Poison in the Pen

CHAPTER 15

Randal March drew up at Willow Cottage at a little after half past three on the following afternoon, whereupon Miss Silver came out of the front door in her black cloth coat and the new hat which she had intended to wear for the wedding. After an unbroken succession of black felts trimmed with ribbon and little bunches of flowers it really was, as Ethel Burkett had declared, “Quite a change,” being more of a toque, and the material black velvet. Three pompons nestled against the crown, grey, black, and lavender. As they drove away, Randal said with an affectionate smile,

“Surely that is a new hat. I like those what-you-may-call-’ems at the side.”

Miss Silver experienced a glow of modest pleasure. She supplied the name.

“They are pompons.”

“Most becoming.”

From this promising opening they proceeded to solicitous enquiries from Miss Silver and a budget of family news on the part of Randal March. Isobel’s second girl was demanding to go on the stage. Margaret and her husband were going to run a chicken farm in Devonshire -“And how anyone can deliberately set out to get mixed up with hens is beyond me.”

Miss Silver confessed that she would not care about it herself, but added that Margaret always knew exactly what she wanted to do, and that once her mind was made up it was no use trying to stop her.*

“Obstinate as a mule,” said Randal March.

It was obvious that no serious business would be discussed while they were still upon the road. Arrived at the house, they were met by Rietta March. The beauty which had once been rather austere was now softened by happiness. Miss Silver recalled the lines which she had heard applied to her when they had first been thrown together-“A daughter of the gods, divinely tall-” Her favourite Lord Tennyson had completed them with “and most divinely fair,” but Rietta Cray was a dark goddess, and in those days a tragic one, since the shadow of murder had rested upon her and hers- a shadow which Miss Silver had been instrumental in lifting. [see *Miss Silver Comes to Stay.] She looked younger now than she had then, and there was a carnation bloom in her cheeks. She kissed Miss Silver warmly and enquired, “When would you like to talk-now or after tea?”

Randal March said,

“Now, I think. And I want to take her into the drawing-room. This has got to be just a social visit, and you never know how things will get round.”

“Very well, I’ll go up to the children. You can call when you are ready for me to come down.”

Miss Silver watched her go away from them up the stairs graceful and gracious in a dress of dark red wool, one of the chrysanthemum shades. Then Randal was taking her into a pleasant room with flowered chintzes and big jars of dahlias, golden rod, and Michaelmas daisy. Seating herself and looking about her with pleasure, she reflected upon the happy atmosphere which filled the house. Although she had disciplined herself very severely in the matter of having favourites amongst her pupils, there was no contesting the fact that Randal March had always had a very special place in her affections. He had been a spoilt, delicate little boy when she arrived to superintend the schoolroom which he shared with two elder sisters. Previous governesses had pronounced him unmanageable, and he was too delicate to be sent to school. After two years of a rule which had combined authority, interest, and beneficence the delicacy had been outgrown, and a deep and enduring respect had been implanted in his mind. When, many years afterwards, he encountered Miss Silver in her capacity as a private enquiry agent, the respect was enhanced and the lively affection of the little boy developed into the enduring friendship and affection of the man. It was the horrible affair of the Poisoned Caterpillars which brought them together, and he had been forward to maintain that she had saved his life. Since those days he had become, first Superintendent at Ledlington, and then Chief Constable of the county, and their paths had continued to cross. He leaned back now in one of the comfortable chintz-covered chairs and said,

“And how are you getting along at Tilling Green?” Miss Silver took a moment before she said soberly, “I do not know that I can answer that. I need not tell you that there is a great deal of talk about the death of Connie Brooke. I do not know how much of it will have reached you.”

“Let us assume that I haven’t heard any of it. I may have done so, or I may not, but I would like to have your angle.”

She repeated what Joyce Rodney had told her. Randal March looked thoughtful.

“So you think she knew something about the anonymous letters, went to the Vicar to tell him what she knew, and came away without doing it on the grounds that once she had said it she couldn’t take it back. What do you make of that?”

“That the person whom she suspected, or against whom she really had some evidence, was someone she knew and someone who could not be lightly accused.”

He nodded.

“Had you met the girl at all? How did she strike you?”

“I saw her at the rehearsal of Valentine Grey’s wedding. Miss Wayne asked me to accompany her. That, as you may know, was on Wednesday afternoon. In the evening the poor girl attended a party at the Manor from which she walked home across the Green with Miss Eccles who lives at Holly Cottage next door to Miss Wayne.”

“Yes, I have seen her statement. She says they separated there, and that Connie Brooke went on alone.”

“Yes, I believe I heard them say good-night to one another.”

“Oh, you did? That might be quite an important point, you know.”

“I would not like to swear to it, Randal. I was dropping off to sleep. It was just an impression.”

“I see. Well, you saw the girl at this wedding rehearsal on Wednesday. That would be after her visit to the Vicar?”

“The following afternoon.”

“How did she strike you?”

“She had been brought in as a substitute for a Miss Merridew who had developed German measles. Shyness, nervousness, or excitement would not have been surprising, but there was no evidence of any of them. The first thing I noticed was that she had been crying. Not within the last few hours, but at some time previous to that-probably during the night. The eyelids were still reddened, and there was some swelling. There had been an unskilful attempt to cover up these traces with powder. The rehearsal was rather a fiasco, the bridegroom having been delayed by an accident to the car in which the best man was driving him down. Those present at the rehearsal were all more or less affected by this delay. There was a general uneasiness, a disposition to fidget, to whisper. Connie Brooke just stood there. I had the impression that she hardly knew what was going on.”

“You think she had something on her mind?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“And that practically everyone in the village was aware of the fact?”

“I suppose most people would know that she had been to see Mr. Martin about the anonymous letters and had come away without telling him what she knew.”

He leaned forward to put a log of wood on the fire. A little shower of sparks flew up.

“That sort of secret could be a dangerous one to keep. You know, she had taken, or been given, a tremendously strong dose of that sleeping stuff. I’ve had the report on the postmortem. It wasn’t a case of an extra tablet and a weak heart or anything like that. She had had about twice as much as would have been necessary to kill her. Now a very large dose like that points to suicide. You can’t swallow a whole lot of tablets without knowing what you are doing.”

Miss Silver gave the slight cough with which she had been accustomed to call a class to order.

“You should, I think, be informed that Connie Brooke had a nervous inability to swallow anything in the form of a pill or tablet. Miss Eccles, Miss Wayne, and Mrs. Rodney having all told me this, I should think it unlikely that anyone in Tilling Green was ignorant on the point. Anything in the form of a tablet must therefore have been crushed and dissolved, probably in her bedtime cocoa.”

“She was in the habit of taking cocoa when she went to bed?”

“Certainly. She found that it helped her to sleep. It seems she told Miss Eccles whilst they were walking home across the Green on Wednesday night that she had left this cocoa all ready mixed in a saucepan so that it wouldn’t take her any time to heat it up. They talked about the tablets Miss Repton had given her, and she said she would dissolve them and put them into the cocoa. Miss Mettie said why couldn’t she just swallow them. She says they went on talking about it all across the Green, and she is very insistent that she told Connie on no account to take more than one tablet.”

“Yes, she put that in her statement. I wonder if she is speaking the truth.”

Miss Silver did not reply. When he realized that her silence was deliberate he spoke again.

“It is quite an easy thing to say. And it puts Miss Mettie Eccles in a very favourable light. Is she the sort of person who sees to it that the light is favourable?”

Miss Silver’s small, neat features were expressionless. She said in a noncommittal voice,

“I suppose, Randal, that most of us would place a certain value upon the impression made by our conduct in an emergency.”

“You mean we all like to stand well with each other.”

“And with the police, Randal.”

He frowned.

“How does Miss Eccles strike you?”

She met his look with one of bright intelligence.

“She is a busy person. She has a hand in everything that goes on in the village. Her connection with the Reptons gives her a certain standing.”

“A finger in every pie, and quite a lot to say as to how the pie is baked!”

“She is efficient. What she does is well done. She talks a great deal. She has decided opinions. Her house is very well kept, the garden neat and formal.”

He laughed.

“Well, I’ve met her, so I know what she looks like. Most women would have started off with that, but you left it out- I wonder why.”

She gave him her peculiarly charming smile.

“There is no mystery about it, my dear Randal. She told me that she had met you.”

“I see. Well, well-Now look here, either this girl melted down a large number of tablets in her cocoa, or someone else put the drug into the cocoa and either left it there hoping she would take it, or came in with her and persuaded her to do so. I find considerable difficulty in believing in either of these theories. As to the first, I don’t believe there were anything like so many tablets in that bottle Miss Repton gave her. I’ve seen Maggie Repton myself. I thought I should probably get more out of her than Crisp.”

“And did you?”

“Yes, I think I did. She’s the well-meaning, nervous kind- afraid to commit herself, afraid to be definite about anything. The kind who holds up a statement for half an hour while she tries to think whether something quite irrelevant took place at half a minute to seven or half a minute past. I spent quite a lot of time getting her sufficiently soothed down to say anything at all, and even then she qualified everything until neither of us knew where we were. But I did emerge with an impression-in fact you can say almost with a conviction-that there weren’t very many tablets in that bottle.”

“Indeed, Randal?”

He nodded.

“It sounds a bit vague, but then so is Maggie Repton.”

Miss Silver was looking at him.

“Would it be possible that she desired to give you that impression?”

“My dear Miss Silver, you simply can’t have Maggie Repton as a suspect.”

“You say that with a good deal of confidence.”

He laughed.

“Come now, what motive could she possibly have?”

She replied soberly.

“The person who wrote the letters would have a motive. If, in fact, Connie Brooke was deliberately removed, there could be only one possible motive for removing her, the fact that she knew, or guessed, the identity of the person who wrote the anonymous letters. The person, and that person alone, would have the necessary motive.”

“You are right about that of course. But Maggie Repton is an impossibility. She is the mildest, vaguest, and most blameless of women-the kind of stay-at-home daughter and sister who is rapidly becoming extinct. She nursed her parents, she kept house for her brother until he married-in fact I believe she still does so. The domestic arts are not much in Scilla Repton’s line.”

Miss Silver gave her slight deliberate cough.

“But do you not see that it is amongst just such people that the anonymous letter-writer is to be found? Too little occupied with their own affairs, having in fact no affairs with which to occupy themselves, too timid and ineffectual to express their own opinions-do you not see that it is to just such a person that the writing of an anonymous letter might appeal? It affords an opportunity for the release of concealed resentments, suppressed desires, the envy, the grudge which has been secretly cherished. There may, or may not, have been some specific sense of injury, but I believe that in most cases it is a feeling of inferiority or frustration which provides the background of these painful cases. As in so many other circumstances, it is only the first step which is hard to take. Once that has been taken, the vice grows rapidly. In a village the effect of each letter can be observed. A sense of power and importance comes to the writer, the letters become more numerous and more poisonous, the appetite grows with what it feeds upon. And then there comes the threat of discovery. A timid person does not suddenly become brave, but he or she may become desperate. Timidity may itself be the incentive to a crime. If Connie Brooke was in a position to ruin such a person, would not that provide a motive for her murder?”

The word had been skirted round, now it had been said. Miss Silver was reminded of poor Connie’s words, “Once I’ve told it, I can’t take it back.” They had been discussing the possibility of murder, but it had not been named until now.

Randal March threw out a hand.

“Of course everything you say is perfectly true, but-if you knew Miss Maggie-”

She said mildly,

“I do not wish you to think that I am accusing her. I am only anxious that in this matter there should be no one so privileged by place, position, or character, as to be withdrawn from the most careful scrutiny. In the case of Miss Repton, she has the background which I have suggested as a probable one, and she is known to have pressed a bottle of sleeping tablets on Connie Brooke. We do not know how many there were in the bottle, nor do we know whether anything was said as to the number it would be prudent to take. If it could be proved that there were only a few tablets, Miss Repton would be exonerated, since it would not have been possible for her to have left the Manor at any time during the evening. There is, in fact, plenty of evidence to show that she did not do so. It would not, therefore, have been possible for her to have tampered with the cocoa which Connie had left in readiness for her return.”

He said,

“Quite. And that brings us to the second of my two theories. As I have said, I don’t believe there were so many in that bottle. If there were, the girl could have committed suicide, but if there were not, then someone murdered her by putting a fatal dose of that stuff into her cocoa. Only just consider how appalling it must have tasted. How could the murderer have counted on her swallowing it? The natural reaction would have been to pour the cocoa away and make fresh.”

Miss Silver recalled a piece of gossip not really heeded at the time.

“Connie Brooke had an illness in her teens which practically destroyed her sense of taste and smell. I have known of such a case before. She would not, therefore, notice the taste of the drug, and this fact would be known to the person who murdered her. Even if she had been aware of an unpleasant taste, you must remember that she had intended to use what Miss Maggie had given her.”

He made an impatient movement.

“I’ve no doubt it would be known to everyone within a five-mile radius. No one can complain that there is a lack of possibilities. Anyone in the county could have done it, provided he could have got into the house. What have you got to say about that?”

“People are extremely careless about their keys. If anyone was planning to get into the house whilst Connie was out, a key might have been abstracted or a window unlatched.”

“A window?”

“I thought of that at once, Randal. If this girl was murdered, it was by someone whom she knew, someone who could have had a quite natural reason for coming to the house. You must remember that it was being used as a school. The older children would be there till four o’clock. In the bustle of their departure it would not be difficult to lock the back door and go away with the key or leave it hidden under a mat. It would be even simpler to contrive that a window should be left unlatched. Or, simplest of all, the person who desired to effect an entrance might have possessed a key which would open one of the doors of the Croft.”

“Do you know of anyone who had the opportunities you speak of?”

“Mrs. Rodney and I walked along to the Croft to fetch her little boy at four o’clock on Wednesday-”

“Are we to suspect Joyce Rodney?”

“I think not, though she certainly entered the house, as did also Miss Eccles who had undertaken to fetch a little girl whose parents live just outside Tilling Green. They are young people of the name of Black, and they had invited Miss Eccles to tea.”

He frowned.

“And Miss Eccles walked home with Connie Brooke after the party.”

“She walked with her as far as Holly Cottage, which is next door to Miss Wayne’s.”

“And you think, but you are not sure, that they said goodnight there. Even if they did, there wasn’t anything to prevent Miss Eccles changing her mind, was there? There wasn’t anything to prevent her saying, ‘Well, I’ll walk the rest of the way with you.’ She could have done just that, and then have gone in with her and found an opportunity of slipping those extra tablets into the cocoa. She would have had to have them all ready ground up, but of course the whole thing must have been very carefully planned. Here’s another possibility. I wonder whether Miss Eccles went to the party with Connie as well as returning from it. If she picked her up at the Croft, there might have been an opportunity for tampering with the cocoa then.”

“I think not, Randal. They did go together, but it was Connie who came to Holly Cottage to pick Miss Eccles up. I was in my room and saw them start. There is, of course, one very strong reason for exonerating Miss Eccles. It must have occurred to you that if it were she who was under suspicion, Connie would not have willingly undertaken to cross the Green with her both on her way to the party at the Manor and on the way back.”

“She might not have been able to help it.”

“That is true. It could all have been arranged before her suspicions came to a head. Once the arrangement had been made it would have been very difficult to alter it. And she would not know that part of her interview with Mr. Martin had been overheard and repeated all round the village.”

“In fact Miss Eccles remains a suspect.”

Miss Silver became slightly aloof.

“I have not said that I suspect her. I go no farther than to say that she had the opportunity.”

He nodded.

“As you say.” After a slight pause he continued. “There is something that I think you ought to know. The post office has been on the look-out for those poison-pen letters. Well, there were three of them posted in Ledlington on Wednesday. They were collected from a box in the High Street, and they were delivered in Tilling Green next morning. As you know, the envelopes are cheap white stuff, and the writing awkward.”

“Are you going to tell me to whom they were addressed?”

“Yes, I think so. Colonel Repton had one, the Vicar another, and a third was for Miss Valentine Grey.”

“Well, Randal?”

“I understand that the wedding has been put off.”

She inclined her head. He said,

“On account of Connie Brooke’s death? Or because of something in those letters? Or because Jason Leigh has come home?”

Miss Silver gazed at him. After what seemed like a deliberate silence she said,

“Mr. Gilbert Earle has returned to London.”

“Yes-we knew that. It may, or may not, be significant.”

“It has been remarked that he has neither written nor telephoned. The postman is naturally acquainted with his writing, and the two girls who work in the telephone exchange are familiar with his voice.”

“There are, in fact, no secrets in a village.”

“Very few, Randal.”

“Then perhaps you can tell me who went into Ledlington on Wednesday morning.”

Miss Silver considered.

“I went in myself on the ten o’clock bus. The wedding was next day, the rehearsal that afternoon, and Miss Wayne had decided to purchase a light pair of gloves. I accompanied her and-now let me see-Miss Eccles was also going in, and I think for the same purpose. We met in Ashley’s, where she was buying a blue evening scarf. Such a good shop. I always enjoy going there. We had quite a pleasant time. Miss Wayne met a number of friends.” She appeared to hesitate for a moment. “She also pointed out to me someone who was not a friend.”

“Are you being mysterious?”

She did not respond to his half laughing intonation, but said gravely,

“No, I am only trying to be accurate. The person pointed out to me was Mr. Barton, the occupant of Gale’s Cottage. He is Miss Wayne’s neighbour on the side nearer the village, and he attracts a good deal of local attention because he does his own housework and cooking and keeps his house locked up. He also keeps seven cats who accompany him on his nocturnal rambles. I believe he very seldom goes out in the day.”

“And he was in Ledlington on Wednesday morning? I presume without the cats.”

“Yes. Miss Wayne remarked on it as a most unusual occurrence.”

“And how did he strike you?”

“He is tall and thin, and his clothes are old and shabby. He has a listening look. I wondered if he was perhaps a little deaf.”

“I believe not.”

She said, “It is a look which elderly people sometimes have.”

“You had not seen him before?”

“Not by daylight. But perhaps I had better tell you that I did see him on Wednesday night.”

“At what time?”

“It was just after half past ten. I had put out my light and was opening the window, when I heard, first footsteps, and then the click of a gate. I leaned out a little and saw that it was the gate of Gale’s Cottage. Mr. Barton was standing by it. After a little he shut the gate again and went up to the door of the house, which is at the side. He switched on a torch and opened the door, allowing the beam to fall upon the threshold. Seven large cats entered the house, after which he went in himself and locked the door behind him.”

“I don’t wonder the village talks. It sounds like the Arabian Nights. Did you notice from which direction he came?”

“From the direction of the Croft. Two or three cars had just come out of the Manor Gate, and most of my attention was taken up with that side of the Green, but I heard the footsteps and the click of the gate.”

He frowned.

“Are you aware that quite a number of people at Tilling Green are firmly persuaded that Mr. Barton is the author of those anonymous letters?”

She said in her most restrained manner,

“They would naturally suspect a stranger and one whose way of life does not conform to the village pattern.”

“Has no one suggested him to you as a suspect?”

“My dear Randal, no one except Mrs. Rodney has mentioned the anonymous letters to me at all.”

“Well, I suppose that is natural. You are a stranger too, and this is a village affair. But they do suspect Barton, and if you saw him coming home at half past ten he could have been along at the Croft taking steps to silence Connie Brooke, though one would hardly expect a would-be murderer to pursue his nefarious purpose attended by a retinue of cats.”

Miss Silver said,

“Since it was his habit to go out with them at night, to leave them at home would attract more attention than to take them with him-always supposing that he was about some unlawful business.”

He laughed.

“Of which there is no proof! Let us return to your expedition with Miss Wayne to Ledlington on Wednesday morning. Were you together the whole time?”

“Oh, no. I found that Ashley’s had some extremely pretty wool. I bought enough to make a jumper and cardigan for my niece Ethel Burkett for Christmas-a really charming shade of red. And then I had the great pleasure of meeting dear Mrs. Jerningham.”

Old memories rose between them. There had been a time when Lisle Jerningham had stood on the very edge of death and these two had watched her. Randal March said,

“She’s a lovely creature and Rafe is a good chap. They are very happy now. But to get back to these Tilling people. As far as I can make out from the bus drivers there were quite a lot of them in Ledlington on Wednesday morning. Odd thing human nature. With all the other days of the week to choose from, they make a bee line for Wednesday because it is early closing, so the shops and the buses are packed. The herd instinct, I suppose. A string of Tilling people as long as your arm were in Ledlington that morning. The Reverend Thomas Martin was there. Roger Repton was there, and his decorative wife, and his sister Maggie. Valentine Grey was there, and a girl who was going to be one of her bridesmaids, Daphne Hollis. And Miss Mettie Eccles and at least a dozen others. I don’t hail from Tilling myself, but I was in Ledlington on Wednesday morning and so was Rietta, and I saw quite a number of Tilling faces. And every single one of those people could have posted those three letters.” Miss Silver was silent for a moment, then she said, “What do the people who received the letters say?”

“Tommy Martin says yes, he got a letter. No, he couldn’t tell me what was in it. Not exactly secrets of the confessional, but getting on that way. It wouldn’t be any help if he told me, and anyhow he wasn’t going to. Valentine Grey flushed up and turned pale. Then she said she had had a nasty letter and she had put it in the fire, and she didn’t want to talk about it. Things like it being her duty to help the police just rolled off. I don’t know whether you-” She shook her head.

“I have not even met her. There would have to be some natural opportunity.”

“Something might be contrived. So far it’s no more than one might have expected-a parson in his office, a girl and her secrets. But when you come to the third letter, there’s something odd. The postman says he delivered it, but Roger Repton says it never reached him.”