Laurels Are Poison

Chapter 11

THE EVE OF WATERLOO

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‘I am quite infinitely obliged to you, Miss Menzies,’ said Mrs Bradley, when the inspector had brought his experts, and Miss Cornflake’s fingerprints, ‘for better, for worse,’ as Laura expressed it, were upon record. ‘Of course, we’ve nothing much to go on, except that a person in unlawful possession of one key may, as I suggested, be in unlawful possession of other keys. And, of course, there does seem something a little odd about her, as you say. And she’s very strong.’

‘ ‘Worst of it is, if she’s got anything to do with the Athelstan Horrors, she’s wise to you now,’ said Laura.

‘Yes. I intended that she should be, child. I now await her reactions.’

‘Golly! But she may take a stab at laying you out, don’t forget. If she did drown Cook, she’s dangerous.’

‘Don’t jump to conclusions, child. I haven’t mentioned Cook, and you must not. Now I should like to show my appreciation of your detective powers. What would you like me to do?’

‘Well,’ said Laura, after a moment’s thought. ‘I wish you’d keep the Deb — keep Miss Cloud out of old Kitty’s literature lesson on Friday afternoon. She wants her to take a poem by Wordsworth, but if she wasn’t coming in, Kitty would be able to read ’em a slab of the latest Tuppenny.’

‘And they would prefer that?’

‘Well, dash it, Warden, of course they would, poor kids. I mean, no one is a greater admirer of Willie Wordsworth than old Kitty. She actually told me this morning that she considers We Are Seven one of the funniest poems in the language. But when it comes to a few poor, innocent offspring, who don’t even want to be in school at all, I do call Wordsworth, as ladled out by old K. on a Friday afternoon, coming it a bit too thick, especially as the poem isn’t We Are Seven.’

‘“Well, child, I can hardly dictate to Miss Cloud which schools and classes she is to visit on Friday afternoon.’

‘No?’ said Laura with a cheeky and confident grin. “Thanks a lot, Warden. Old Kitty will remember you in her will for this, I shouldn’t wonder. I’ll tell her to go ahead, then.’

Strange to say, Deborah did not visit Kitty on Friday afternoon, and that unwilling applicant for professional honours spent a pleasant last hour with a strangely attentive class to whom she had delivered the following homily at the commencement of the period:

‘Now, look here, cads’ — a form of address which the class accepted at its B.B.C. value, and liked tremendously — ‘this is the very latest issue. I only got it at dinner-time, and I haven’t even looked at it yet, so no interruptions, or else I shall jolly well set you some sums or something, and read it all to myself. Now anybody who wants to open a desk, or shut one, or say anything, or fidget about, or drop things, or break a ruler, or any other dashed thing, just jolly well go ahead and do it, and then I’ll begin. All set? Righto. We’re off. Keep your poetry books open at page eleven, and, if anybody comes in, never mind who I mean, mind you’re reading that bally poem like billy-o. I’d better put mine ready, too…’

Some of the children cried when school practice was over and Kitty was compelled to say good-bye. She returned to Hall laden with late chrysanthemums, two hyacinth bulbs vouched for ‘to come up’ in the spring, and a collection of confectionery.

‘Hullo, Kitty? Got a cold?’ asked the slightly obtuse Alice, when she met her.

‘No. I’ve been having a howl,’ said Kitty, frankly.

‘What on earth for? The Deb. didn’t come in, did she?’

‘No. But those blinking kids. You just get fond of them, and then you don’t go any more.’

‘You are an ass!’ said Laura, when she heard it. But the words were comforting, for Laura, in her way, was as acute a psychologist as Mrs Bradley.

School practice having been concluded, and holiday reading having been settled by the various lecturers with their groups, work came to a close and thoughts turned pleasurably to the end of term dance. This was not exciting, in the sense that the summer term dance was exciting for no visitors were allowed, but it was anticipated eagerly by students a little jaded by the exigencies of school practice. The various committees met twice on Saturday and again on Monday morning, to have all the necessary arguments about an orchestra, Christmas decorations, the arrangement of the programme, printing, catering and the vexed question of whether the Principal would allow the proceedings to continue until midnight for once.

Laura was on the programme committee, and was, as she herself expressed it, ‘lost to sight, to memory dear,’ for most of Saturday. Alice had a pleasant voice, and was to sing from the platform in the interval, so she had gone off to the Music Room for a practice. Kitty went back to Athelstan and ironed the three dance frocks for Tuesday.

The week-end passed without untoward incident, the programme was settled, and willing hands rolled out copies of it by the score on the College duplicator, the supper was decided upon and the books balanced. Each student contributed one shilling and sixpence towards the cost of the festivities, and all lecturers were invited, free of charge. Decorators (the Advanced Art group, mostly, assisted by such gifted amateurs as Kitty, who insisted upon helping ‘put up the stuff’ and proved a practical and experienced workman, and a steady and even daring performer upon step-ladders) did their bit towards contributing to the success of the evening, and a ladies’ orchestra was hired from Bradford and arrangements made to feed it and bed it down since it could not get back by train that night, particularly if the principal should relax the ‘eleven o’clock rule’ and allow the party to continue until midnight.

This she refused to do, although a deputation, made up of first years, second years and third years, waited upon her with eloquence, great respect and some special pleading.

‘I am sorry, students,’ she said, when she had listened patiently to all their arguments, ‘but it will be past midnight by the time you get to your beds, and some of you are catching the seven-thirty train on the morrow. It isn’t fair on the servants.’

This ‘time-honoured gag,’ as the disgusted Laura put it, clinched all arguments, and the deputation, completely deflated, filed out.

The next petitioner was Mrs Bradley, but upon a different matter.

‘I want you to allow me, Miss du Mugne,’ she said, ‘as part of my attempt to account for Miss Murchan’s disappearance, to supply the College with a band of Thugs. For one night only,’ she added; and proceeded to supply footnotes. The Principal, without relish — in fact, with complete and awful disapproval — listened carefully to Mrs Bradley’s plans, and, against her will, agreed to them.

‘ “Now it is the time of night”,’ observed Laura, gazing critically at herself in the mirror, ‘ “that the graves, all gaping wide…” Kitty, lovey, do up my zip, would you? If I bend, be it never so slightly, I can’t get it to do its stuff. I seem to have put on flesh since I came to this glory hole.’

‘And then,’ said Kitty, ‘I’d better just re-arrange your hair. I told you to be careful of it when you put your dress on, and you haven’t been careful. You’ve completely mussed it up.’

She had been, needless to say, hairdresser in chief, not only to her two comrades, but to half of Athelstan. All those, as Laura observed, who had one lock of hair to lay beside another, had clamoured for her skilful ministrations. Kitty had responded nobly, and the Athelstan contingent formed ‘a bevy of fashion and beauty unequalled in the annals of the College,’ as Laura announced with pride, surveying the happy faces and ‘gala get-up’ — her phrase again — of the young girls ‘ere Time’s fell hand had touched them.’

‘You seem in form tonight,’ observed Miss Cartwright, who had attempted sophistication in a scarlet frock and a good deal of rouge, and was not too certain whether the end justified the means.

‘Wait till you see the Warden,’ said Laura mysteriously.

‘I’ve seen the Deb, and I must say she looks too beautiful for a wicked world,’ said Miss Cartwright. ‘In fact, she makes me look quite Tottenham Court Road, and I rather relished the look of myself before.’

Kitty had waylaid Deborah on the previous afternoon.

‘You’ve had it set,’ she said, without preamble.

‘Yes,’ said Deborah nervously, conscious of a professional eye upon her coiffure.

‘You come to me an hour before tea tomorrow,’ said Kitty. ‘It isn’t bad. I’ll be able to do something there.’

Deborah had laughed, but, in the end, was compelled to promise. But Kitty’s great triumph was to come. Mrs Bradley, who had something to talk over with Miss Topas, dressed early, in an orange and royal blue evening frock which was then in its fourth season, and encountered Kitty, who was on her way to the bathroom, as she herself was about to descend the stairs.

Kitty’s jaw dropped; her eyes opened wide. She made odd, gurgling noises. Mrs Bradley halted.

‘Goodness me, Miss Trevelyan!’ she said. ‘Are you ill, child?’

‘Well, you might call it that, Warden,’ replied the sufferer.

‘But what is the matter, my poor dear?’

‘Warden,’ said Kitty, with the desperate honesty of the artist, ‘you can’t go over to College looking like that.’

It was a statement which many of Mrs Bradley’s relatives, notably her sister-in-law, Lady Selina, and her nephew’s wife, Jenny Lestrange, would have given much for the courage to make.

‘Why, what’s the matter with it?’ asked the head of the house, genuinely surprised by the passionate outburst.

‘Well, nothing, of course, Warden. It’s like my cheek… only, haven’t you got something…?’

‘Come and rummage,’ said Mrs Bradley, grinning. ‘But I mustn’t be long. I’ve got to see Miss Topas before the dance begins.’

Kitty accepted the invitation with alacrity, but, confronting the contents of Mrs Bradley’s wardrobe, her face fell.

‘No?’ said the Warden, in Kitty’s opinion unnecessarily and wrong-headedly amused by the proceedings.

‘I might do something if you’d let me put on a touch of Miss Cartwright’s rouge. It’s perfectly horrible on her — wrong shade altogether — but it would make this dress quite wearable on you. It’s a lovely frock…’ She took it down, and, laying it on the bed, brooded over it, and then looked critically at Mrs Bradley’s raven hair, black eyes and yellow countenance.

‘Don’t mind me,’ said the Warden; but she herself was surprised at the result, especially of a skilful and artful application of Miss Cartwright’s rouge. ‘Dear me, I don’t think I’ve seen myself like this for thirty years.’

Kitty hung up the discarded blue and orange in the wardrobe.

‘Well, you see, you’ve got the bones all right,’ she said. ‘And your hair — not a touch of grey. And that frock, now, with the rouge, and your shoes are nice. I wish I could afford expensive shoes.’

Mrs Bradley kissed her — a brush against the smooth, young, earnest brow.

‘It’s kind of you to take the trouble, my dear,’ she said, and laughed again. ‘Has Miss Cloud…?’

‘Oh, the Deb’s a beauty… really a beauty,’ said Kitty. ‘Even at that ghastly little hairdresser’s she goes to they can’t really do much to muck her up. Of course, I took out their wave and re-set it… Well, I had better have my bath, I think, or Dog will be yelling her head off.’

Mrs Bradley gazed after her, still struggling with laughter, but when she saw Deborah she did not laugh; she moaned (to Deborah’s discomfiture) with appreciation of her loveliness.

‘You know,’ she said, holding Deborah off and looking her up and down, ‘we shall have to make sure that that child doesn’t waste her time teaching. Even the mouse-like Alice looks almost pretty tonight.’

Deborah looked at her suspiciously.

‘You’re up to something,’ she said.

‘I have been up to something,’ Mrs Bradley corrected her. ‘I have had Miss Cornflake put under guard.’

‘Arrested, do you mean?’

‘Not arrested, exactly; rather, illegally detained. Miss Topas, Miss Cartwright, Miss Menzies and Miss Boorman assisting, George and I have locked her up in the cellar of the chief engineer’s house, where George and the chief engineer are mounting guard until midnight.’

‘But won’t there be trouble about it?’

‘No. She thinks it is an Athelstan rag. George, Miss Topas and I did not appear. We merely made the plans to incarcerate her, and arranged for the necessary transport.’

‘But what on earth was your object in preventing her from going to the dance?’

‘I want to solve a mystery or two, and I want to be certain, for her own sake, that she is out of the way.’

‘Do you really suspect her of the murders?’

‘I don’t suspect her because I don’t know as much yet as I should like to. She may be as innocent as Miss Murchan was. And that, I may as well inform you, is a double-edged statement. But if she is innocent, it is as well to keep her safe and sound. Or don’t you think so?’

‘I think it’s a good thing you are friends with the police,’ said Deborah. ‘And what on earth will the Principal say? All the same, if you want any assistance in solving your mysteries…’

‘No, thank you, not from you. The inspector is coming to help me. He is bringing the sergeant and the police doctor, so I shall be perfectly safe.’

‘Can’t you tell me what you are going to do?’ asked Deborah, looking anxious.

‘I had better not, child. The very walls have ears.’

‘That’s not the reason. But I can see you’ve made up your mind to be obstinate.’

‘I’ve made up my mind I shall be late in meeting Miss Topas,’ said Mrs Bradley.

The dance was mildly entertaining, Deborah thought. The students were enjoying themselves. She herself, although she did not know it, filled Alice’s cup to overflowing by sitting next her at supper. Laura made a speech, and the Principal, at half past ten, ‘saw the light,’ as Laura insisted, and permitted announcement to be made of her permission for an extension to eleven-thirty. The students applauded. Miss Topas, dancing (very badly) with a clumsy-looking One-Year from her own Hall thought: ‘Oh, so she hasn’t found it.’ Mrs Bradley had withdrawn from the College Hall at half past eight as unobtrusively as she could, but the majority of the Athelstan students missed her before nine o’clock, and asked Deborah whether she was ‘all right’.

Deborah reassured them, but felt anxious, as the young are apt to do when they feel responsible for the safety and well-being of the elderly. She said to Miss Topas, when they met in a Paul Jones: ‘What’s she up to?’

Miss Topas replied irritatingly: ‘Elle cherche la femme,’ and grinned. Deborah scowled at her. ‘No, really, it’s completely hush-hush,’ Miss Topas continued.

‘Come into the staff-room and tell me, while I tidy my hair.’

‘Nothing doing. Oh, Lord. The merry-go-round again! See you later!’ And they separated into their respective circles.

She dodged Deborah the next time their orbits intersected in the dance, and seized a fat student from Bede. Deborah grimaced at her, but was almost swept off her feet by a muscular captain of hockey, who gripped her purposefully and swung her relentlessly into a polka which the orchestra, with what Deborah could only classify as a misplaced sense of fun, had suddenly introduced instead of the waltzes and fox trots with which the Paul Jones had, so far, got along so nicely. The muscular student then took Deborah out to the buffet for an ice, and when they returned to the dancing floor Miss Topas had disappeared. She reappeared again in the doorway at twenty-five past ten and went across to speak to the Principal. At half past ten the announcement was made of the ‘first extension night in the long and glorious history of the College’ (Laura).

Deborah buttonholed Miss Topas.

‘What’s been happening? What’s come over Miss du Mugne? The Second-Years say she never extends the time.’

Miss Topas, who was looking pleased with herself, said brightly: ‘Nothing. Come over to Columba with me for a drink.’

‘On condition you tell me what has been happening,’ said Deborah. Miss Topas took her arm and pulled her gently out into the passage.

‘I’ve been to take some nourishment to the Athelstan prisoner,’ she said. ‘It’s cold across the grounds. The wind’s changed. It’s in the east. Put your coat on, and tie something over your hair.’

‘The Athelstan prisoner? What are you talking about?’

‘Nothing. I’m merely babbling. Come on! What a time you take!’

It was dark, as well as cold, across the grounds, and seemed a good step from the College to Columba. There was a light, however, in the window of Miss Topas’s sitting-room, which seemed to beckon and welcome, and Miss Topas had her latch-key and opened the front door wide.

‘Come on. Don’t stop to wipe your feet,’ she said in a voice in which Deborah recognized excitement.

Miss Topas switched on the light in the passage, shut the front door and led the way to her sitting-room. A man rose from her most comfortable arm-chair as they went in.

‘Hullo, Deborah,’ he said. ‘Aunt Adela sent for me, and told me to fetch up here.’

‘Hullo, Jonathan! Whatever you’re doing here, or think you’re doing, I don’t see why you have to explain yourself,’ Deborah said, with a laugh to hide the fact that she was blushing.

‘I’ll go and get the drinks,’ said Miss Topas, going on the instant, and closing the door behind her.

‘Sit down, Deborah. Or, rather, don’t. At least, not yet,’ said Jonathan, advancing.

Before Deborah could avoid it, he had taken her in his arms, and, with a most disconcerting amount of enterprise, swinging her slightly sideways, so that her head was firmly against his upper arm, he kissed her with an enthusiasm which caused Miss Topas, coming in with the tray of drinks, to click her tongue regretfully and to observe that her sitting-room was not a film studio. She then put down the tray, seized Deborah (who seemed uncertain whether to launch an attack upon the intrepid wooer or whether to cry) and embraced her more gently and a good deal less disturbingly than she had been embraced by the ardent young man.

This action decided Deborah. She made a dash for the door, tore out, and they could hear her running up the stairs.

‘A bit precipitate, weren’t you?’ said Miss Topas. ‘Say when.’

‘Make it a good one,’ the young man responded. ‘I’ve been obeying orders, that is all.’

‘Whose?’

‘Aunt Adela’s. She told me she wanted Deborah in the family — Oh, I say, when!’

‘There you are, then. And did your Aunt Adela advise you on procedure?’

‘Well, no. But I’ve wanted to do that to Deborah since that week-end — you remember? — at Carey’s. Anyway, I seem to have mucked it. Do you suppose I’ve put her off for good? She wouldn’t agree to marry me when we were there, so I thought I’d try other methods.’

‘Well, you’d better not have more than one drink. Women don’t like being made love to by a stink of whisky. You drink that, and make it last, and I’ll go up and bring her down again. And you’d better be a little more gentle. Deborah’s not a Rugby football player, you know. She’s nervous and highly strung, and all those other things that you’ve probably previously connected only with racehorses and prize pumpkins.’

With this delicate admonition, she went upstairs to her bedroom. Deborah was seated in front of the dressing-table tidying her hair. Her hands were shaking.

‘Let me,’ said Miss Topas; but instead of taking the comb she took Deborah by the shoulders, held her firmly for a minute and then said: ‘Well, and do you want him?’

‘Of course I want him,’ said Deborah.

‘Come on down, then, and say so.’

‘I can’t meet him again tonight’

‘Rot. Don’t be girlish.’

‘I can’t go down there. Tell him — tell him — ’

‘Tell him yourself. Come on. Don’t be a coward.’

‘I’m not. You don’t — Look here, why did you ask him to come here tonight?’

Miss Topas laughed, and made for the door.

‘There’s nobody at home to make scandal. I’ll send him up,’ she said.

Deborah tried to detain her, failed, and, mistrustful of her sense of humour, followed. She found Jonathan alone. He was seated on the settee, staring gloomily at his whisky, which he had not touched. He put it down and stood up when she came in.

Deborah backed away, but heard the key turn in the lock behind her. Miss Topas was taking no chances of her match-making going astray.

‘Deborah,’ said Jonathan. ‘Look here, come and sit down. No, honestly, I won’t do it again. At least, I won’t do it without warning you! I’m sorry I rushed at you like that. Silly to frighten you, but my courage failed me. I say, Deborah, you will marry me, won’t you?’

‘But, it’s so silly! I hardly know you. In fact, I don’t know you at all!’

‘Yes, you do. What about that Saturday afternoon at half-term? What about the Monday? Besides, you know my aunt, and what could be more respectable than that? You like Aunt Adela, don’t you?’

‘I love her. She’s been a darling, but…’

‘Well, you could love me, too. It’s perfectly easy. My parents have managed it for years, and they’re not terribly talented. And I’m more of a darling than Aunt Adela. And if you know her, you know me. We’re exactly alike. The same noble, generous natures; the same acute psychological insight, the same brains, the same brawn…’

‘Yes, you’ve got the same brawn,’ admitted Deborah, beginning to laugh. ‘But she hasn’t your amount of classic impudence!’

‘Hasn’t she?’ said the young man. ‘Look here, giving you due warning, I am about to repeat my effects, after which, I will tell you just how much classic impudence my aunt has got! Ready?’

‘No!’ said Deborah, putting up an ineffective hand. The young man removed it.

‘What are you afraid of? Not of me,’ he said gently. ‘Come on! Don’t be a chump. It only messes your hair up when we fight, and I like it best as it is.’

Whilst these preparations were being made to enlarge her already wide circle of relatives, Mrs Bradley was putting in some grim work, with the assistance of George and the policemen. Athelstan was empty of servants, for all were helping over at the College, with permission to watch or join in the dancing. Mrs Bradley had decided to put this clear field to the test. Did it, or did it not, she inquired of the police, conceal the body of Miss Murchan?

Having put in her brief appearance at the dance, she returned to the house to meet the inspector, and, having changed from the garment of Kitty’s choosing into workaday clothes, she and the inspector commenced the search.

By a quarter-past ten nothing had been discovered by the inspector, although Mrs Bradley had made one notable find, and Miss Topas, who had been taken into her confidence and who had already ‘popped over’ once or twice ‘to see whether there was anything doing’, appeared again in time to take back a message to the Principal, and to give Mrs Bradley the news that Deborah was engaged to be married. She made this announcement in characteristic fashion. ‘By the way,’ she said, ‘you are by way of adding a niece to your collection. Do you mind?’

‘Deborah?’ said Mrs Bradley, grinning. ‘How did you manage it?’

‘I invited Jonathan over to Columba, as you suggested, and prevailed on her to come over with me for a drink. All unsuspecting, she came. I told him he would have to work fast.’

‘He must have taken you at your word. Is everything settled?’

‘Oh, yes.’

‘Well, heaven knows what her parents will think of him! But there! It’s no business of theirs,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘I’m glad Kitty did Deborah’s hair,’ she added, with apparent irrelevance.

‘From what I saw, I don’t really believe it made the slightest difference,’ said Miss Topas. ‘They’ll make rather a lovely couple — he so overriding and Deborah so devilish obstinate.’

They contemplated this picture of married loveliness in silence but appreciatively. Then Miss Topas said briskly: ‘Well, you’ll have to pack up the researches. The students will be coming over in about a quarter of an hour, unless you want me to ask the Principal for another extension, but, if I do, some of the intelligent young will smell a rat, and you don’t want that, I suppose?’

‘No, I don’t want that,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘I showed the inspector the only result I obtained. He is greatly disgusted. Should you like to see what I found?’

‘Is it gruesome?’

‘Yes and no.’

‘Then I’d like to see it. By the way, have Miss Menzies and Miss Cartwright their orders respecting Miss Cornflake, or shall I go along and let her out?’

‘No. They will do it. How is she? Very angry?’

‘No. She seems cheerful enough. Of course, I haven’t spoken to her myself. I’ve been over in company with the Chief Engineer. He’s been very good. He explained that he cannot let her out because the students responsible for the rag have the only key. I think she believes him all right. Did you have to tell him everything?’

‘Well, almost. He’s been in the Army, so it didn’t excite him too much.’

‘About poor Miss Murchan, do you mean?’

‘No, I didn’t need to tell him anything much about her. He decided long ago that she had been murdered, and he is firm that the grandfather did it.’

‘I think myself it’s quite a possible thing, you know, although I see the difficulties in the way of such a theory. Much depends now, I suppose, on your being able to trace a connexion between Miss Cornflake and the school where the child was killed.’

‘Everything, I suppose, depends on that. I am going there tomorrow. The school does not break up until Wednesday week. Their term is longer than ours. Now where’s this Sub-Warden of mine? Still over at Columba?’

‘Yes. I’ll send them both over. But what about your promise? Forward to the Chamber of Horrors, please.’

‘Well, not a bad show,’ said Laura, ‘and the water’s hot, thank heaven.’

‘Well, come out, pig, and let somebody else have a go,’ suggested Kitty. ‘There’s still Alice after me to have her turn.’

‘And two more,’ said Alice’s voice from the landing. ‘Oh! Hi! Let me in! Here’s the Warden!’

Kitty obligingly unlocked the door. Alice slipped in, and the ‘two more’ scurried hastily into study-bedrooms.

‘Good night, students,’ said Mrs Bradley primly. This benediction was followed by a distinctly masculine laugh.

‘Golly!’ said Laura coarsely. ‘She’s taking a man to bed!’

‘I bet it’s the Deb, not her,’ said Kitty, antedating by a mere couple of months an interesting and, to Deborah, a dreaded ceremony. ‘Wonder what Mrs Croc. has been doing with herself all the evening?’

Laura, who knew, had too much loyalty and discretion even to look wise.

‘Come on, young Alice,’ she said. ‘You’d better just take a shower. The bath water makes such a hell of a row running out.’

This order was well received by Alice, and the three were soon in their adjacent cubicles and in bed.

‘What happened to Cornflake?’ asked Kitty suddenly. ‘I didn’t seem to spot her at the revels.’

‘Didn’t you? Who cares, anyway?’ said Laura, sleepily. Kitty took the hint, and turned over. Miss Cornflake was, as a matter of fact, in her own study-bedroom at Columba, having pushed under the Warden’s door an ultimatum to the effect that she wanted an interview in the morning on a question of serious ragging.

The Warden granted the interview, and Miss Topas, brought into an affair with which the Warden of Columba felt incapable of dealing, observed that the matter was already under consideration by the Principal, the students concerned having confessed their crime.

‘They were Athelstan students,’ she added, soothingly.

‘I am sorry for Mrs Bradley. There seems to be a most undesirable element in Athelstan this year, from what one can gather,’ said the Warden, when Miss Cornflake, protesting still, had been ushered out of the presence, and bidden to catch her train.

Laura and Kitty watched her go. The students and their suitcases were all allotted to buses, and theirs was the fourth to go off, Miss Cornflake’s the second.

‘So that’s that,’ said Laura, climbing into the bus. ‘What’s the date we come back on, again?’

‘Twenty-fourth of Jan.,’ replied Kitty. Alice, whose train went a good deal later than theirs, was on bus fifteen. ‘Happy Christmas, and all that.’

‘Incidentally,’ said Kitty, before they parted at the station, ‘does it strike you that there is a certain sort of fat satisfaction on Mrs Croc’s face this morning?’

‘It hadn’t struck me,’ said Laura, torn between two loyalties, and therefore lying boldly. ‘Don’t forget the twenty-seventh at Charing Cross. District Station, mind, and the Embankment entrance. Bung-ho!’

During College vacations the servants stayed up for two or three days to clear up and scrub through, as Kitty put it, and then were put on board wages until three days before the return of the students. The Chief Engineer and the Infirmary Matron, having their own quarters, often stayed up all the time. The Principal usually stayed up for an extra day or two after the students had gone, and Mrs Bradley had decided to wait until the College was empty before communicating to Miss du Mugne her discovery. With this aim, she waited until the Saturday before producing her evidence. Then, with George’s assistance, she carried up to her sitting-room the damaged trunk of the younger twin, Miss Annet Carroway.

‘Let’s lock the contents up in here, George,’ she said, indicating a large cupboard. ‘Then you can take the trunk down again.’

The contents surprised George, although he had been in Mrs Bradley’s employment for some years. They comprised human bones.

‘Pretty work, George, don’t you think?’ she asked, taking them out one by one. ‘See how beautifully they were articulated before somebody took the skeleton to pieces.’

She showed him the ingenious wiring.

‘Then I take it this is not the remains of the missing lady, madam?’ George inquired.

‘No. This is the skeleton of a man. Look at the length of leg, the magnificent jaws, the size and strength of the bones. Besides, this person has been dead for a good many years, by the look of him, and has been used, I should say, for demonstration lessons to students.’

‘A kind of doctor’s piece, madam?’

‘Well, something of that sort; or possibly for physiology lessons to students in training here. If so, we shall soon get some information about him, I’ve no doubt.’

This information she sought immediately, by going to the Principal with her news. Miss du Mugne ordered coffee and talked about College affairs until it came. When the maid had gone she said:

‘What exactly has happened, then?’

‘I’ve found the wrong skeleton,’ said Mrs Bradley; and proceeded to explain.

‘It sounds like another of those silly practical jokes which have been perpetrated in Athelstan all this term,’ said the Principal. Mrs Bradley agreed, with disarming meekness, that it did sound exactly like that. ‘I suppose you’ve no suspicions of anyone?’ the Principal continued. ‘I know you don’t like the suggestion, but I still think Miss Menzies, of your Hall, could be watched with advantage. She came up with a bad reputation.’

‘For ragging,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘And Miss Cloud came with a bad reputation for not being able to keep order. I’ve seen no evidence yet to support either contention. Besides, the disturbances of one kind and another which we have suffered at Athelstan since September have been directed chiefly at me, and in such circumstances that Miss Menzies can scarcely come under suspicion.’

‘Well, you know your students better than I do, of course,’ said the Principal, in a tone which indicated that she did not believe this, ‘but such a business as purloining and breaking up the College skeleton certainly seems to me like a stupid, would-be joke on the part of some of the students.’

‘Even so,’ said Mrs Bradley, ‘it would help considerably if we could prove that the bones I have found are those of the College skeleton. Would you be able to recognize them?’

‘Oh, good gracious, Mrs Bradley!’ said the Principal, losing her calmness entirely. ‘You — you’re not suggesting —? I thought you said just now —?’

‘Not suggesting that these are Miss Murchan’s bones? No, I am not. The skeleton is not only that of a man, but the bones have been wired to give articulation — so necessary in demonstrations to a physiology group, for example.’

The Principal sat down again. Her face took on a look of regret struggling with its customary expression of benign conceit. The look of regret — to the credit of her intellectual conscience — won fairly easily.

‘I am sorry to say that I could not possibly undertake to recognize the College skeleton except as a skeleton,’ she said. ‘I mean that if you offered me a collection of well-articulated skeletons to choose from, I could not possibly pick out the one used here in the physiology or physical training classes.’

‘Oh — you use the skeleton for the physical training classes, do you?’

‘Certainly.’

‘Let me congratulate you,’ said Mrs Bradley, poking her in the ribs with a remarkably bony forefinger, and thus obtaining unintentional but indubitable revenge for the slights proffered, earlier in the interview, towards her students. ‘But tell me,’ she added, as the writhing Miss du Mugne eluded her torturing hand, ‘when can I see the College skeleton and how unlock the cupboard in which it is kept?’

‘I have a key.’ The Principal, smiling wanly, produced it. Mrs Bradley thanked her, and rose to go. As she came out of the Principal’s office she saw Deborah.

‘Why, what on earth are you doing here, child?’ she asked. ‘I thought you went home two days ago, and took my nephew with you.’

‘Well, what are you doing here?’ demanded Deborah. ‘I made him bring me back. What are you doing?’

‘Oh — just clearing up,’ said Mrs Bradley, vaguely, waving a skinny claw. ‘What have you done with the young man?’

‘He’s in the lane with the car.’

‘If Jonathan’s there, go and get him. I may be able to give him a job, and you, too. Fancy coming back, after all the trouble I had to smuggle him off the premises that Wednesday morning without the students’ knowing.’

‘Poor lambs! It would have given them the thrill of their lives!’ said Deborah, with the wicked, unamused glint which Mrs Bradley was interested to think of in connexion with her nephew Jonathan, whose conception of life from childhood, so far as she had ever been able to determine, was that he should have his own way in everything. She began to hum.

‘I don’t like you when you sing,’ said Deborah, who recognized the tune as that of a light-hearted sea-shanty called ‘The Drummer and the Cook’, ‘and I shall be obliged if you won’t refer to Jonathan as the young man.’

‘Well, go and get him, anyway,’ said her aunt-in-law to be, with a propitiatory smile which gave the unfortunate impression of being a lewd and evil grin. Deborah hesitated, then said:

‘Please tell me why you’re staying up. If you’re still hunting murderers we’re going to stay and help you. I’ve absolutely made up my mind, and Jonathan agrees, so you needn’t argue about it.’

‘Now, don’t be naughty,’ said Mrs Bradley, placidly. ‘Go and fetch Jonathan, and tell him I want him to carry a bag of bones across to College.’

‘Not — not —?’

‘No, not Miss Murchan’s bones. Quite accountable bones, in fact.’

‘What’s the argument?’ inquired Jonathan, who had left the car in the lane and had come up to the building to find out what was keeping Deborah so long. ‘I say, Aunt Adela, we’ve come to be your bodyguard. Deb’s going to stand outside the bathroom door listening to somebody lifting up your feet and submerging you, and I’m going to stand outside on the gravel with a hatchet, waiting to bean the murderer when she crawls out over the sill.’

‘So I understand,’ replied his aunt graciously. ‘Meanwhile, I want you to come over to Athelstan and help me with a skeleton. Comparisons are odious, but two sets of bones have to be compared, and I want witnesses to prove that I don’t change over the skeletons when I’ve compared them.’

She took the two over to Athelstan, and, to her observant nephew’s interest, stood for a second at the top of the basement steps before she descended. Deborah began to ascend to the first floor to get a book she wanted from her sitting-room.

‘Come back, Deborah,’ said Mrs Bradley. For a moment Jonathan thought that Deborah was going to disobey, and he leapt up to catch her, but she turned and they met face to face on the stairs.

‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’m well trained.’ She followed him down, and Mrs Bradley nodded.

‘I don’t want anybody to walk about alone in this house,’ she said quietly, when the two had rejoined her. ‘It isn’t too safe.’

‘Miss Cornflake?’ asked Deborah.

‘What do you know about Miss Cornflake?’ retorted Mrs Bradley. She led the way down the basement steps, listened again at the bottom, and then pushed open the door which led into the box-room. ‘There!’ she said to Jonathan. ‘That badly-battered trunk, if you don’t mind. The bones are in my sitting-room cupboard.’

‘I see.’ Another thought came to him. ‘By the way, you don’t expect to find poor old Miss Thingummy locked up in the Science Room, do you? Because, if so…’ He gave an eloquent glance in the direction of Deborah, who was looking out of the window.

‘Don’t be oafish, dear child,’ retorted his aunt. ‘Deborah is quite as capable of seeing a skeleton as you are.’

‘A skeleton, yes, granted. But…’

Deborah turned round.

‘You don’t really suppose the College Science Room could have housed a corpse all this term without somebody complaining, do you?’ she demanded coldly. ‘Our students are not all idiots.’

‘Oh, granted. I see. Then, in that case, may I ask…?’

‘No, you may not,’ said his aunt.

‘I beg pardon. Lead on, Patrick Mahon.’ Mrs Bradley cackled, and no more was said until they had left Athelstan with ‘the luggage,’ as Jonathan termed it, and had mounted to the second floor of the College building.

‘Now,’ said Mrs Bradley, producing the Principal’s key, and unlocking a cupboard.

The skeleton was in a long box, coffin-like, and yet with the indefinable austerity of hospitals rather than that of morgues. The three of them gazed upon it in silence. Jonathan, characteristically, broke this silence.

‘Indubitably male,’ he said. ‘Pass, skeleton. All’s well.’

‘Hm!’ said Mrs Bradley.

‘Are you disappointed?’ asked Deborah.

‘No. One and one make two,’ replied Mrs Bradley, ‘not to speak of two and one making three.’

‘Once aboard the lugger, and the girl is mine,’ said her nephew, whose quotations were apt to follow the line dictated by his immediate preoccupations.

‘The trouble will be to find some reasonable excuse for obtaining eye-witness’s information about the girl in question,’ said Mrs Bradley. ’There is no doubt now where she is.’

‘Where, then?’ asked Deborah, startled.

‘Cast your mind back to our first-night rag,’ Mrs Bradley replied. ‘I suppose they have a new lecturer in Science, or perhaps in Physical Training, at Wattsdown College. At any rate, I think that rag is now seen in its true perspective.’

‘But — ’ said Jonathan. His aunt silenced him by cackling and shaking her head. Then she locked away the College skeleton, picked up the Athelstan bones and led the way out. Her nephew relieved her of her burden, and the three of them went back to Athelstan.

‘Please tell me what you’re going to do during the holidays,’ said Deborah, before they parted.

‘I shall carry out my original plan of visiting Miss Murchan’s former school,’ said Mrs Bradley. She watched the car as far as the first bend, and then put through a long-distance call to the school at Cuddy Bay. It was the dress rehearsal of the Christmas play, she was informed. She arranged to go on the Monday, and ordered the car for one-fifteen.