The Girl in the Cellar

CHAPTER 13

Jim Fancourt leaned forward suddenly.

‘We’ll have to try and find the house.’

Miss Silver looked at him.

‘I can’t see any other way,’ he said.

‘How do you propose to find it?’

He began to speak, not as if he was talking to her, but rather as if he was thinking aloud.

‘If it’s an empty house it won’t be so difficult. To be used for a murder like that, the house would either be empty or the people would be away-or else they’d be the tenants, I don’t think that’s so very likely. No, I should think it lay between the first two-either a dead empty house, or one where the people are away. Yes, that’ll be it.’ He changed his tone and spoke directly to Miss Silver. ‘I’ve been down to the people Anne stayed with-or rather she didn’t stay with them. I didn’t like to send her straight to my aunts in case of their not being able to have her. They might have been away, or something like that. So I gave her the address of an old parlourmaid who lets rooms. She was to go there, forward my letter to Lilian, and wait for an answer. Well, she did that-at least she did part of it. She didn’t stay there. She must have posted my letter to Lilian, and she called for the answer. At least someone called for it on the morning of the day that you saw Anne in the bus. That Anne reached Haleycott the same evening. The real Anne was murdered between the time she fetched the letter and the time that the other Anne stumbled on her in the cellar of that house.’

Miss Silver said, ‘Dear me!’ Then she said, ‘Do you think that it was the real Anne who fetched the letter?’

‘I don’t know. It might have been-it might not. Mrs Birdstock is short-sighted, and it was a dark morning. She says the lady rang the bell and said she was Mrs Fancourt. Was there a letter for her, please? She was expecting one. Mrs Birdstock says she did have a good look at her then, but she was standing with her back to the light and she couldn’t make much of it. She says she was young and quite pretty, and it never entered her head that there was anything wrong, so she gave her the letter. She says the young lady opened it and read it then and there, and when Mrs Birdstock asked her if there was anything she could do for her she just said no, thank you, she would be going straight down to Haleycott, and that was all. She went away with the letter which was found in Anne’s bag. And whether she was really Anne or not, no one knows. If she was, why didn’t she go straight to Mrs Birdstock and stay there until she heard from Lilian, which was what she had been told to do? She hadn’t done that, you know. You have to allow three days to get an answer to a letter from London. If she wrote to Haleycott one day, Lilian would get it the next day, and if she wrote at once in reply-well, you see how it goes.’

Miss Silver said, ‘Yes.’

‘Then there’s another thing. The letter Lilian wrote was found in her bag. The girl who called on Mrs Birdstock hadn’t a bag at all. When she had read the letter she put it in the pocket of her coat. She hadn’t got a bag. Mrs Birdstock noticed that most particularly. She may not have been Anne at all. But if she wasn’t, who was she? Someone who was sent to get that letter? I don’t know, you don’t know, nobody knows. There’s no sense in it.’

Miss Silver put the pink shawl into a knitting-bag which she had placed on the lower shelf of the table beside her. All her movements were without fuss or hurry. When she had disposed of the bag she said, ‘I will put on my hat and coat. We will see whether we can identify the house.’

She came back into the room a few minutes later in the black coat and the fur tippet which Anne had described. She wore black thread gloves and a neat pair of black Oxford shoes, but instead of the hat with the red roses she was wearing a very similar shape with a bow of black ribbon on one side and a bunch of small mixed flowers upon the other.

As they went on their way she was thinking intently of her interview with Anne. When she had entered the bus Anne was already sitting on the opposite side of it with a lost look which had immediately attracted her attention. She had no idea how long she had been sitting there. There was no means of knowing.

They rode for one more street, and then Miss Silver got out. When Jim Fancourt had followed her, they were standing at the corner. She turned to him and said, ‘It may be this street. We have no means of knowing.’

‘She might have crossed over. The road we want may be on the other side.’

Miss Silver shook her head.

‘I do not think it likely. She was not in a state to do anything except what was obvious. I think she would have reached the main road and got onto the first bus that came along. She was in a dazed condition and faint with hunger.’

He said, ‘Why?’ his voice angry.

‘I do not know. It was certainly hours since she had eaten.’

They began to walk down the street. They walked all down one side and up the other. There was no house to let or with the appearance of being unoccupied. It was the next turning which held out the first hope. Half-way down it there stood an unmistakably empty house. There was a board up which said ‘Briggs & Co.’ and the address on the board was round the corner on the main road.

Miss Silver strolled on the opposite side whilst Jim Fancourt went for the key. He came back accompanied by a golden-haired young man with a ready tongue.

‘The late Miss Kentish’s house,’ he explained. ‘The family have left the furniture here for the time being. It is a most comfortable residence and has been well looked after. Very particular Miss Kentish was. How many bedrooms did you want, madam? Five or six? You would, I think, find the accommodation just what you require. Of course a house does not show at its best when it has been shut up for six months-you will quite appreciate that, I am sure.’ He put a key in the door, turned it, and the cold, still air of the house came to meet them.

Jim Fancourt had cause to think of Miss Silver with gratitude. She was so perfectly at her ease. She produced a pencil and paper and took notes. She brimmed over with the right questions and took down the answers so readily supplied by the golden-haired young man.

They went all over the house and found nothing at all until they came back to the empty echoing hall. There Miss Silver lingered.

‘The kitchen-’ she said. ‘The friend who told me about the house mentioned it particularly. I hope it is on the ground floor. I do not like basement kitchens at all, and I am afraid-’

The young man broke in brightly.

‘Ah, madam, your views are exactly the same as those of the late Miss Kentish. She had a horror of a basement, and built out at the back.’

He led the way. The kitchen was neat and spotless. Having viewed it and the scullery, they came back again to the hall. It was dark there. Jim Fancourt moved restlessly. The young man continued to speak of the convenience, the comfort, the good furnishing of the house. ‘I am sure you would find it just what you want,’ he was saying, when Jim broke in.

‘I should like to see the cellar.’

‘Oh, of course-of course,’ said the young man. ‘But I’m afraid there is no lighting. Miss Kentish did not use it, so omitted to install the electric light.’

He went past them and opened a door. It was not easily seen. There was a screen which had to be pushed away. A table stood close in to it. The young man from the office found himself tried, but he continued with his role of persevering politeness.

‘There is nothing here,’ he said, ’but it would of course make a capital place for the storage of heavy luggage.’

Jim said, ‘I should like to go down. I have a torch. There is no need for you to bother.’ He produced from his pocket a small but powerful torch and turned it on.

Miss Silver stepped after him into the open door. The voice of the young man followed them as they descended the steps.

‘There is really nothing down there-nothing at all.’

They took no notice of him. Miss Silver came down slowly. She had made no picture of what she expected to see. What she did see in the concentrated torch-light was a clean, bare floor at the foot of the steps. It was quite clean, quite bare.

It was too clean, too bare.

The house was clean. The bright young man had laid stress on that. A woman came once a week to open the windows and to dust. Miss Silver thought she must be a prodigy unique amongst charwomen if she descended into the cellar and extended her ministrations to its floor.

The cellar was entirely empty except for two or three boards which leaned against the wall on the far side. Jim Fancourt stood in the middle of the bare floor space and shone his light upon it. There was a dead silence. Then he pushed the torch into Miss Silver’s hand and went to move the clutter of old boards against the wall. There was nothing behind them-no gap in the wall, no door. But on Miss Silver’s exclamation he turned round to her and saw that she was pointing. A small bright bead lay on the floor where the dust behind the boards had not been cleared. There was thick dust, and that small bright bead no larger than a pea. He stooped to pick it up and stood there, the bead in his hand and the light of the torch upon it.

Miss Silver spoke in a low voice.

‘Why is it not dusty like the floor?’

Jim Fancourt frowned. The small bead lay on his palm. There was no dust on it. He moved his hand, and the bead on the palm moved. He did not speak, but he stooped down and touched the floor outside the space where the boards had been piled. There was no dust outside, no dust at all. Under the shelter of the boards which he had just moved there was a soft thick layer which spoke of years of neglect. But the bead itself was clean. The months or years during which the dust had gathered had not troubled its brightness. If it had lain there for those months or years, the dust would have silted into it and over it and through it. It had lain there no more than a few days. It was a witness. His mind went back to Anne as he had seen her just before she stepped into the plane and left him. She had about her neck a chain of little beads like this one. He put the bead away in his pocket.

As they came up the cellar steps Miss Silver did all the talking. She thanked the young man and said they would have to ask the lady for whom they were acting.

‘Oh, no, it is not for ourselves. We shall have to let my sister know, but I am afraid the house may be a little too large for her, and she did not really wish to take a furnished house.’

‘The furniture could be removed,’ said the young man with bright hopefulness.

‘Ah, well. I will let you know if she thinks that this will suit her, but I am very much afraid-’

When the young man had taken his departure they walked on to the far end of the road in silence. As they turned to come back Miss Silver spoke.

‘You recognise the bead?’

‘Yes.’

‘It was Anne’s?’

‘Yes.’

He walked beside her in silence until they came to the house again. Then he said, ‘The bead was from a necklace she wore. She wore it always. This means that the other Anne’s story is true-not just a dream or anything like that. She did see a girl’s dead body in that cellar. It doesn’t just rest on the bag any more. This bead is Russian. Anne was wearing a Russian necklace-don’t you see-don’t you see-’

Miss Silver said, ‘Yes, I see.’