. Voycey nodded.

“Yes—Catherine Welby. Quite too absurd, as I said. It began with his offering to go and put up shelves in her house, and then he said he would plant her bulbs, and she lent him books. And when she wanted to pay him he wouldn’t take a penny, so of course she couldn’t let him go on. He isn’t twenty-one yet, so she is more than old enough to be his mother.”

Miss Silver coughed indulgently.

“Oh, my dear Cecilia, what difference does that make?”

James Lessiter sat back in his chair and looked across the table at Mr. Holderness, who appeared to be considerably perturbed. A flush had risen to the roots of the thick grey hair, deepening his florid complexion to something very near the rich plum-colour achieved by the original founder of the firm, a three-bottle man of the early Georgian period whose portrait hung on the panelling behind him. He stared back at James and said,

“You shock me.”

James Lessiter’s eyebrows rose.

“Do I really? I shouldn’t have thought anyone could practise as a solicitor for getting on for forty years and still retain a faculty for being shocked.”

There was a moment’s silence. The flush faded a little. Mr. Holderness smiled faintly.

“It is difficult to remain completely professional about people when one has known them as long as I have known your family. Your mother was a very old friend, and as to Catherine Welby, I was at her parents’ wedding—”

“And so you would expect me to allow myself to be robbed.”

“My dear James!”

James Lessiter smiled.

“How very much alike everyone is. That is exactly what Rietta said.”

“You have spoken to her about this—distressing suspicion of yours?”

“I told her there were a good many things missing, and that it wouldn’t surprise me to find that Catherine knew where they had gone, and—what they had fetched. Like you, all she could find to say was, ‘My dear James!’ ”

Mr. Holderness laid down the pencil he had been balancing and placed his fingertips together. It was a pose familiar to any client of long standing, and indicated that he was about to counsel moderation.

“I alluded just now to this idea of yours as a distressing suspicion. You cannot wish to precipitate a family scandal upon a mere suspicion.”

“Oh, no.”

“I was sure of it. Your mother was extremely fond of Catherine. If there is no evidence to the contrary, there would be a strong presumption that the furniture at the Gate House was intended to be a gift.”

James continued to smile.

“My mother left Catherine five hundred pounds. By a few strokes of the pen she could have added, ‘and the furniture of the Gate House,’ or words to that effect. Yet she did not do so. If it comes to presumptions, that would be one on the other side. The will never mentions the furniture. Did my mother ever mention it to you?”

“Not precisely.”

“What do you mean by not precisely?”

The fingertips came apart. The pencil was taken up again.

“Well, as a matter of fact, I mentioned it to her.”

“And she said?”

“She put the matter aside. She could be very peremptory, you know. I cannot pretend to give her exact words. The will was drawn more than ten years ago, but my recollection is that she said something like ‘That doesn’t come into it.’ Considered in the light of what you have been saying, it might be argued that her will had no concern with the furniture because she had already given it to Catherine—”

“Or because she had no intention of giving it to her. You didn’t ask her what she meant?”

“No—she was being extremely peremptory.”

James laughed.

“I’ve no doubt of it! What I shall continue to doubt is that my mother had any intention of letting Catherine get away with so much valuable stuff.”

Mr. Holderness rolled the pencil meditatively to and fro between finger and thumb.

“You may have some grounds for such a doubt, but you have no certainty. I dare say, if the truth were known, that your mother never defined the situation very clearly. When she told Catherine that she might have this or that from Melling House she may have intended a loan, or she may have intended a gift, or she may have had no very clear intention. Catherine, on the other hand, might naturally have concluded that the things were being given to her. I think, if I may say so, that it would be a pity to encourage a suspicion which you cannot prove.”

James Lessiter sat up straight and formidable.

“Who says I can’t prove it? I will if I can.”

Mr. Holderness looked shocked all over again. His colour did not mount so vigorously as before, nor did it attain to quite so deep a shade. He stopped rolling the pencil and said,

“Really—”

James nodded.

“I know, I know—you think I ought to let it slide. Well, I’m not going to. I have an extreme dislike for being taken for a fool, and an even more extreme dislike for being done down— I can assure you that very few people have ever got away with it. I’ve got an idea that there’s been quite a lot going on behind my back. Well, I mean to get to the bottom of it, and when I do, anyone who thought he could take advantage of my absence is going to find himself in Queer Street.”

Mr. Holderness put up a hand.

“My dear James, I hope you don’t mean that you suspect the Mayhews. Your mother had every confidence—”

James Lessiter laughed.

“If there weren’t so much confidence, there would be no room for the confidence trick, would there? Now I’m going to tell you something. You say I can’t prove my suspicions because my mother held her tongue and didn’t put anything in her will. What she did do was to write to me a couple of days before she died. Would you like to know what she said?”

“I should indeed.”

“I can give it you verbatim. ‘I have not troubled you with letters about business as I hope you will soon be coming home. Meanwhile, in case of accident, I should like you to know that I have kept a careful note of everything.’ A careful note of everything—that should tell us what we want to know, shouldn’t it?”

“It might,” said Mr. Holderness slowly.

“Oh, I think you are too cautious. I think we may assume that it would. I haven’t found the note yet. My mother, like so many women, had a profound distrust of banks and office safes. It would, of course, have been a great deal more sensible—and convenient—if she had left this memorandum in your hands, but she didn’t. I have been through the drawers of her writing-table and a filing-cabinet which she had in the library, but for a special paper of this kind she may have had some special hiding-place. I have every hope that I shall find it, and when I do—”

Mr. Holderness lifted his eyes and looked steadily and gravely across the table.

“You sound vindictive.”

James laughed easily.

“Oh, yes.”

“You would really proceed to extremes?”

“I should prosecute.”

Mrs. Voycey’s tea-party went off as tea-parties do. Homemade scones were partaken of, and home-made quince preserve offered with modest pride.

“My dear mother’s recipe. A lovely colour, isn’t it? It reminds me of that deep red dress of yours, Rietta. But what I would like to know is how to keep the pale green colour of the fruit as they do in Portugal. I stayed out there for a month when I was a girl, and they made a most delicious quince cheese which they called marmalada, the colour of green grapes and turned out of a jelly-mould. You ate it in slabs, and it was crystallized all over the top—quite terribly good. But I never met anyone who could tell me how it was done. The minute I boil quinces with sugar they behave like traffic lights—first they go amber, and then they go red.”

Mrs. Voycey laughed very heartily at her own joke and proceeded to terrible disclosures about Portuguese plumbing. Whilst Miss Silver shared her views as to up-to-date sanitation, it was, in her opinion, a subject not at all suited to the tea-table. She coughed and endeavoured to change the topic, but it was some time before she was able to do so, and then, a good deal to her distaste, she found her professional activities the next topic on Cecilia’s rattling tongue. The whole story of the extraordinary affair of the Eternity Earring as retailed by Miss Alvina Grey was poured out.

No use for Miss Silver to say with her slight admonitory cough, “I prefer not to talk about it,” or even, “My dear Cecilia, I never discuss my cases.” Even as a schoolgirl it had always been very difficult to stop Cissy Christopher. As an elderly woman in her own house it was quite impossible to check or deflect Cecilia Voycey. Miss Silver sighed and gave up the attempt. At the earliest possible opportunity she introduced the subject of education, and found herself able to exchange views in a very interesting manner with Miss Rietta Cray.

“I spent twenty years in the scholastic profession.”

Something stirred at the back of Rietta’s mind and vanished again in the shadows. A little later it was there again—something just on the edge of being remembered. And then all at once, in the middle of Catherine being plaintive about the cost of living, Mrs. Voycey urging everyone to have more tea, and Miss Silver interrupting a quotation from Tennyson to say, “No, thank you, dear,” it came to her.

‘ “Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers,’ as Lord Tennyson so aptly says.”

Rietta said, “Oh—” And then abruptly, “Are you Randal March’s Miss Silver?”

Miss Silver smiled in a gratified manner.

“He and his sisters were pupils of mine. The friendship has, I am glad to say, been maintained. Do you know the Marches?”

“I was at school with Isabel and Margaret. They were big girls when I was a little one. Miss Atkinson always said how well grounded they were. Randal was younger of course— about my age. He’s Chief Constable of the county now.”

“Yes. I had the pleasure of lunching with him in town not long ago. Isabel has married, you know. A widower with several children—extremely suitable. In my experience these late marriages are often very happy. People have learned to appreciate companionship. Margaret, of course, married in her early twenties, but it has turned out very well.”

They went on talking about the Marches.

Catherine and Rietta walked home together. It was deep dusk. There were no lights except a distant yellow gleam here and there where a curtain had been carelessly drawn in one of the cottages which bordered the Green. When they had gone a little way Catherine said with sudden energy,

“Rietta, what did James say to you last night? Did he talk about me?”

Rietta considered. There seemed to be no reason why she should hold her tongue. She said,

“He asked me whether I knew what arrangement his mother had made with you about the Gate House.”

“What did you say?”

“I said I didn’t know.”

Catherine took a quick breath.

“Anything else?”

“He asked me about the furniture.”

“What about it?”

“Whether it was given or lent.”

“And what did you say?”

“Just what I said before—I didn’t know.”

Catherine brought her hands together in sharp exasperation.

“Aunt Mildred gave me the furniture—you know she did— I’ve told you a dozen times! Why couldn’t you say so?”

Rietta said in her brusque way,

“What you’ve told me isn’t evidence.”

“You mean you don’t believe me when I tell you—when I tell you that she gave me the things?”

“No, I don’t mean that. I mean just what I said—what you told me isn’t evidence.”

“And what evidence do you want?”

How exactly like Catherine to make a scene about nothing. Rietta wondered, as she had often wondered before, whether the old friendship was really worth while. Only when you have known someone all your life and live practically next door each other in a village, there isn’t much you can do about it except to try and keep your temper. She said as coolly as she could,

“It isn’t what I want—it’s James. And what he wants is evidence—something to show his mother’s intention. He asked whether she had ever said anything.”

“What did you say?” The words came quick and angry.

“I said your mother told me, ‘I’m letting Catherine have the Gate House. I’ve told her she can have the two ground-floor rooms knocked into one, and I suppose I shall have to let her have some furniture.’ ”

“There—you see! What did he say to that?”

“That it might mean anything,” said Rietta drily.

“Oh!” It was a gasp of pure rage, followed by a sharp, “How perfectly outrageous!”

They were in the middle of the Green on the narrow footpath which cut across it. Rietta stopped.

“Catherine, don’t you see you can’t take James like that? You’ll only get his back up. He looks on the whole thing as a business transaction—”

Catherine broke in with an edge to her voice.

“Of course you would stand up for him—we all know that!”

Rietta’s temper rose. She restrained it.

“I’m not standing up for him—I’m telling you how he looks at the thing. Opposition always put his back up. Unless he has changed very much, the best thing you can do is to lay your cards on the table and tell him the exact truth.”

“What do you think I’ve been telling him—lies?”

“Something betwixt and between,” said Rietta in a blunt voice.

“How dare you!” She began to walk on quickly.

Rietta caught her up.

“Well, you asked me. Look here, Catherine, what’s the good of going on like this? You know, and I know, what Aunt Mildred was like, and what is more, James knows too. She had spasms of being businesslike, but most of the time she couldn’t be bothered. She was an autocrat to her fingertips, and she was as changeable as a weathercock. If she told you you could have something, she might have meant it for a present one day and not meant it the next, or she might never have meant it at all. And if you want to know what I really think, well, I don’t believe she did mean to give you the things outright—some of them are too valuable. But I didn’t say that to James.”

“But you will.”

“No. He didn’t ask me, and I shouldn’t have said it if he had. It’s just what I think.”

They walked along in silence for a minute or two. Then Catherine’s hand came out and caught at Rietta’s arm. She said in a trembling voice,

“I don’t know what to do.”

“Do what I said, put your cards on the table.”

“I can’t.”

“Why can’t you?”

“I can’t—he might turn nasty.”

A little contempt came into Rietta’s tone.

“What can he do? If you don’t make him angry, he’ll probably take back the half dozen things which are really valuable and let you keep the rest.”

Catherine’s grip became desperate.

“Rietta—I’d better tell you—it’s worse than that. I—well, I sold some of the things.”

“Oh!”

Catherine shook the arm she was holding.

“You needn’t say ‘Oh!’ at me like that. They were mine to do what I liked with. Aunt Mildred gave them to me—I tell you she gave them to me.”

“What did you sell?”

“There were some miniatures, and—and a snuffbox—and a silver tea-set. I got three hundred for one of the miniatures. It was a Cosway—really very pretty—I’d liked to have kept it. And the tea-set was Queen Anne. I got quite a lot for that.”

“Catherine!”

Catherine let go and pushed her away.

“Don’t be a prig—one must dress! If you’re going to blame anyone, what about Edward, never telling me he was head over ears in debt and leaving me practically without a penny! And now, I suppose, you’ll go and tell James!”

“You don’t suppose anything of the sort,” said Rietta coolly.

Catherine came close again.

“What do you think he’ll do?”

“I should think it would depend on what he finds out.”

“He knows the things have gone—the snuff-box, and the miniatures, and the tea-set. I mean, he knows they’re not at Melling House, and Mrs. Mayhew told him Aunt Mildred let me have the tea-set. He said last night that he hoped it wouldn’t inconvenience me, but of course it was an heirloom and he must have it back. As if it mattered whether it was an heirloom or not! He hasn’t any children.”

After a moment’s silence Rietta said,

“You’ve got yourself into a mess.”

“What’s the good of telling me that? What am I to do?”

“I’ve told you.”

There was a pause. Then Catherine said under her breath,

“He says his mother made out a—a memorandum of everything she’d done—all the business things, you know—while he was away. It hasn’t turned up yet, but when it does—” Her voice petered out.

Rietta finished the sentence.

“When it does, you don’t think there will be anything about giving you the Cosway miniature and the Queen Anne tea-set.”

“She might have forgotten to put them down,” said Catherine in an extinguished tone.

They had reached the edge of the Green. As they stood, the Gate House lay to the left, and the White Cottage to the right. Catherine turned to where the tall pillars loomed up in the dusk. She said, “Goodnight,” and went across the road.

Rietta took her own way, but before she could reach the Cottage gate she heard quick footsteps on the path. Catherine came up with her and put out a hand.

“I want to ask you something—”

“Yes?”

“It would make a lot of difference if you could remember Aunt Mildred saying she had given me those things—”

“I don’t remember anything of the sort.”

“You could if you tried.”

Rietta Cray said, “Nonsense!” She made a movement to go, but Catherine held her.

“Rietta—listen a minute! After he came back last night James was—” she caught her breath—“rather frightening. Polite, you know, but in that sort of icy way. He talked about things missing—oh, it wasn’t so much what he said, it was a sort of undercurrent. I thought he wanted to frighten me, and I tried not to show it, but I think he saw I was frightened, and I think he enjoyed it. I haven’t ever done anything to make him feel like that, but I got the most horrid sort of impression that he would hurt me if he could, and that he would enjoy doing it.”

Rietta stood perfectly still. The shadow which she had shut away all those years ago came out and stood at her shoulder.

Catherine spoke in a whispering voice.

“Rietta—when you and James were engaged—was he like that? It would come out if you were engaged to someone. Did he like—hurting?”

Rietta stepped back. She said, “Yes,” and then she walked quickly away, lifted the latch of her own gate, and went in.