The Sittaford Mystery

Chapter 2 The Message

After tea, Mrs Willett suggested bridge.

‘There are six of us. Two can cut in.’

Ronnie’s eyes brightened.

‘You four start,’ he suggested. ‘Miss Willett and I will cut in.’

But Mr Duke said that he did not play bridge.

Ronnie’s face fell.

‘We might play a round game,’ said Mrs Willett.

‘Or table-turning,’ suggested Ronnie. ‘It’s a spooky evening. We spoke about it the other day, you remember. Mr Rycroft and I were talking about it this evening as we came along here.’

‘I am a member of the Psychical Research Society,’ explained Mr Rycroft in his precise way. ‘I was able to put my young friend right on one or two points.’

‘Tommy rot,’ said Major Burnaby very distinctly.

‘Oh! but it’s great fun, don’t you think?’ said Violet Willett. ‘I mean, one doesn’t believe in it or anything. It’s just an amusement. What do you say, Mr Duke?’

‘Anything you like, Miss Willett.’

‘We must turn the lights out, and we must find a suitable table. No—not that one, Mother. I’m sure it’s much too heavy.’

Things were settled at last to everyone’s satisfaction. A small round table with a polished top was brought from an adjoining room. It was set in front of the fire and everyone took his place round it with the lights switched off.

Major Burnaby was between his hostess and Violet. On the other side of the girl was Ronnie Garfield. A cynical smile creased the Major’s lips. He thought to himself:

‘In my young days it was Up Jenkins.’ And he tried to recall the name of a girl with fluffy hair whose hand he had held beneath the table at considerable length. A long time ago that was. But Up Jenkins had been a good game.

There were all the usual laughs, whispers, stereotyped remarks.

‘The spirits are a long time.’

‘Got a long way to come.’

‘Hush—nothing will happen unless we are serious.’

‘Oh! do be quiet—everyone.’

‘Nothing’s happening.’

‘Of course not—it never does at first.’

‘If only you’d all be quiet.’

At last, after some time, the murmur of talk died away.

A silence.

‘This table’s dead as mutton,’ murmured Ronnie Garfield disgustedly.

‘Hush.’

A tremor ran through the polished surface. The table began to rock.

‘Ask it questions. Who shall ask? You, Ronnie.’

‘Oh—er—I say—what do I ask it?’

‘Is a spirit present?’ prompted Violet.

‘Oh! Hullo—is a spirit present?’

A sharp rock.

‘That means yes,’ said Violet.

‘Oh! er—who are you?’

No response.

‘Ask it to spell its name.’

The table started rocking violently.

‘A B C D E F G H I—I say, was that I or J?’

‘Ask it. Was that I?’

One rock.

‘Yes. Next letter, please.’

The spirit’s name was Ida.

‘Have you a message for anyone here?’

‘Yes.’

‘Who is it for? Miss Willett?’

‘No.’

‘Mrs Willett?’

‘No.’

‘Mr Rycroft?’

‘No.’

‘Me?’

‘Yes.’

‘It’s for you, Ronnie. Go on. Make it spell it out.’

The table spelt ‘Diana’.

‘Who’s Diana? Do you know anyone called Diana?’

‘No, I don’t. At least—’

‘There you are. He does.’

‘Ask her if she’s a widow?’

The fun went on. Mr Rycroft smiled indulgently. Young people must have their jokes. He caught one glance of his hostess’s face in a sudden flicker of the firelight. It looked worried and abstracted. Her thoughts were somewhere far away.

Major Burnaby was thinking of the snow. It was going to snow again this evening. Hardest winter he ever remembered.

Mr Duke was playing very seriously. The spirits, alas, paid very little attention to him. All the messages seemed to be for Violet and Ronnie.

Violet was told she was going to Italy. Someone was going with her. Not a woman. A man. His name was Leonard.

More laughter. The table spelt the name of the town. A Russian jumble of letters—not in the least Italian.

The usual accusations were levelled.

‘Look here, Violet,’ (‘Miss Willett’ had been dropped) ‘you are shoving.’

‘I’m not. Look, I take my hands right off the table and it rocks just the same.’

‘I like raps. I’m going to ask it to rap. Loud ones.’

‘There should be raps.’ Ronnie turned to Mr Rycroft. ‘There ought to be raps, oughtn’t there, sir?’

‘Under the circumstances, I should hardly think it likely,’ said Mr Rycroft drily.

There was a pause. The table was inert. It returned no answer to questions.

‘Has Ida gone away?’

One languid rock.

‘Will another spirit come, please?’

Nothing. Suddenly the table began to quiver and rock violently.

‘Hurrah. Are you a new spirit?’

‘Yes.’

‘Have you a message for someone?’

‘Yes.’

‘For me?’

‘No.’

‘For Violet?’

‘No.’

‘For Major Burnaby?’

‘Yes.’

‘It’s for you, Major Burnaby. Will you spell it out, please?’

The table started rocking slowly.

‘T R E V—are you sure it’s V? It can’t be. T R E V—it doesn’t make sense.’

‘Trevelyan, of course,’ said Mrs Willett. ‘Captain Trevelyan.’

‘Do you mean Captain Trevelyan?’

‘Yes.’

‘You’ve got a message for Captain Trevelyan?’

‘No.’

‘Well, what is it then?’

The table began to rock—slowly, rhythmically. So slowly that it was easy to count the letters.

‘D—’ a pause. ‘E—AD.’

‘Dead.’

‘Somebody is dead?’

Instead of Yes or No, the table began to rock again till it reached the letter T.

‘T—do you mean Trevelyan?’

‘Yes.’

‘You don’t mean Trevelyan is dead?’

‘Yes.’

A very sharp rock. ‘Yes.’

Somebody gasped. There was a faint stir all round the table.

Ronnie’s voice as he resumed his questions held a different note—an awed uneasy note.

‘You mean—that Captain Trevelyan is dead?’

‘Yes.’

There was a pause. It was as though no one knew what to ask next, or how to take this unexpected development.

And in the pause, the table started rocking again.

Rhythmically and slowly, Ronnie spelled out the letters aloud…

M-U-R-D-E-R…

Mrs Willett gave a cry and took her hands off the table.

‘I won’t go on with this. It’s horrible. I don’t like it.’

Mr Duke’s voice rang out, resonant and clear. He was questioning the table.

‘Do you mean—that Captain Trevelyan has been murdered?’

The last word had hardly left his lips when the answer came. The table rocked so violently and assertively that it nearly fell over. One rock only.

‘Yes…’

‘Look here,’ said Ronnie. He took his hands from the table. ‘I call this a rotten joke.’ His voice trembled.

‘Turn up the lights,’ said Mr Rycroft.

Major Burnaby rose and did so. The sudden glare revealed a company of pale uneasy faces.

Everyone looked at each other. Somehow—nobody quite knew what to say.

‘All rot, of course,’ said Ronnie with an uneasy laugh.

‘Silly nonsense,’ said Mrs Willett. ‘Nobody ought to—to make jokes like that.’

‘Not about people dying,’ said Violet. ‘It’s—oh! I don’t like it.’

‘I wasn’t shoving,’ said Ronnie, feeling unspoken criticism levelled at him. ‘I swear I wasn’t.’

‘I can say the same,’ said Mr Duke. ‘And you, Mr Rycroft?’

‘Certainly not,’ said Mr Rycroft warmly.

‘You don’t think I’d make a joke of that kind, do you?’ growled Major Burnaby. ‘Rotten bad taste.’

‘Violet dear—’

‘I didn’t, Mother. Indeed, I didn’t. I wouldn’t do such a thing.’

The girl was almost tearful.

Everyone was embarrassed. A sudden blight had come over the cheerful party.

Major Burnaby pushed back his chair, went to the window and pulled aside the curtain. He stood there looking out with his back to the room.

‘Twenty-five minutes past five,’ said Mr Rycroft glancing up at the clock. He compared it with his own watch and somehow everyone felt the action was significant in some way.

‘Let me see,’ said Mrs Willett with forced cheerfulness. ‘I think we’d better have cocktails. Will you ring the bell, Mr Garfield?’

Ronnie obeyed.

Ingredients for cocktails were brought and Ronnie was appointed mixer. The situation grew a little easier.

‘Well,’ said Ronnie, raising his glass. ‘Here’s how.’

The others responded—all but the silent figure by the window.

‘Major Burnaby. Here’s your cocktail.’

The Major roused himself with a start. He turned slowly.

‘Thank you, Mrs Willett. Not for me.’ He looked once more out into the night, then came slowly back to the group by the fire. ‘Many thanks for a very pleasant time. Good night.’

‘You’re not going?’

‘Afraid I must.’

‘Not so soon. And on a night like this.’

‘Sorry, Mrs Willett—but it’s got to be done. If there were only a telephone.’

‘A telephone?’

‘Yes—to tell you the truth—I’m—well. I’d like to be sure that Joe Trevelyan’s all right. Silly superstition and all that—but there it is. Naturally, I don’t believe in this tommy rot—but—’

‘But you can’t telephone from anywhere. There’s not such a thing in Sittaford.’

‘That’s just it. As I can’t telephone, I’ll have to go.’

‘Go—but you couldn’t get a car down that road! Elmer wouldn’t take his car out on such a night.’

Elmer was the proprietor of the sole car in the place, an aged Ford, hired at a handsome price by those who wished to go into Exhampton.

‘No, no—car’s out of the question. My two legs will take me there, Mrs Willett.’

There was a chorus of protest.

‘Oh! Major Burnaby—it’s impossible. You said yourself it was going to snow.’

‘Not for an hour—perhaps longer. I’ll get there, never fear.’

‘Oh! you can’t. We can’t allow it.’

She was seriously disturbed and upset.

But argument and entreaty had no more effect on Major Burnaby than if he were a rock. He was an obstinate man. Once his mind was made up on any point, no power on earth could move him.

He had determined to walk to Exhampton and see for himself that all was well with his old friend, and he repeated that simple statement half a dozen times.

In the end they were brought to realize that he meant it. He wrapped himself up in his overcoat, lighted the hurricane lantern, and stepped out into the night.

‘I’ll just drop in to my place for a flask,’ he said cheerily, ‘and then push straight on. Trevelyan will put me up for the night when I get there. Ridiculous fuss, I know. Everything sure to be all right. Don’t worry, Mrs Willett. Snow or no snow—I’ll get there in a couple of hours. Good night.’

He strode away. The others returned to the fire.

Rycroft had looked up at the sky.

‘It is going to snow,’ he murmured to Mr Duke. ‘And it will begin long before he gets to Exhampton. I—I hope he gets there all right.’

Duke frowned.

‘I know. I feel I ought to have gone with him. One of us ought to have done so.’

‘Most distressing,’ Mrs Willett was saying, ‘most distressing. Violet, I will not have that silly game ever played again. Poor Major Burnaby will probably plunge into a snowdrift—or if he doesn’t he’ll die of the cold and exposure. At his age, too. Very foolish of him to go off like that. Of course, Captain Trevelyan is perfectly all right.’

Everyone echoed:

‘Of course.’

But even now they did not feel really too comfortable.

Supposing something had happened to Captain Trevelyan…

Supposing…