Dead Water

III Threats

Miss Emily arrived at noon on Monday. She had stayed overnight in Dorset and was as fresh as paint. It was agreeable to be able to command a chauffeur-driven car, and the man was not unintelligent.

When they drew up at Portcarrow jetty she gave him a well-considered tip, asked his name and told him she would desire, particularly, that he should be deputed for the return journey.

She then alighted, observed by a small gang of wharf loiterers.

A personable young man came forward to meet her.

“Miss Pride? I’m Patrick Ferrier. I hope you had a good journey.”

Miss Emily was well-disposed towards the young and was, she had good reason to believe, a competent judge of them. She inspected Patrick and received him with composure. He introduced a tall, glowing girl who came forward, rather shyly, to shake hands. Miss Emily had less experience of girls but she liked the look of this one and was gracious.

“The causeway is negotiable,” Patrick said, “but we thought you’d prefer the launch.”

“It is immaterial,” she rejoined. “The launch let it be.”

Patrick and the chauffeur handed her down the steps. Trehern stowed away her luggage and was profuse in cap-touching. They shoved off from the jetty, still watched by idlers, among whom, conspicuous in his uniform, was a police sergeant. “ ’Morning, Pender!” Patrick called cheerfully as he caught sight of him.

In a motor launch, the trip across was ludicrously brief, but even so Miss Emily, bolt upright in the stern, made it portentous. The sun shone and against it she displayed her open umbrella as if it were a piece of ceremonial plumage. Her black kid gloves gripped the handle centrally and her handbag, enormous and vise-like in its security, was placed between her feet. She looked, Patrick afterwards suggested, like some Burmese female deity. “We should have arranged to have had her carried, shoulder-high, over the causeway,” he said.

Major Barrimore, with a porter in attendance, awaited her on the Island’s jetty landing. He resembled, Jenny thought, an illustration from an Edwardian sporting journal. “Well tubbed” was the expression. His rather prominent eyes were a little bloodshot. He had to sustain the difficult interval that spanned approach and arrival and decide when to begin smiling and making appropriate gestures. Miss Emily gave him no help. Jenny and Patrick observed him with misgivings.

“Good morning!” he shouted, gaily bowing, as they drew alongside. Miss Emily slightly raised and lowered her umbrella.

“That’s right, Trehern. Easy does it. Careful man,” Major Barrimore chattered. “Heave me that line. Splendid!” He dropped the loop over a bollard and hovered, anxiously solicitous, with extended arm. “Welcome! Welcome!” he cried:

“Good morning, Major Barrimore,” Miss Emily said. “Thank you. I can manage perfectly.” Disregarding Trehern’s outstretched hand, she looked fixedly at him. “Are you the father?” she asked.

Trehern removed his cap and grinned with all his might. “That I be, ma’am,” he said. “If you be thinking of our Wally, ma-am, that I be, and mortal proud to own up to him.”

“I shall see you, if you please,” said Miss Emily, “later.” For a second or two everyone was motionless.

She shook hands with her host.

“This is nice,” he assured her. “And what a day we’ve produced for you! Now, about these steps of ours. Bit stiff, I’m afraid. May I…?”

“No, thank you. I shall be sustained in my ascent,” said Miss Emily, fixing Miss Cost’s shop and then the hotel façade in her gaze, “by the prospect.”

She led the way up the steps.

“ ’Jove!” the Major exclaimed when they arrived at the top. “You’re too good for me, Miss Pride. Wonderful going! Wonderful!”

She looked briefly at him. “My habits,” she said, “are abstemious. A little wine or cognac only. I have never been a smoker.”

“Jolly good! Jolly good!” he applauded. Jenny began to feel acutely sorry for him.

Margaret Barrimore waited in the main entrance. She greeted Miss Emily with no marked increase in her usual diffidence. “I hope you had a pleasant journey,” she said. “Would you like to have luncheon upstairs? There’s a small sitting-room we’ve kept for you. Otherwise, the dining-room is here.” Miss Emily settled for the dining-room but wished to see her apartment first. Mrs. Barrimore took her up. Her husband, Patrick and Jenny stood in the hall below and had nothing to say to each other. The Major, out of forgetfulness, it seemed, was still madly beaming. He caught his stepson’s eye, uttered an expletive and without further comment made for the bar.

Miss Emily, when she had lunched, took her customary siesta. She removed her dress and shoes, loosened her stays, put on a grey cotton peignoir and lay on the bed. There were several illustrated brochures to hand and she examined them. One contained a rather elaborate account of the original cure. It displayed a-fanciful drawing of the Green Lady, photographs of the spring, of Wally Trehern and of a number of people passing through a sort of turnpike. A second gave a long list of subsequent healings, with names and personal tributes. Miss Emily counted them up. Nine warts, five asthmas (including Miss Cost), three arthritics, two migraines and two chronic diarrheas (anonymous). “And many many more who have experienced relief and improvement,” the brochure added. A folder advertised the coming Festival and, inset, Elspeth Cost’s Gifte Shoppe. A more businesslike leaflet caught her attention.

Miss Emily studied this information for some minutes. She then consulted a whimsical map of the island, with boats, fish, nets and pixies; and, of course, a Green Lady. She noted that it showed a direct route from the Boy-and-Lobster to the spring.

At five o’clock she had tea brought to her. Half an hour later, she dressed and descended, umbrella in hand, to the vestibule.

The hall porter was on duty. When he saw Miss Emily he pressed a bellpush on his desk and rose with a serviceable smirk. “Can I help you, madam?” he asked.

“Insofar as I require admission to the enclosure, I believe you may. I understand that entry is effected by means of some plaque or token,” said Miss Emily.

He opened a drawer and extracted a metal disk. “I shall require,” she said, “seven,” and laid two half-crowns and a florin on the desk. The hall porter completed the number.

“No, no, no!” Major Barrimore expostulated, bouncing out from the interior. “We can’t allow this. Nonsense!” He waved the hall porter aside. “See that a dozen of these things are sent up to Miss Pride’s suite,” he said and bent gallantly over his guest. “I’m so sorry! Ridiculous!”

“You are very good,” she rejoined, “but I prefer to pay.” She opened her reticule, swept the disks into it and shut it with a formidable snap. “Thank you,” she said to the hall porter, and prepared to leave.

“I don’t approve,” Major Barrimore began, “I — really, it’s very naughty of you. Now, may I — as it’s your first visit since — may I just show you the easiest way?”

“I have, I think, discovered it from the literature provided, and need not trespass upon your time, Major Barrimore. I am very much obliged to you.”

Something in her manner, or perhaps a covert glance from his employer, had caused the hall porter to disappear.

“In respect of my letter,” Miss Emily said, with a direct look at the Major, “I would suggest that we postpone any discussion until I have made myself fully conversant with prevailing conditions on my property. I hope this arrangement is convenient?”

“Anything!” he cried. “Naturally. Anything! But I do hope—”

“Thank you,” said Miss Emily, and left him.

The footpath from the hotel to the spring followed, at an even level, the contour of an intervening slope. It was wide and well-surfaced, and, as she had read in one of the brochures, amply provided for the passage of a wheeled chair. She walked along it at a steady pace, looking down, as she did so, at Fisherman’s Bay, the cottages, the narrow strip of water and a not very distant prospect of the village. A mellow light lay across the hillside; there was a prevailing scent of sea and of bracken. A lark sang overhead. It was very much the same sort of afternoon as that upon which, two years ago, Wally Trehern had blundered up the hillside to the spring. Over the course he had so blindly taken there was now a well-defined, tar-sealed and tactfully graded route, which converged with Miss Emily’s footpath at the entrance to the spring.

The spring itself, its pool, its modest waterfall and the bouldered slope above it, were now enclosed by a high wire-netting fence. There were one or two rustic benches outside this barricade. Entrance was effected through a turnpike of tall netted flanges, which could be operated by the insertion into a slot machine of one of the disks with which Miss Emily was provided.

She did not immediately make use of it. There were people at the spring: an emaciated man whose tragic face had arrested Jenny Williams’s attention at the bus stop, and a young woman with a baby. The man knelt by the fall and seemed only by an effort to sustain his thin hands against the pressure of the water. His head was downbent. He rose, and, without looking at them, walked by the mother and child to a one-way exit from the enclosure. As he passed Miss Emily his gaze met hers, and his mouth hesitated in a smile. Miss Emily inclined her head and they said “Good evening” simultaneously. “I have great hopes,” the man said rather faintly. He lifted his hat and moved away downhill.

The young woman, in her turn, had knelt by the fall. She had bared the head of her baby and held her cupped hand above it. A trickle of water glittered briefly. Miss Emily sat down abruptly on a bench and shut her eyes.

When she opened them again, the young woman with the baby was coming towards her.

“Are you all right?” she asked. “Can I help you? Do you want to go in?”

“I am not ill,” Miss Emily said, and added, “Thank you, my dear.”

“Oh, excuse me. I’m sorry. That’s all right, then.”

“Your baby. Has your baby…?”

“Well, yes. It’s sort of a deficiency, the doctor says. He just doesn’t seem to thrive. But there’ve been such wonderful reports — you can’t get away from it, can you? So I’ve got great hopes.”

She lingered on for a moment and then smiled and nodded and went away.

“Great hopes!” Miss Emily muttered. “Ah, mon Dieu! Great hopes indeed.”

She pulled herself together and extracted a nickel disk from her bag. There was a notice by the turnstile saying that arrangements could be made at the hotel for stretcher cases to be admitted. Miss Emily let herself in and inspected the terrain. The freshet gurgled in and out of its pool. The waterfall prattled. She looked towards the brow of the hill. The sun shone full in her eyes and dazzled them. She walked round to a ledge above the spring, and found a flat rock upon which she seated herself. Behind her was a bank and, above that, the boulder and bracken where Wally’s Green Lady was generally supposed to have appeared. Miss Emily opened her umbrella and composed herself.

She presented a curious figure, motionless, canopied and black, and did indeed resemble, as Patrick had suggested, some outlandish presiding deity, whether benign or inimical must be a matter of conjecture. During her vigil seven persons visited the spring and were evidently much taken aback by Miss Emily.

She remained on her perch until the sun went down behind the hill and, there being no more pilgrims to observe, descended and made her way downhill to Fisherman’s Bay, and thence, round the point, to Miss Cost’s shop. On her way she overtook the village police sergeant, who seemed to be loitering. Miss Emily gave him “Good evening.”

It was now a quarter to seven. The shop was open and, when Miss Emily went in, deserted. There was a bell on the counter but she did not ring it. She examined the welter of objects for sale. They were as Patrick had described them to Jenny: fanciful reconstructions in plastic of the spring, the waterfall and Wally’s cottage; badly printed rhyme-sheets; booklets, calendars and postcards all of which covered much the same ground. Predominant among all these wares, cropping up everywhere, in print and in plastic — smirking, even, in the form of doll and cut-out — was the Green Lady. The treatment was consistent: a verdigris-coloured garment, long yellow hair, upraised hand and a star on the head. There was a kind of madness in the prolific insistence of this effigy. Jostling each other in a corner were the products of Miss Cost’s handloom: scarves, jerkins and cloaks of which the prevailing colours were a sad blue and mauve. Miss Emily turned from them with a shudder of incredulity.

A door from the interior opened and Miss Cost entered on a wave of cottage pie, wearing one of her own jerkins.

“I thought I heard—” she began and then she recognized her visitor. “Ae-oh!” she said. “Good evening. Hem!”

“Miss Cost, I believe. May I have a dozen threepenny stamps, if you please?”

When these had been purchased Miss Emily said: “There is possibly no need for me to introduce myself. My name is Pride. I am your landlord.”

“So I understand,” said Miss Cost. “Quite.”

“You are no doubt aware of my purpose in visiting the Island; but I think, perhaps, I should make my position clear.”

Miss Emily made her position very clear indeed. If Miss Cost wished to renew her lease of the shop in three months’ time, it could only be on condition that any objects which directly or indirectly advertised the spring was withdrawn from sale.

Miss Cost listened to this with a fixed stare and a clasp-knife smile. When it was over she said that she hoped Miss Pride would not think it out of place if she, Miss Cost, mentioned that her little stock of fairings had been highly praised in discriminating quarters, and had given pleasure to thousands. Especially, she added, to the kiddies.

Miss Emily said she could well believe it, but that was not the point at issue.

Miss Cost said that each little novelty had been conceived in a spirit of reverence.

Miss Emily did not dispute the conception. The distribution, however, was a matter of commercial enterprise, was it not?

At this juncture a customer came in and bought a plastic Green Lady.

When she had gone, Miss Cost said she hoped that Miss Pride entertained no doubts about the efficacy of the cures.

“If I do,” said Miss Emily, “it is of no moment. It is the commercial exploitation that concerns us. That, I cannot tolerate.” She examined Miss Cost for a second or two and her manner changed slightly. “I do not question your faith in the curative properties of the spring,” she said. “I do not suggest, I assure you, that in exploiting public credulity you do so consciously and cynically.”

“I should hope not!” Miss Cost burst out. “I! I! My asthma…I, who am a living witness! Ae-oh!”

“Quite so. Moreover, when the Island has been restored to its former condition, I shall not prevent access to the spring any more than I shall allow extravagant claims to be canvassed. It will not be closed to the public. Quite on the contrary.”

“They will ruin it! The vandalism! The outrages! Even now, with every precaution…the desecration!”

“That can be attended to.”

“Faërie ground,” Miss Cost suddenly announced, “is holy ground.”

“I am unable to determine whether you adopt a pagan or a Christian attitude,” said Miss Emily. She indicated a rhyme-sheet which was clothes-pegged to a line above the counter. It read:

“Who,” asked Miss Emily, fixing her gaze upon Miss Cost, “is the author of this doggerel?”

“It is unsigned,” she said loudly. “These old rhymes—”

“The spelling is spurious, and the paper contemporary. Does it express your own views, Miss Cost?”

“Yes,” said Miss Cost, shutting her eyes. “It does. A thousand times, yes.”

“So I imagined. Well, now,” Miss Emily briskly continued, “You know mine. Take time to consider…There is one other matter.”

Her black kid forefinger indicated a leaflet advertising the Festival. “This,” she said.

A spate of passionate defiance broke from Miss Cost. Her voice was pitched high, and she stared at some object beyond Miss Emily’s left shoulder.

“You can’t stop us!” she cried. “You can’t! You can’t prevent people walking up a hill. You can’t prevent them singing. I’ve made inquiries. We’re not causing a disturbance, and it’s all authorized by the Mayor. He’s part of it. Ask him! Ask the Mayor. Ask the Major! We’ve got hundreds and hundreds of people coming, and you can’t stop them. You can’t, you can’t!”

Her voice cracked and she drew breath. Her hands moved to her chest.

Into the silence that followed there crept a very small and eerie sound: a faint, rhythmic squeak. It came from Miss Cost.

Miss Emily heard it. After a moment she said, with compassion: “I am sorry. I shall leave you. I shall not attempt to prevent your Festival. It must be the last, but I shall not prevent it.”

As she prepared to leave, Miss Cost, now struggling for breath, gasped after her.

“You wicked woman! This is your doing.” She beat her chest. “You’ll suffer for it. More than I do. Mark my words! You’ll suffer.”

Miss Emily turned to look at her. She sat on a stool behind the counter. Her head nodded backwards and forwards with her laboured breathing.

“Is there anything I can do?” Miss Emily asked. “You have an attack—”

“I haven’t! I haven’t! Go away. Wicked woman! Go away!”

Miss Emily, greatly perturbed, left the shop. As she turned up from the jetty, a boy shambled out of the shadows, stared at her for a moment, gave a whooping cry and ran up the steps. It was Wally Trehern.

The encounter with Miss Cost had tired Miss Emily. She was upset. It had, of course, been a long day and there were still those steps to be climbed. There was a bench halfway up and she decided to rest there for a few minutes before making the final ascent. Perhaps she would ask for an early dinner in her room and go to bed afterwards. It would never do to overtire herself. She took the steps slowly, using her umbrella as a staff, and was rather glad when she reached the bench. It was a relief to sit there and observe the foreshore, the causeway and the village.

Down below, at the end of the jetty, a group of fishermen stood talking. The police constable, she noticed, had joined them. They seemed to be looking up at her. “I daresay it’s got about,” she thought, “who I am and all the rest of it. Bah!”

She stayed on until she was refreshed. The evening had begun to close in and she was in the lee of the hill. There was a slight coolness in the air. She prepared, after the manner of old people, to rise.

At that moment she was struck between the shoulder blades, on the back of her neck and head and on her arm. Stones fell with a rattle at her feet. Above and behind her there was a scuffling sound of retreat and of laughter.

She got up, scarcely knowing what she did. She supposed afterwards that she must have cried out. The next thing that happened was that the policeman was running heavily uphill towards her.

“Hold hard, now ma-am,” he was saying. “Be you hurt, then?”

“No. Stones. From above. Go and look.”

He peered at her for a moment and then scrambled up the sharp rise behind the bench. He slithered and skidded, sending down a cascade of earth. Miss Emily sank back on the bench. She drew her glove off and touched her neck with a trembling hand. It was wet.

The sergeant floundered about overhead. Unexpectedly two of the fishermen had arrived and, more surprising still, the tall bronze girl. What was her name?

“Miss Pride,” she was saying, “you’re hurt! What happened?” She knelt down by Miss Emily and took her hands.

The men were talking excitedly and presently the constable was there again, swearing and breathing hard. “Too late,” he was saying. “Missed ’im.”

Miss Emily’s head began to clear a little.

“I am perfectly well,” she said in French — rather faintly and more to herself than to the others, “it is nothing.”

“You’ve been hurt. Your neck!” Jenny said, also in French. “Let me look.”

“You are too kind,” Miss Emily murmured. She suffered her neck to be examined. “Your accent,” she added more firmly, “is passable though not entirely d’une femme du monde. Where did you learn?”

“In Paris,” said Jenny. “There’s a cut in your neck, Miss Pride. It isn’t very deep but I’m going to bind it up. Mr. Pender, could I borrow your handkerchief? And I’ll make a pad of mine. Clean, luckily.”

While Miss Emily suffered these ministrations the men muttered together. There was a scrape of boots on the steps and a third fisherman came down from above. It was Trehern. He stopped short. “Hey!” he ejaculated. “What’s amiss, then?”

“Lady’s been hurt, poor dear,” one of the men said.

“Hurt!” Trehern exclaimed. “How? Why, if it bean’t Miss Pride! Hurt! What way?”

“Where would you be from, then, Jim?” Sergeant Pender asked.

“Up to pub as usual, George,” he said. “Where else?” A characteristic parcel protruded from his overcoat pocket. “Happen she took a fall? Them steps be treacherous going for females well gone into the terrors of antiquity.”

“Did you leave the pub this instant-moment?”

“Surely. Why?”

“Dicl you notice anybody up-along — off of the steps, like? In the rough?”

“Are you after them courting couples again, George Pender?”

“No,” said Mr. Pender shortly. “I bean’t.”

“I did not fall,” said Miss Emily loudly. She rose to her feet and confronted Trehern. “I was struck,” she said.

“Lord forbid, ma-am! Who’d take a fancy to do a crazy job like that?”

Jenny said to Pender: “I think we ought to get Miss Pride home.”

“So we should, then. Now, ma-am,” said Pender with an air of authority. “You’m not going to walk up them steps, if you please, so if you’ve no objection us chaps’ll manage you, same as if we was bringing you ashore in a rough sea.”

“I assure you, officer—”

“Very likely, ma-am, and you with the heart of a lion as all can see, but there’d be no kind of sense in it. Now, then, souls: Hup!”

And before she knew what had happened, Miss Emily was sitting on a chair of woollen-clad arms with her own arms neatly disposed by Mr. Pender round a pair of slightly fishy-smelling shoulders, and her face in close association with those of her bearers.

“Pretty as a picture,” Pender said. “Heave away, chaps. Stand aside, if you please, Jim.”

“My umbrella.”

“I’ve got it,” said Jenny. “And your bag.”

When they reached the top Miss Emily said: “I am extremely obliged. If you will allow me, officer, I would greatly prefer it if I might enter in the normal manner. I am perfectly able to do so and it will be less conspicuous.” And to Jenny: “Please ask them to put me down.”

“I think she’ll be all right,” Jenny said.

“Very good, ma-am,” said Pender. “Set ’er down, chaps. That’s clever. Gentle as a lamb.”

They stood round Miss Emily, and grinned bashfully at her.

“You have been very kind,” she said; “I hope you will be my guests; though it will be wiser, perhaps, if I do not give myself the pleasure of joining you. I will leave instructions. Thank you very much.”

She took her umbrella and handbag from Jenny, bowed to her escort and walked quite fast towards the entrance. Jenny followed her. On the way, they passed Wally Trehern.

Patrick was in the vestibule. Miss Emily inclined her head to him and made for the stairs. Her handbag was bloody and conspicuous. Jenny collected her room key from the desk.

“What on earth…?” Patrick said, coming up to her.

“Get Dr. Mayne, could you? Up to her room. And Patrick — there are two fishermen and Mr. Pender outside. She wants them to have drinks on her. Can you fix it? I’ll explain later.”

“Good Lord! Yes, all right.”

Jenny overtook Miss Emily on the landing. She was shaky and, without comment, accepted an arm. When they had reached her room she sat on her bed and looked at Jenny with an expression of triumph.

“I am not surprised,” she said, “it was to be expected, my dear”—and fainted.

“Well,” said Dr. Mayne, smiling into Miss Emily’s face, “there’s no great damage done. I think you’ll recover.”

“I have already done so.”

“Yes, I daresay, but I suggest you go slow for a day or two, you know. You’ve had a bit of shock. How old are you?”

“I’m eighty-three and four months.”

“Good God!”

“Ours is a robust family, Dr. Mayne. My sister, Fanny Winterbottom, whom I daresay you have met, would be alive today if she had not, in one of her extravagant moods, taken an excursion in a speedboat.”

“Did it capsize?” Jenny was startled into asking.

“Not at all. But the excitement was too much and the consequent depression exposed her to an epidemic of Asiatic influenza. From which she died. It was quite unnecessary, and the indirect cause of my present embarrassment.”

There was a short silence. Jenny saw Dr. Mayne’s eyebrows go up.

“Really?” he said. “Well, now, I don’t think we should have any more conversation tonight. Some hot milk with a little whisky or brandy, if you like it, and a couple of aspirins. I’ll look in tomorrow.”

“You do not, I notice, suggest that I bathe my injuries in the spring.”

“No,” he said, and they exchanged a smile.

“I had intended to call upon you tomorrow with reference to my proposals. Have you heard of them?”

“I have. But I’m not going to discuss them with you tonight.”

“Do you object? To my proposals?”

“No. Good night, Miss Pride. Please don’t get up until I’ve seen you.”

“And yet they would not, I imagine, be to your advantage.”

There was a tap on the door and Mrs. Barrimore came in.

“Miss Pride,” she said. “I’m so sorry. I’ve just heard. I’ve come to see if there’s anything…” She looked at Dr. Mayne.

“Miss Pride’s quite comfortable,” he said. “Jenny’s going to settle her down. I think we’ll leave her in charge, shall we?”

He waited while Mrs. Baltimore said another word or two, and then followed her out of the room. He shut the door, and they moved down the passage.

“Bob,” she said, “what is it? What happened? Has she been attacked?”

“Probably some lout from the village.”

“You don’t think…”

“No.” He looked at her. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Don’t worry so, Margaret.”

“I can’t help it. Did you see Keith?”

“Yes. He’s overdone it, tonight. Flat out in the old bar-parlour. I’ll get him up to bed.”

“Does Patrick know?”

“I’ve no idea.”

“He wasn’t flat out an hour ago. He was in the ugly stages. He — he — was talking so wildly. What he’d do to her — to Miss Pride. You know?”

“My dear girl, he was plastered. Don’t get silly ideas into your head, now, will you? Promise?”

“All right,” she said. “Yes. All right.”

“Good night,” he said and left her there with her fingers against her lips.

On the next day, Tuesday, Miss Emily kept to her room, where in the afternoon she received, in turn, Mr. Nankivell (the Mayor of Portcarrow), Dr. Mayne and the Reverend Mr. Carstairs. On Wednesday, she called at Wally’s cottage. On Thursday she revisited the spring, mounted to her observation post, and remained there, under her umbrella, for a considerable time, conscientiously observed by Sergeant Pender, to whom she had taken a fancy, and by numerous visitors as well as several of the local characters, including Miss Cost, Wally Trehern and his father.

On Friday she followed the same routine — escaping a trip wire, which had been laid across her ascent to the ledge and removed by Mr. Pender two minutes before she appeared on the scene.

An hour later, this circumstance having been reported to him, Superintendent Alfred Coombe rang up Roderick Alleyn at his holiday address.

Alleyn was mowing his host’s tennis court when his wife hailed him from the terrace. He switched the machine off.

“Telephone,” she shouted. “Long distance.”

“Damnation!” he said and returned to the house. “Where’s it from, darling?”

“Portcarrow. District Headquarters. That’ll be Miss Emily, won’t it?”

“Inevitably, I fear.”

“Might it be only to say there’s nothing to report?” Troy asked doubtfully.

“Most unlikely.”

He answered the call, heard what Coombe had to say about the stone throwing and turned his thumb down for Troy’s information.

“Mind you,” Coombe said, “it might have been some damned Ted, larking about. Not that we’ve had trouble of that sort on the Island. But she’s raised a lot of feeling locally. Seeing what you’ve told us, I thought I ought to let you know.”

“Yes, of course. And you’ve talked to Miss Pride?”

“I have,” said Coombe with some emphasis. “She’s a firm old lady, isn’t she?”

“Gibraltar is as butter compared to her.”

“What say?”

“I said: Yes, she is.”

“I asked her to let me know what her plans might be for the rest of the day. I didn’t get much change out of her. The doctor persuaded her to stay put on Tuesday; but ever since, she’s been up and about — worse luck. She’s taken to sitting on this shelf above the spring and looking at the visitors. Some of them don’t like it.”

“I bet they don’t.”

“The thing is, with this Festival coming along tomorrow the place is filling up and we’re going to be fully extended. I mean, keeping observation, as you know, takes one man all his time.”

“Of course. Can you get reinforcements?”

“Not easily. But I don’t think it’ll come to that. I don’t reckon it’s warranted. I reckon she’ll watch her step after this. But she’s tricky. You’ve got to face it: she is tricky.”

“I’m sorry to have landed you with this, Coombe.”

“Well, I’d rather know. I’m glad you did. After all, she’s in my district — and if anything did happen…”

“Has there been anything else?”

“That’s why I’m ringing. My chap, Pender, found a trip wire stretched across the place where she climbs to her perch. He was hanging about, waiting for her to turn up, and noticed it. Workmanlike job. Couple of iron pegs and a length of fine clothesline. Could have been nasty. There’s a five-foot drop to the pond. And rocks.”

“Did you tell her?”

“Yes. She said she’d have spotted it for herself.”

“When was this?”

“This morning. About an hour ago.”

“Damn.”

“Quite so.”

“Does she suspect anyone?”

“Well, yes. She reckons it’s a certain lady. Yes, Mr. Mayor. Good morning, sir. I won’t keep you a moment.”

“Has your Mayor just walked in?”

“That’s right.”

“Did you, by any chance, mean the shopkeeper? Miss Cost, is it?”

“That’s right.”

“I’ll ring up Miss Pride. I suppose she knocks off for lunch, does she? Comes off her perch?”

“That’s right. Quite so.”

“What’s the number of the pub?”

“Portcarrow 1212.”

“You’ll keep in touch?”

“That’ll be quite all right, sir. We’ll do that for you.”

“Thank you,” Alleyn said. “No matter what they say, I’ve got great faith in the police. Good-bye.”

He heard Coombe give a chuckle, and hung up.

“Oh, Rory!” his wife said. “Not again? Not this time? It’s being such fun, our holiday!”

“I’m going to talk to her. Come here to me and keep your fingers crossed. She’s hell when she’s roused. Come here.”

He kept his arm round her while he waited for the call to go through. When at last Miss Emily spoke, from her room at the Boy-and-Lobster, Troy could hear her quite clearly though she had some difficulty in understanding, since Miss Emily spoke in French. So did Alleyn.

“Miss Emily, how are you getting on?”

“Perfectly well, I thank you, Rodrigue.”

“Have there been unpleasantnesses of the sort that were threatened?”

“Nothing of moment. Do not disarrange yourself on my account.”

“You have been hurt.”

“It was superficial.”

“You might well have been hurt again.”

“I think not.”

“Miss Emily, I must ask you to leave the Island.”

“In effect: you have spoken to the good Superintendent Coombe. It was kind, but it was not necessary. I shall not leave the Island.”

“Your behaviour is, I’m afraid, both foolish and inconsiderate.”

“Indeed? Explain yourself.”

“You are giving a great deal of anxiety and trouble to other people. You are being silly, Miss Emily.”

“That,” said Miss Emily distinctly, “was an improper observation.”

“Unfortunately, not. If you persist I shall feel myself obliged to intervene.”

“Do you mean, my friend,” said Miss Emily with evident amusement, “that you will have me arrested?”

“I wish I could. I wish I could put you under protective custody.”

“I am already protected by the local officer, who is, for example, a man of intelligence. His name is Pender.”

“Miss Emily, if you persist you will force me to leave my wife.”

“That is nonsense.”

“Will you give me your word of honour that you will not leave the hotel unaccompanied?”

“Very well,” said Miss Emily after a pause. “Understood.”

“And that you will not sit alone on a shelf? Or anywhere? At any time?”

“There is no room for a second occupant on the shelf.”

“There must be room somewhere. Another shelf. Somewhere.”

“It would not be convenient.”

“Nor is it convenient for me to leave my wife and come traipsing down to your beastly Island.”

“I beg that you will do no such thing. I assure you —” Her voice stopped short. He would have thought that the call had been cut off if he hadn’t quite distinctly heard Miss Emily catch her breath in a sharp gasp. Something had fallen.

“Miss Emily!” he said. “Hullo! Hullo! Miss Emily!”

“Very well,” her voice said. “I can hear you. Perfectly.”

“What happened?”

“I was interrupted.”

“Something’s wrong. What is it?”

“’No, no. It is nothing. I knocked a book over. Rodrigue, I beg that you do not break your holiday. It would be rather ridiculous. It would displease me extremely, you understand. I assure you that I will do nothing foolish. Good-bye, my dear boy.”

She replaced the receiver.

Alleyn sat with his arm still round his wife. “Something happened,” he said. “She sounded frightened. I swear she was frightened. Damn and blast Miss Emily for a pigheaded old effigy. What the hell does she think she’s up to?”

“Darling: She promised to be sensible. She doesn’t want you to go. Does she, now?”

“She was frightened,” he repeated. “And she wouldn’t say why.”

At the same moment Miss Emily, with her hand pressed to her heart, was staring at the object she had exposed when she had knocked the telephone directory on its side.

This object was a crude plastic image of a Green Lady. A piece of ruled paper had been jammed down over the head, and on it was pasted a single word of newsprint:

Miss Emily surveyed the assembled company.

There were not enough chairs for them all in her sitting-room. Margaret Barrimore, the Rector and the Mayor were seated. Jenny and Patrick sat on the arms of Mrs. Barrimore’s chair. Major Barrimore, Superintendent Coombe and Dr. Mayne formed a rather ill-assorted group of standees.

“That, then,” said Miss Emily, “ is the situation. I have declared my purpose. I have been threatened. Two attempts have been made upon me. Finally, this object”—she waved her hand in the direction of the Green Lady, which, with its unlovely label still about its neck, simpered at the company—“this object has been placed in my room by someone who evidently obtained possession of the key.”

“Now, my dear Miss Pride,” Barrimore said, “I do assure you that I shall make the fullest possible investigation. Whoever perpetrated this ridiculous—” Miss Emily raised her hand. He goggled at her, brushed up his moustache and was silent.

“I have asked you to meet me here,” she continued, exactly as if she had not been interrupted, “in order to make it known, first, that I am not, of course, to be diverted by threats of any sort. I shall take the action I have already outlined. I have particularly invited you, Mr. Mayor, and the Rector and Dr. Mayne, because you are persons of authority in Portcarrow and also because each of you will be affected in some measure by my decision. As, perhaps more directly, will Major Barrimore and his family. I regret that Miss Cost finds she is unable to come. I have met each of you independently since I arrived and I hope you are all convinced that I am not to be shaken in my intention.”

Mr. Nankivell made an unhappy noise.

“My second object in trespassing upon your time is this. I wish, with the assistance of Superintendent Coombe, to arrive at the identity of the person who left this figurine, with its offensive label, on my desk. It is presumably the person who is responsible for the two attempts to inflict injury. It must have been — I believe ‘planted’ is the correct expression — while I was at luncheon. My apartment was locked. My key was on its hook on a board in the office. It is possible to remove it without troubling the attendant and without attracting attention. That is what must have been done, and done by a person who was aware of my room number. Unless, indeed, this outrage was performed by somebody who is in possession of, or has access to, a duplicate or master key.” She turned with splendid complacency to Superintendent Coombe. “That is my contention,” said Miss Emily. “Perhaps you, Mr. Coombe, will be good enough to continue the investigation.”

An invitation of this sort rested well outside the range of Superintendent Coombe’s experience. Under the circumstances, he met the challenge with good sense and discretion. He kept his head.

“Well, now,” he said. “Miss Pride, Mr. Mayor, and ladies and gentlemen: I’m sure we’re all agreed that this state of affairs won’t do. Look at it whatever way you like, it reflects no credit on Portcarrow mainland or the Island.”

“Yurr-yurr,” said the Mayor, who was clearly fretted by the minor role for which he seemed to be cast. “Speak your mind, Alfred! Go ahead.”

“So I will, then. Now. As regards the stone throwing and the trip wire incidents. Inquiries have been put in hand. So far, from information received, I have nothing to report. As regards this latest incident: in the ordinary course of events, it having been reported to the police, routine inquiries would be undertaken. That would be the normal procedure.”

“It has been reported,” said Miss Emily. “And I have invited you to proceed.”

“The method, if you will pardon me, Miss Pride, has not been normal. It is not usual to call a meeting on such an occasion.”

“Evidently, I have not made myself clear. I have called the meeting in order that the persons who could have effected an entry into this room, by the means I have indicated, may be given an opportunity of clearing themselves.”

This pronouncement had a marked but varied effect upon her audience. Patrick Ferrier’s eyebrows shot up and he glanced at Jenny, who made a startled grimace. Mrs. Barrimore leaned forward in her chair and looked, apparently with fear, at her husband. He, in his turn, had become purple in the face. The Mayor’s habitual expression of astonishment was a caricature of itself. Dr. Mayne scrutinized Miss Emily as if she were a test case for something. The Rector ran his hands through his hair and said: “Oh, but surely…”

Superintendent Coombe, with an air of abstraction, stared in front of him. He then produced his notebook and contemplated it as if he wondered where it had sprung from.

“Now, just a minute!” he said.

“I must add,” said Miss Emily, “that Miss Jenny Williams may at once be cleared. She very kindly called for me, assisted me downstairs, and to my knowledge remained in the dining-room throughout luncheon, returning to my table to perform the same kind office. Do you wish to record this?”

He opened his mouth, shut it again and actually made a note.

“It will perhaps assist the inquiry if I add that Major Barrimore did not come into the dining-room at all, that Mrs. Barrimore left it five minutes before I did, and that Mr. Patrick Ferrier was late in arriving there. They will no doubt wish to elaborate.”

“By God!” Major Barrimore burst out. “I’ll be damned if I do! By God, I’ll—”

“No, Keith! Please!” said his wife.

“You shut up, Margaret.”

“I suggest,” Patrick said, “that on the whole it might be better if you did.”

“Patrick!” said the Rector. “No, old boy.”

Superintendent Coombe came to a decision.

“I’ll ask you all for your attention, if you please,” he said and was successful in getting it. “I don’t say this is the way I’d have dealt with the situation,” he continued, “if it had been left to me. It hasn’t. Miss Pride has set about the affair in her own style, and has put me in the position where I haven’t much choice but to take up the inquiry on her lines. I don’t say it’s a desirable way of going about the affair, and I’d have been just as pleased if she’d had a little chat with me first. She hasn’t, and that’s that. I think it’ll be better for all concerned if we get the whole thing settled and done with, by taking routine statements from everybody. I hope you’re agreeable.”

Patrick said quickly: “Of course. Much the best way.”

He stood up. “I was late for lunch,” he said, “because I was having a drink with George Pender in the bar. I went direct from the bar to the dining-room. I didn’t go near the office. What about you, Mama?”

Mrs. Barrimore twisted her fingers together and looked up at her son. She answered him as if it were a matter private to them both. “Do you mean, what did I do when I left the dining-room? Yes, I see. I–I went into the hall. There was a crowd of people from the bus. Some of them asked about — oh, the usual things. One of them seemed — very unwell — and I took her into the lounge to sit down. Then I went across to the old house. And—”

Dr. Mayne said: “I met Mrs. Barrimore as she came in. I was in the old house. I’d called to have a word with her about Miss Pride. To learn if she was”—he glanced at her—“if she was behaving herself,” he said drily. “I went into the old bar-parlour. Major Barrimore was there. I spoke to him for a minute or two, and then had a snack lunch in the new bar. I then visited a patient who is staying in the hotel, and at 2:30 I called on Miss Pride. I found her busy at the telephone, summoning this meeting. At her request I have attended it.”

He had spoken rapidly. Mr. Coombe said: “Just a minute, if you please, Doctor,” and they were all silent while he completed his notes. “Yes,” he said at last. “Well, now. That leaves His Worship, doesn’t it, and—”

“I must say,” Mr. Nankivell interrupted, “and say it I do and will — I did not anticipate, when called upon at a busy and inconvenient time, to be axed to clear myself of participation in a damn fool childish prank. Further, I take leave to put on record that I look upon the demand made upon me as one unbecoming to the office I have the honour to hold. Having said which, I’ll thank you to make a note of it, Alf Coombe. I state further that during the first part of the period in question I was in the Mayoral Chambers at the execution of my duties, from which I moved to the back office of my butchery, attending to my own business, which is more than can be said of persons who shall, for purposes of this discussion, remain nameless.”

Mr. Coombe made a short note: “In his butchery,” and turned to the Rector.

“I’ve been trying to think,” said Mr. Carstairs. “I’m not at all good at times and places, I fear, and it’s been a busy day. Let me see. Oh, yes! I visited the cottages this morning. Actually, the main object was to call on that wretched Mrs. Trehern — things have been very much amiss, there, it’s a sad case — and one or two other folk on the Island. I don’t know when I walked back, but I believe I was late for lunch. My wife, I daresay, could tell you.”

“Did you come up to the Boy-and-Lobster, sir?”

“Did I? Yes, I did. As a matter of fact, Miss Pride, I intended to call on you, to see if you were quite recovered, but the main entrance was crowded and I saw that luncheon had begun so — I didn’t, you see.”

“You went home, sir?” asked the Superintendent.

“Yes. Late.”

Mr. Coombe shut his notebook. “All right,” he said, “so far as it goes. Now, in the normal course of procedure these statements would be followed up; and follow them up I shall, which takes time. So unless anyone has anything further to add — Yes, Miss Pride?”

“I merely observe, Superintendent, that I shall be glad to support you in your investigations. And to that end,” she added, in the absence of any sign of enthusiasm, “I shall announce at once that I have arrived at my own conclusion. There is, I consider, only one individual to whom these outrages may be attributed, and that person, I firmly believe, is—”

The telephone rang.

It was at Miss Emily’s elbow. She said, “T’ch!” and picked it up. “Yes? Are you there?” she asked.

A treble voice, audible to everybody in the room, asked:

“Be that Miss Emily Pride?”

“Speaking.”

“You leave us be, Miss Emily Pride, or the Lady will get you. You’ll be dead as a stone, Miss Emily Pride.”

“Who is that?”

The telephone clicked and began to give the dial tone.

Patrick said: “That was a child’s voice. It must have been—”

“No,” said Miss Emily. “I think not. I have an acute ear for phonetics. It was an assumed accent. And it was not a child. It was the voice of Miss Elspeth Cost.”