Weekend with Death (6 page)

Her focus narrowed to the faces of the two at the table—Morgan's still half scared, Joanna's vacant. She looked down at the hands stretched out to the heart-shaped board. Startlingly alike, those two pairs of hands—and so like Wilson's too. Unexpected for Morgan to share those thin, nervous hands which belonged of right to Wilson and Joanna. His should have been coarser—stronger—blunt-fingered and insensitive.

Just as she thought that, the board began to move. She leaned forward, watching intently. It was hardly a movement. There was a quivering. She thought, “One of them is pushing it—” and then, “No—it's pushing them.” And even as the words came into her mind, the thing really was moving, with the up and down, to and fro motion of a clumsily handled pencil. The hands went with it—they did not appear to guide it. The pencil attachment ran off the edge of the paper and stopped. Morgan Cattermole dropped his hands from the board as if they found it hot.

“Look here, I don't like this. But you were pushing it, Jo—you were, weren't you?”

She looked up, flustered and scandalized.

“Oh, no—of course not! Morgan,
dear
—that would be cheating!”

“You didn't push it? Honest injun?”

“Oh, no.”

“Well, that's a queer start. If it was anyone else, I'd say you were having me on.”

The tears came into Joanna's eyes. She flushed painfully.

“Morgan—
dear
!”

He laughed and patted her hand.

“Don't be silly, old dear. You're O.K.—I know that. I only said if it was anyone else.”

For the first time Sarah came somewhere near liking him, or at any rate to understanding why Joanna liked him. They really did seem fond of one another.

He laughed now and picked up the sheet of paper with its trail of scrawled writing.

“Here—let's see what we've got. String of rubbish it looks like to me—
a, b
—
ab
…
b, a
—
ba
… like a kid's spelling-book.… Hullo, here's a word—‘
bark
'. Does your smuggler keep a dog, Jo? ‘
Bark
—
beach
—
tar
—
boots
—
sand
—' And that's where we ran off the paper. It doesn't turn a corner very pretty. Here, let's have another go and take the long way of the paper.”

Joanna beamed.

“I knew you would be interested once you made a start! You see, he's just trying to get through—that's what makes it rather disjointed. But if we persevere he may come right through, and that would be so marvellous. And
bark
wouldn't be anything to do with a dog, dear. It's just one of those old-fashioned words for a boat—the mariner's barque, you know.”

The board was set again. This time the movement started at once. With no preliminary tremor, it seemed to run away, reaching the paper's edge almost as quickly as if the pencil had been driven by a practised hand.

Sarah watched, not the hands, but the faces. Joanna's blank—eyes fixed, lips parted. Morgan's interested now, but with a strange look of uneasiness. She thought, “He's like a schoolboy doing something he knows he oughtn't to—and rather enjoying it.”

The board stopped. He picked up the paper and read from it:

“‘
Night
—
dark—fog
—
case
—
night—fog
—'”

Joanna woke up.

“Oh, that's quite new! He's trying to tell us about landing the cases of rum—only he's always called them kegs before. And the fog is new. Do, pray, let us go on!”

Sarah became aware that her feet were cold—icy cold. How wretchedly silly—
dark—fog
—
case
.… For a moment she was back in the cold, narrow waiting-room listening to Miss Emily Case whilst the fog thickened the blank window-panes and a man's footsteps went to and fro outside in the dark.
Fog
—
dark
—
case
—and even as the words were in her thought, Morgan Cattermole had picked up the paper again and was reading them aloud:

“‘
Fog
—
dark
—
case
—' Hullo! Oh, he's repeating himself.… No—here's something new: ‘
Where is it
—' And he's written it twice, only it's slipped off the edge a bit at the end. Come on—he's getting going now. What is it, Bogey? Speak up—we're all attention!”

The finger-tips came down on the planchette again. Joanna's trembled slightly, but the movement gave no impetus to the board. It was not until the tremor died that motion began. There was a jerk, a smooth rhythm, another jerk, and so on while the paper lasted.

Sarah found herself watching with strained attention. And yet it was all nonsense—it
must
be all nonsense. She didn't believe a word of it. Joanna's mind was running on her smuggler. She wouldn't consciously cheat, but somehow these words which called up pictures of a dark beach—a landing in the fog—somehow these were transmitted to the paper. She didn't know how it was done. She only knew that it must be something like that. Anything else was ludicrous—out of all bounds of possibility.

Morgan pulled his hands away. There was still that effect of a recoil. He read again:

“‘
Fog
—
dark
—' A bit of a harper, isn't me?… ‘
Emily
—
where is it
—'”

Sarah's heart knocked so hard against her side that it frightened her.
Emily
—it wasn't possible. She leaned back and felt the hair damp against her temples. There was an icy chill somewhere. Was it in the room, or in the empty places of thought? She didn't know. She heard Morgan say, “Getting a bit mixed, aren't you, Bogey? Who's Emily? And what's the betting the last thing ought to read, ‘Where is she—'? ‘Emily—where is it—' don't make sense to me. “Let's have another go and see what we get this time.”

Joanna put up a hand to her light, floating hair.

“I don't know—” she said in an uncertain voice. “I'm tired. He's not coming through very well.”

“Jealous because he's got a lady friend! That's it—isn't it, Miss Sarah?” His eyes ran over her with a sly smile in them. Then he turned back to the board. “Come on, old dear—open your mouth and shut your eyes and see what Bogey'll send you.”

Joanna's fingers shook a little as she placed them on the board. Then, as before, her face took on its blank look. Morgan leaned forward, laughing.

“Come on—get a move on! Jibbing, are you? Wait till you hear me crack my whip! Off with you! Yoicks! Tally ho!”

The board did not move. Sarah felt her pulses steadying. Actually, a little surprise crept upon her. The board had moved so immediately and so freely that she found she was expecting it to move again, to go on moving. Now it did not move at all. It was as dead as a telephone with a cut wire. It was as dead as Emily Case. The sweat came to her temples again. What a horrible thought to have! She heard Morgan Cattermole exclaim impatiently,

“Well, I'm not going to sit here all night waiting for your darned smuggler, old girl. Let's have out the cards and rook Miss Sarah at cut-throat.”

CHAPTER VII

Morgan Cattermole was gathering up the cards for his second deal, when the telephone bell rang. Though there was only one fixture—in Wilson's study—though a bell rang on every floor.

Sarah pushed back her chair.

“Hi! What's wrong with the servants answering it?” said Morgan. “Or let the darned thing ring—ten to one it'll be some of Wilson's clap-trap, and no loss to him or anyone else—eh, Jo? What's the odds it's some nobody from nowhere ringing up to tell our eminent brother that there's a spook walking in his back garden, and will he please come along and interview it?”

Sarah had reached the door. She looked over her shoulder and said,

“I am afraid that is why I must go. You see, it happens to be my job.”

She ran downstairs to the study and picked up the receiver. A voice she did not know said,

“Is that Miss Marlowe?”

As soon as she had said “Yes”, she heard it say, “She's on the line, Mr. Cattermole,” and at once there was Wilson, speaking.

“Miss Marlowe, I am so sorry to trouble you, but I have had a good deal on my mind, and I am not quite sure whether I asked you to post the letters I dictated this afternoon. If they are posted, never mind. But if by any chance I forgot, perhaps you would send Thompson to the post with them. I am afraid I can't wait just now, but if you will just see to it, that will be quite all right. I am sorry to have troubled you. Good-night.”

There was a click as the receiver was hung up at the other end. Sarah put back hers and looked about her. The letters.… No—they were in the post. He had given them to her and she had pushed them through the slit in their own corner letter-box with a feeling of good riddance. Joseph Cassidy, Esq., and the Rev. Peter Brown—a pair of bores who would be certain to reply at length and in the most tedious manner. It would be pleasant to think that their letters had gone astray. But no such luck—the perfect secretary had posted them with her own methodical hands.

She thought, “He was worried enough to ring up, but he didn't wait for an answer. Fancy worrying over Joseph and Peter!” And on that the telephone bell rang again and brought her back from the door. She banged it behind her and groped without waiting to put on the light. It would probably be Wilson again, to ask whether she had remembered to shut the inkpot, or put his address-book away.

She got hold of the receiver, and it wasn't Wilson, it was Henry Templar.

“Sarah—is that you?”

Sarah said “‘M—” and added in a resigned voice, “It always is. But all the same you'd do better to make sure before you come out with your Sarahs like that.”

Henry sounded impatient. Not that that was anything new.

“Look here, I want to talk to you. But before I start I want to know whether there are any extensions your end.”

“Why?”

“I don't want anyone listening in—that's why. Are there any?”

“No—only for the bell.”

“That's all right. Did you listen to the nine o'clock news?”

“No. We were interviewing Miss Cattermole's smuggler with planchette—all eighteenth-century. Why—was there anything special?”

“Not in the news. Sarah, what train did you come up by last night?”

“Last night? Well, it was supposed to be the 5.17, but it was about three quarters of an hour late because of the fog.”

“5.17 from Craylea?” Henry sounded relieved.

“No—from the junction. All the trains were behind, and I thought I was going to be late for dinner—a
frightful
crime.”

“When you say ‘the junction', you mean Cray Bridge?”

“Yes, of course. What is all this about?”

Henry said in what she stigmatized as a stuffy voice,

“What did you do while you were waiting for your train?”

A little warning bell rang in Sarah's mind. She spoke lightly and at once.

“Darling, what does one do? I got frightfully bored, and my feet froze solid.”

It wasn't any good. Henry was thorough both by nature and by training. He just went on.

“Were you on the platform, or in the waiting-room?”

Well, she wasn't prepared to lie—not to Henry. She said in an exasperated voice,

“My good Henry, I'm not quite cracked. Why should I wait on the platform in a fog with the temperature heading for zero?”

“You were in the waiting-room?”

“I was in one of them.”

She oughtn't to have said that. It would sound as if she knew what he was driving at. But it didn't matter, because he just drove on.

“What platform did your train go from?”

“How should I know?”

“You
must
know—and I mean to.”

Well, they could quarrel about that. But even a quarrel wasn't going to stop Henry if he was really set. She said,

“A bit totalitarian, aren't you? As a matter of fact I believe it was number four—it generally is.”

“Then your waiting-room was between number four and number five—is that right?”

“Henry, what's all this about?”

“Sarah, listen! Was there anyone in the waiting-room with you?”

“Yes.”

“Can you describe her?”

“I didn't say it was a her.”

“But it was, wasn't it?”

“Yes.”

This conversation was going all wrong. She was letting him drag it out of her bit by bit. She ought to have kept the talk in her own hands. She ought.… What was the good of saying what she ought to have done? She hadn't done it.

“There was a woman there when I went in—the sort of person you do find in waiting-rooms. I can't imagine why you want to know.”

“Can't you? Didn't you read your paper this morning?”

“Of course.”

“Didn't you see that a woman had been murdered in the train between Cray Bridge and Ledlington? That train left number five platform at five minutes past six. The woman was a Miss Case, and she had been waiting for her train at Cray Bridge for the best part of an hour. The porter says there was another lady there with her most of the time—a young lady in a brown fur coat. He knows her quite well by sight, but he doesn't know her name. The initials on her suitcases are S.M. He put her into the London train at six o'clock.”

Sarah said in a dry, shaky voice which didn't sound at all like her own,

“Well, thank heaven for that, or I suppose they'd be saying I murdered her.”

Henry went on implacably.

“It was you.”

“You knew that all the time! How did you know?”

“There was a police message in the nine o'clock news—that's why I asked you if you had been listening to it. You'll have to ring up the police at once—Ledlington 3412.”