The Case Is Closed

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Miss Silver looked up from her copybook with an air of bright helpfulness.

‘Ah yes – to be sure. I have some information for you, Captain Cunningham. I have not seen you since it came in.’

‘Yes?’ said Henry.

Miss Silver leaned across the table and picked up the half finished infant’s coatee and the ball of pale blue wool. Then she sat back in her chair and began to knit.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I put a small advertisement in the paper. It is so fortunate that Mrs. Mercer should have had an uncommon name like Anketell. One could feel practically sure that there would not be more than one Louisa Kezia Anketell, or at least not more than one in the same generation. These peculiar names generally run in a family. My own second name is Hephzibah – most unsuitable with Maud, but there has been a Hephzibah in our family for at least two hundred years.’ She coughed. ‘I have wandered from the point – I apologise.’ She clicked a needle out and clicked it in again. ‘To resume – I interviewed a woman yesterday who says she is a cousin of Mrs. Mercer’s. She wrote in answer to the advertisement, and I called upon her in Wood Green. Her name was Sarah Anketell -not a very pleasant person, but, I think, truthful. She seemed to have some kind of grudge against her cousin, but I can see no reason to doubt what she told me.’

‘And what did she tell you?’ said Hilary.

‘Well, to begin with she said that Louie, as she called her, had always thought more of herself than there was any need for – I give you the vulgarism, as it conveys the woman’s frame of mind. Louie, she said, was very high in her notions, and thought herself better than those that were every bit as good as herself – a good deal of animus here, and a good deal of pleasure in informing me that pride had gone before a fall, and that Louie, with all her fine ways and her fine talk, had got herself into trouble. There was a baby, but Mrs. Akers said it did not live.’

‘Oh,’ said Hilary, ‘that’s why she minded so much about Marion losing her baby.’

Miss Silver looked up, and down again -an odd fleeting look. ‘The man’s Christian name was Alfred. Mrs. Akers did not know his surname. He may have been Alfred Mercer or he may not. Well, thirty years ago a young woman who had lost her character had very little hope indeed of ever getting another place. Louisa Anketell was considered very fortunate in attracting the sympathy and interest of a lady who was willing to give her a second chance. This lady heard Louisa’s story whilst visiting in the neighbourhood. She had a kind heart and considerable means, and when she went away she took the girl with her to be trained under her cook. Sarah Anketell saw no more of her cousin, and knew nothing except by hearsay. She believed that Louie rose to be cook, and stayed on in the same service for a number of years, in fact until the lady’s death. This may not seem very important to you, Captain Cunningham. I myself was inclined to be disappointed, but just at the end it occurred to me to ask Mrs. Akers whether she knew the lady’s name. She did, and when she repeated it to me I felt very amply rewarded.’

Hilary said, ‘Oh – ’ and Henry said quickly, ‘What was the name?’

Miss Silver allowed her knitting to fall into her lap.

‘The name was Everton – Mrs. Bertram Everton.’

‘What!’ said Henry. Then, after a moment of stupefaction, ‘Who – I mean what? I mean, Bertie Everton isn’t married.’

‘Thirty years ago!’ gasped Hilary – “Bertie’s mother -Aunt Henrietta – the one that brought the red hair into the family!’

‘Exactly,’ said Miss Silver.

‘Was anything known about this?’ said Henry after a pause spent in dotting I’s and crossing T’s. ‘Hilary, did Marion know that this Mercer woman had been in service with the Everton family before she came to James Everton?’

Hilary looked bewildered.

‘She never said.’

Miss Silver glanced from one to the other.

‘A connection between Mrs. Mercer and Bertie Everton’s family, especially one of old and long standing, must surely have been mentioned at the time of the trial – if it had been acknowledged. If it was not mentioned, it must have been because it was not known.’

‘But look here, Miss Silver,’ said Henry – ‘how could it have not been known? If this Louisa Anketell Mercer woman was his brother’s cook for years, James Everton must have known her by sight.’

‘That is a point, Captain Cunningham. But a cook in a big house might never be seen by a visitor.’

‘But he wasn’t!’ cried Hilary. ‘I mean he wasn’t a visitor – I mean James Everton wasn’t! Marion told me. He had a frightful row with his brother Bertram because they both wanted to marry Henrietta, and James never went there, or saw them, or anything.’

‘That certainly makes things easier,’ said Miss Silver. ‘I think we may assume that Mrs. Mercer concealed her previous connection with the Everton family. She may have done so because she felt that it would be no recommendation, or – there may have been a more sinister reason. We are bound to give weight to the fact that her employer’s nephew Bertie Everton instead of being a complete stranger to her was someone whom she had seen grow up from childhood and to whose mother she owed a deep debt of gratitude.’

‘That’s all very well,’ said Henry. ‘But debt of gratitude or no debt of gratitude, are you going to tell me that Mrs. Mercer perjured herself and swore away a perfectly innocent man’s life just because she’d once been cook to the real murderer’s mother? I take it that you are now casting Bertie Everton for the part of the murderer. Hilary, of course, is quite sure he did it, but then she doesn’t bother about evidence – I suppose you do.’

‘A good deal of evidence will be necessary, Captain Cunningham, if Mr. Geoffrey Grey is to be got out of prison. I am not assuming that Mr. Bertie Everton was the murderer. I have merely suggested that you and Miss Hilary should check up that very useful alibi of his.’

‘You say you are not assuming that Bertie Everton was the murderer -and unless his alibi breaks down he couldn’t have been, because he simply wasn’t within four hundred miles of Putney when James Everton was shot. But suppose his alibi was a fake and he did shoot his uncle, do you mean to say that a poor frightened creature like Mrs. Mercer would instantly on the spur of the moment invent a story which incriminates Geoffrey Grey and, what’s more, stick to it under cross-examination?’

‘I didn’t say anything about the spur of the moment,’ said Miss Silver gravely. ‘The murder of Mr. Everton was very carefully planned. Observe that Alfred Mercer married Louisa Anketell the following day. Notice must have been given of that marriage. I believe it was part of the plan, and was at once a bribe and a safeguard. Observe also the deaf woman who was invited to supper. Her evidence cleared the Mercers as, I believe, it was intended to do, and her deafness made it certain that she would not know at what hour the shot was really fired. Everything about this case points to systematic timing, and a very careful consideration of detail. The person who planned this murder is extremely ruthless, ingenious, and cunning. I shall be very glad to feel that Miss Carew is at a safe distance during the next few critical days.’

‘You really think she is in danger?’ said Henry.

‘What is your own opinion, Captain Cunningham?’

Hilary shivered, and quite suddenly Henry’s opinion was that he would like to fly away with her in an aeroplane to the Mountains of the Moon. And on the top of that he remembered the foggy Ledstow road and his feet were cold. He said nothing, and Miss Silver said.

‘Exactly, Captain Cunningham.’

Hilary shivered again.

‘I keep thinking about Mrs. Mercer,’ she said. ‘She’s afraid -she’s awfully afraid of him. That’s why she wouldn’t speak to me last night. Do you think it’s safe for her – in that cottage – all alone with him?’

‘I think she is in very great danger,’ said Miss Silver.