Poison In The Pen (20 page)

“Don’t ask me—though I suppose I could make a guess if I tried.”

“Who was it?”

James Barton shook his head.

“Abimelech crawled in under the gate. It was shut. I put my hand to the latch and I heard someone coming round from the back of the house, soft-foot and not making any more noise than one of the cats. I stepped back, and I can go soft-foot too. Someone went by me in the dark and Abimelech growled and spat. That’s all.”

“All!”

“As far as I am concerned.”

“Was it a man or a woman?”

Barton said slowly, “It was a—shape. You might say it went too soft for a man. But some men can go soft—I can, and so can any poacher.”

“Which way did it go?”

“Oh, back towards the village, the same as I did myself.”

Jason said,

“You ought to tell the police, you know. A person who came round from the back of the Croft without showing a light wasn’t likely to have been up to much good and could have been drugging Connie’s cocoa. The police ought to know about it.”

James Barton gave an odd half laugh.

“But you see, there isn’t anything I can say about whoever this was that he or she couldn’t say about me. I too lurked in the dark and showed no light. Also I was accompanied by the cats, always a sinister factor in midnight wanderings. You know, in spite of the cinema, the march of science, and the Education Authority, villages still have a lingering belief in witchcraft—and you can’t have a witch without a cat, now can you?”

Disregarding this, Jason said abruptly,

“Why didn’t you have a light?”

Barton shrugged.

“I don’t need one.”

“And yet when someone comes out of a gate right under your nose you can’t tell whether it’s a man or a woman!”

Barton laughed again.

“I suppose you think you’ve caught me.”

“I think the word should have been won’t, not can’t.”

“Perhaps. But that’s how it is—I was there, and I can’t say that I was there without laying myself open to any suspicion that is going.”

Jason frowned.

“I think you know who it was.”

Barton leaned forward.

“No one could swear to it by sight. It’s very dark round by the Croft with all those trees.”

“But?”

“Why should there be any but?”

“Oh, there’s a but all right, and you might as well tell me what it is.”

James Barton sat there with his pipe in his hand. He began to tap on the table with it. And then all at once he stopped and reached for his tobacco-pouch.

“There’s only one person Abimelech growls at,” he said.

“Well?”

“He growled.”

Miss Silver walked down across the Green between tea and the evening meal which the Manor still alluded to as dinner though the rest of Tilling Green was content to sup. Even in the war Miss Maggie had dined, in spite of being told to her face by Mettie Eccles that it was plain snobbery when it came to cutlets made with egg-powder or a sardine on toast. Miss Maggie had been a little perturbed by the imputation, but she continued to dine. She said Roger didn’t like changes, and she didn’t think Mrs. Glazier would like them either. To which Mettie replied that Maggie never did have a will of her own, and of course if you hadn’t, she supposed you just had to prop yourself with conventions. There was quite a tiff, but Miss Maggie’s obstinacy had prevailed. All this was now far in the past, but Miss Repton had recurred to it over the teacups that afternoon.

“Mettie has a very dominating character,” she finished up by saying. “She is so efficient, you know, and if you don’t do things her way, she tries to show you how. She means well, and I know it is wrong to get cross with her, but I am afraid I sometimes do. Only not now of course, because I am so very, very sorry for her. She and Roger and I were all really brought up together, and she truly loved him. Dear Eleanor was a good deal younger—Valentine’s mother, you know. Oh dear, it does seem such a long time ago.”

Miss Silver had begun upon the dark red wool she had bought at Ashleys’ to make a cardigan for her niece Ethel Burkett. It was to be a Christmas present. The first few rows made a line of rich colour upon the green plastic needles. She said in her kindest voice,

“You must have many happy memories.”

Miss Maggie wiped away a tear.

“Oh, yes, I have. But poor Mettie—do you know, I am feeling so concerned about her, all alone in that cottage, and though she has Renie Wayne next door, I don’t think—no, I really don’t think she would find her any help. Renie always has so many grievances of her own—she wouldn’t have time for anyone else’s troubles. I did ask Mettie if she would come up here, but she says she can’t whilst Scilla is in the house, and I’m afraid I don’t feel equal to going down to her—not just yet. Now I suppose you would not feel inclined—it would do her so much good to see you—”

Since an interview with Mettie Eccles was a thing which Miss Silver greatly desired, she made no demur, replying with perfect truthfulness that she would be very glad to go down to Holly Cottage if Miss Eccles would not think her visit an intrusion, adding, “She may not care to see me. I am, after all, a stranger, and she has had a great shock.”

“You have helped me so wonderfully.” Miss Maggie’s voice was full of gratitude. “You know, I am really anxious about Mettie, and I should be most grateful if you would go and see her. Valentine has already had too much strain, and I could make it all seem quite natural if you would just take her down a basket of James Grieves. Such a nice apple and she is so fond of them, but not a keeper so you can hardly ever buy them in the shops.”

Miss Silver was half way across the Green with the basket of James Grieves upon her arm, when Jason Leigh loomed up out of the deepening dusk. A little to her surprise he stopped, spoke her name, and said,

“I should very much like to have a talk with you, Miss Silver.”

From the equable tone of her reply no one would have guessed how unexpected this was.

“Why, certainly, Mr. Leigh.”

Without directly pursuing the subject he said,

“You are on your way to Willow Cottage?”

“I shall be going there to fetch a few more of my things, but at the moment I am taking a basket of fruit to Miss Eccles from Miss Repton.”

He stood before her on the path, blocking her way.

“Miss Silver, I think there is something that you ought to know. If you would turn and walk back with me to the edge of the Green and then allow me to walk with you as far as Holly Cottage, I think that would give me time to say what I want to, if you don’t mind walking slowly.”

Miss Silver turned and began to move back along the way by which she had come.

“What do you wish to say to me, Mr. Leigh?”

She had spoken to him before, because he had been often at the Manor in the last two days, but this was the first time that she had suspected him of having any interest in herself. She was not therefore prepared for his saying, “Well to begin with, I think I had better tell you that I know why you are here.”

She gave her slight prim cough and said,

“Indeed?”

With this small encouragement, he continued.

“You see, I know Frank Abbott. I happened to see him on my way through town. He thought I had better know how you were placed. To be quite candid, he’s got the wind up.”

She said on a note between reproof and affection,

“Frank is not always prepared to allow other people to take what he considers to be a risk.”

“Connie Brooke’s death rattled him, you know, and last night he rang me up in what you might call a flap.”

Miss Silver dissociated herself from this expression by saying, “He was apprehensive on my account?”

“He was.”

“There is no need, Mr. Leigh. I hope the whole matter will soon be cleared up, and for the time being I feel it right to remain with Miss Repton. But there was something you wished to tell me?”

“Yes there was—there is. Does the name of James Barton mean anything to you?”

“Certainly, Mr. Leigh. He lives in Gale’s Cottage next door to Miss Wayne. He is a woman-hater, a recluse. He has seven cats. They all have Bible names beginning with an A, and they accompany him on his nocturnal rambles.”

There was something like a laugh beside her in the dusk.

“You have him taped! I want to tell you that he has been a friend of mine ever since I was ten, that he is a strictly truthful and honest person, and that he is quite incapable of injuring man, woman, child or beast. And when I say this I am talking of what I know.”

“Yes, Mr. Leigh?”

Jason went on.

“I’ve just been seeing him. We were speaking about the anonymous letters and the three deaths associated with them.”

They had reached the edge of the Green and turned again. Lights shone in the cottages which faced them on the farther side. There was some wind blowing and it was very nearly dark. They seemed to be the only people abroad. Jason said,

“He told me something—I think it may be important. He refuses to go to the police with it. Your position in the matter—it isn’t official?”

“Not exactly. But I could not be a party to concealing anything which the police ought to know.”

“That is what I thought you would say. I told Barton as much myself. The whole thing is too serious, too dangerous, for anyone to go about withholding evidence. But—and this is why I am talking to you—this isn’t a matter for the Ledlington police station. It wants careful handling. In fact, to be perfectly frank, I am bringing it to you because you are in a position to take it to the Chief Constable. I told Barton that this was what I should do, and though he didn’t say so, I think it was a relief to his mind. He wouldn’t have told me what he did if he hadn’t expected me to do something about it.”

Miss Silver said in her quiet voice,

“And what did he tell you, Mr. Leigh?”

Since Miss Eccles only had morning help, and that not every day, it was she herself who opened the door in reply to Miss Silver’s knock. She had put on the hall light, and as she stood back under it Miss Silver was shocked to see how greatly she had changed in the two days that had passed since Roger Repton’s death. She was, as always, carefully dressed, and she was not wearing black, but the navy blue skirt and cardigan seemed too loose. Her hair had lost its spring and the silver lustre which had set off the delicate complexion and the bright blue eyes. There was no colour anywhere now. Miss Silver was reminded of a doll that has been left out in the rain. There was compassion in her voice as she said,

“May I come in for a few minutes, Miss Eccles? Miss Repton has charged me with messages, and I have a basket of apples which she has sent you. I think she said the name was James Grieves. I hope that is right.”

Social training is not lightly thrown aside. Whilst the last thing Mettie Eccles desired was to open the door to a stranger, she felt herself quite unable to close it in that stranger’s face. Miss Silver, stepping into the passage, was conducted to a sitting-room with blue curtains, a few pieces of good furniture, and the oriental carpet which had been a present from Roger Repton. There was no white in the pattern, and the prevailing colours were a deep blue and some shades of rich old rose. Miss Silver reflected that a scrap of white paper would certainly be quite noticeable against it.

Miss Eccles took the basket of apples and emptied them out into a bowl of old bleu de roi. Returning the basket, she had intended to remain standing, but as Miss Silver had taken a seat, she could hardly refrain from doing so herself.

“Miss Repton hoped you would understand that she would have come down but she is not really quite up to it, and Dr. Taylor insists that she should not put any strain upon herself.”

Mettie Eccles said in a dry voice,

“What a pity that doctors cannot give us a prescription against strain.”

Miss Silver said,

“We have to find such a prescription for ourselves. Friendship and sympathy help, do you not think so? Miss Repton is reaching out for them. She asked me to say how very much she wanted to see you, and how glad she would be if you would come over.”

Mettie Eccles did not look as if she had wept. Her eyelids had the brown, shrivelled appearance which comes from tearless grief. Momentarily between these dry lids her eyes took on colour—not their old bright blue, but the colder shade of steel. She said,

“Not whilst that woman is there.” The words came short and sharp.

“You mean Mrs. Repton? Miss Maggie said—”

Mettie Eccles lifted a hand.

“I don’t know what Maggie is made of. How can she eat or sleep or live under the same roof with Roger’s murderess? You have come with messages to me. I would like you to take that back as my message to her. That woman murdered Roger, and Maggie and Valentine go on living in the same house with her, and the police don’t arrest her!”

Miss Silver spoke with a sudden quiet air of authority.

“Miss Eccles, do you truly believe that Mrs. Repton poisoned her husband?”

Mettie Eccles gave a terrible little laugh.

“Doesn’t everyone? Don’t you?”

Miss Silver coughed in a manner which conveyed the impression that she was being discreet.

“Then you must believe that she wrote those anonymous letters.”

Mettie Eccles stared.

“What has that got to do with it?”

“Everything, I think. Colonel Repton was killed because he had declared that he knew who had written them.”

“He was killed because he was going to divorce that woman and cut her out of his will.”

Miss Silver’s air of authority became more noticeable. She said,

“I think not. He was killed because he knew who had written the letters, just as Connie Brooke and Doris Pell were killed because they knew.”

Miss Eccles was accustomed to dominate an argument. She had a quick brain and a quick tongue. It was something new to her to find herself without words. She said almost in a whisper,

“I don’t know what you mean.”

Miss Silver went on speaking in that quiet voice,

“Only the person who wrote the letters had an interest in those three deaths. Did you ever see one of the letters?”

Mettie Eccles said, “No.” And then, “Why should I?”

“You might have had one.”

The sagging shoulders lifted in a gesture of pride.

“There hasn’t ever been a reason for anyone to write me a letter like that. No one can say—no one—” Her voice shook and broke. “How dare you ask me that?”

Miss Silver went on calmly.

“Then you would not know what the letters looked like? You would not know whether this was a piece of one?”

She put out her hand with a small torn scrap of paper in it. A scrap of cheap white paper which looked like the corner torn from the bottom of a sheet. Mettie Eccles took it in her hand and looked at it. She saw scrawled on it the first part of the name Tilling—just three letters, and then the jagged edge of the tear. Miss Silver said,

“You wouldn’t have seen this scrap of paper before? You would not be interested to know where it had been found?”

She was watching Mettie Eccles intently. What she saw interested her very much. She had come with an open mind, and with great experience in reading the motives and the thoughts of others. She had come without fear or bias, and she saw what she had hoped to see, an answer to the problem on which she was engaged.

Miss Eccles’ reaction was in line with the most salient of her characteristics. Even in her present condition of shock and grief a lively curiosity had its way. She exclaimed and said,

“Good gracious—you don’t mean to say you’ve had one!”

“No.”

“Not poor Maggie! What a shame! It’s too bad!”

Miss Silver said soberly,

“I would like to tell you a story. On the day that Doris Pell was drowned she paid a call in connection with her work as a needlewoman. In that house, and during that call, she picked up a scrap of cheap white paper torn from the corner of one of those anonymous letters. It had the first three letters of the word Tilling written upon it. She knew it at once for what it was, because she had herself received the letter from which this corner had been torn. By the way, may I have my piece of paper back?”

Miss Eccles handed it over. A little colour had come into her face. She said with almost her old energy of voice and manner,

“What a perfectly horrid thing! What house was it?”

“I cannot tell you that.”

Miss Eccles’ brows drew together in a frown.

“Good gracious—but you must! Don’t you see how important it might be? Why, she was here that afternoon. I was going to have some nightgowns made—poor Doris! Now, let me see, where else had she been? I know she was up at the Manor because Maggie was in a way about her blouse not being right, and Doris had been there and fitted it and was going to run up again with it in the evening, and it was when she was coming back from there that she was drowned. That all came out at the inquest, only the more I think about it— I haven’t been able to help thinking about it—the more I just don’t believe that she did it on purpose. She was here that afternoon and I was talking to her, and if she had had that in her mind, don’t you think it would have shown?”

Miss Silver said, “You interest me extremely. Will you tell me just how Doris was that afternoon? Was she just as usual?”

“No—no—she wasn’t—I can’t say that. But she wasn’t depressed or gloomy. Not the way a girl would have to be before she made up her mind to commit suicide. And you know, the Pells weren’t Church people, but they were very religious. Doris was a good girl and she would have known how wrong it was. I just thought perhaps something had upset her. As a matter of fact I wondered whether Maggie had been a little sharp with her about the blouse, and I thought it wouldn’t be like her if she had. Maggie is a muddler, but she has always been easygoing.” She paused, as if considering, and then shook her head. “No, I can’t get nearer to it than that about Doris. I thought something had upset her, and I thought she was jumpy. But I don’t believe she drowned herself.”