Miss Silver Deals With Death

CHAPTER 28

In the Willards’ flat husband and wife looked at each other. Sergeant Curtis had come and gone. His brisk, efficient manner, his notebook with its carefully sharpened pencil, his dark tweed suit and horn-rimmed glasses, were interposed between the moment when Mr. Willard had seen the blood on Mrs. Willard’s sleeve and the moment when the door had been briskly and efficiently shut and they were alone again.

Alone with the width of the room between them. Mr. Willard had receded until he stood against the sitting-room door. Mrs. Willard sat by the writing-table with her hands in her lap. In this position the stain on her sleeve was hidden, but Alfred Willard knew that it was there. He was shaking from head to foot as he leaned against the door and said,

“Take off that dress, Amelia!”

Mrs. Willard said, “Why?”

“Don’t you know why?”

“No, Alfred.”

His shaking increased. How she could sit there and look at him-how she could sit there at all! That the stained sleeve had been touching him when he knelt before her with his head in her lap made him feel actually and physically sick. He said in a desperate whisper,

“It’s stained, Amelia-it’s stained-it’s got blood on it- didn’t you know?”

Mrs. Willard didn’t speak or move for a moment. Then she turned her arm and looked at the stain with an expression of distaste. After about half a minute had gone by she got up and began to walk slowly in the direction of the bedroom.

Still in that whispering voice, Mr. Willard said,

“Where are you going?”

“To change my dress.”

“Is that all-you’ve got to say?”

There was a door between the bedroom and the sitting-room. Mrs. Willard stopped on the threshold and said without turning round,

“Yes, I think so. I’m too tired to talk.”

The door shut behind her. Mr. Willard sat down on the couch and burst into tears.

Presently when he went into the bathroom to wash his face he saw that Mrs. Willard had left her dress soaking in the basin. The water was horribly tinged. With an extreme effort he overcame the nausea which threatened him and pulled out the plug. The stained water ran away, the dress settled in a sodden mass.

He ran in more water, and rinsed the dress. When the water ran clear he wrung it out and folded it in the small cupboard through which the hot water pipe ran, removing his own and his wife’s towels in order to make room for it.

When he had finished he opened the bedroom door and looked in. The pink curtains were drawn. By the light that came in through the door he could see that Mrs. Willard was lying on her bed. She had pulled back the coverlet, which lay trailing on the floor, but she had not troubled to turn down the bedclothes or to undress herself. She lay outside the bed, covered by the rosy eiderdown, her grey hair tumbled on the pillow, her hands tucked together under her chin, her eyelids closed, her breathing deep and natural.

Mr. Willard stood and looked at her with an extraordinary mixture of feelings, trivial and profound. She had done murder for him. Few husbands are as dearly loved as that. She shouldn’t let the coverlet trail on the floor. It was careless, very careless. Pink was a delicate colour. Recollection of the tinged water flooded his mind and sickened it. She was a murderess-Amelia. He had never been in a room with a murderess before. He had been married to Amelia for twenty years. Suppose the police found out and took her away… Suppose… Mrs. Willard slept peacefully.