Vanishing Point

CHAPTER 35

The house appeared to be in complete darkness. On either side of the passage running up to the front door the windows on both floors showed nothing. A narrow glass door on the left led from the passage into the garden. It was locked on the inside. Miss Silver producing a very serviceable torch from her coat pocket, the key was located and turned. Feeling a good deal like a burglar, Craig preceded her, and found himself on a gravel path between two banks of shrubs. Closing the door behind her, Miss Silver followed him. She extinguished the torch, put it back in her pocket, and began to walk along the path with as much composure as if she had been an invited guest.

At the corner of the house the path turned, the shrubbery widened out. A blackness of trees appeared behind it. There was still no light anywhere. The mass of the house towered over them like a cliff. Craig bent to say, “Do we go all the way round?” and could discern that she inclined her head.

It was at this moment that they heard the sound. It came from in front of them and to the left-the small crisp sound of a snapping twig. He felt Miss Silver’s hand on his arm, drawing him away from the path and towards the house. A couple of steps, and they stood amongst bushes, listening. Someone was coming through the shrubbery on the other side of the path. If it had not been for the snapped twig, they would all have come together a little farther on. Miss Silver stood motionless remembering the lie of the land. This wall of the house did not run straight back from front to rear. It broke, to form a small paved courtyard, rather damp and gloomy at this time of the year, and with what she considered an excessive number of creepers. She remembered an old magnolia, a good deal of Virginia creeper, and one or two dark cypresses growing far too close to the house.

Someone came out of the shrubbery on the left and entered the courtyard. Miss Silver’s hand came down with a warning pressure upon Craig’s wrist. Then, quite soundlessly, she was gone. He could be in no doubt but that he had been told to remain where he was-the clumsy man whose big feet would naturally betray him if he moved. Since he had served as a paratrooper and time and again risked more than his own life upon his silence, he could afford a private grin over that. Nevertheless he stood where he was, since it wasn’t his show, and in any event two people made more noise than one.

Time goes slowly in the dark. It goes slowly anywhere when you wait and wonder what is going on. When something stirred in the gloom ahead of him he stepped to meet it. Miss Silver’s hand came out and touched him. As he bent to her, she said in an almost soundless voice,

“Someone has just come from Crewe House and entered the Dower House by a concealed door. I believe that we should follow.”

“How do we get in?”

If it was breaking and entering, he was definitely prepared to put the male foot down and keep it there. In a good cause any woman would break any law with an unruffled conscience, but he was not prepared to celebrate his wedding by being arrested.

Miss Silver’s reply was lucid and succinct,

“She unlocked the door, but I did not hear her lock it again.”

He found a Gilbertian echo in his mind-“Who the deuce may she be?”

Lucy Cunningham? But why the melodramatic secret door?

Jenny? He wouldn’t put it past her. But how would she come by an illicit key?

It wouldn’t be either of these-oh, no. It would be Lydia Crewe. And that set such a danger signal ringing that he hadn’t a word to say.

Miss Silver kept her hand on his arm. The stones of the courtyard were damp and soft with moss. Where the added blackness of a tall cypress pressed against the dark wall of the house she stepped before him. Her hand groped, found what it felt for, and reaching back, invited him to follow. There was no more than room to pass. He scraped the wall and was buffeted by twigs and branches. There was a cold aromatic smell. And then they were in a narrow, a very narrow passage. He was to learn afterwards that it ran between two of the rooms. His shoulders touched it on either side. He wondered how many cobwebs he would collect before they were through. The place reeked of dust.

Ahead of them there was a line of light. It cut the darkness like an incandescent wire-as narrow and sharp as that. As they came up to it, he saw that there was a door-no, not a door, a sliding panel. Someone had gone through that way and pushed it to carelessly, leaving the shining crack. Where light can pass sound passes. Lydia Crewe’s deep, harsh voice spoke from beyond the panel.

“Really Henry-what a story! Lucy must be going off her head!”

It was Henry Cunningham who answered her. He sounded nervous and fretful.

“She says there was a string across the stairs. She said it nearly tripped her up. She thinks there was only Nicholas in the house-and me.”

Her voice came leaping at him, strong with anger.

“And I suppose you told her I was here!”

She must have made a move towards him. The chair grated as he pushed it back. The picture of a man who cowers from a blow flashed into Craig’s mind, but he didn’t think that the blow would have been a physical one. As the chair scraped, the nervous voice tripped over itself with hurry.

“No, no-of course I didn’t. I didn’t say a word. She doesn’t know you come. I’ve never told her that. Or anything.”

Lydia Crewe said,

“You’d better not. It would be the end if you did.”

“I don’t see why.”

“She knows too much already.”

“She doesn’t know anything from me.”

She said with impatience,

“What does it matter how she knows it! If she knows anything at all, it’s too dangerous!”

“I don’t know what you mean. What did you do last night? You went through into the house. What did you do? This story of Lucy’s-why should you try to trip her up?”

“Perhaps I thought she would be better out of circulation- for a time. Perhaps I thought it would be good for her to have a nice long rest.”

He must have stared at her, for she said with a scornful laugh,

“Don’t look at me like that! My dear Henry, you had really better leave all this to me. Keep your head in the sand and don’t ask questions. You are very good at your own job, and you had much better stick to it. Pack the Melbury rubies inside those disgusting spiders of yours, and we’ll get them out of the country under everyone’s very nose. Your Belgian correspondent is a godsend. He can give another lecture after a reasonable interval, and we can get the diamonds off too. It was those big rubies which were the bother. I give you marks for thinking of the spiders.”

He said, “Yes, yes,” in a peevish way. Then, with a sudden energy, “Why should you want to get Lucy out of the way?”

There was the sound of a chair being moved. It seemed Miss Crewe was tired of standing. She said in a conversational tone,

“I thought I told you not to ask questions.”

“I’ve got to ask this one.”

“Well then, here is your answer! And don’t blame me if you don’t like it. Lucy knows too much. She may know enough to ruin us.”

“What does she know?”

“Mrs. Bolder found that Holiday woman in my room on Sunday afternoon. She must have picked up an envelope there-a very important envelope. It came into Lucy’s hands afterwards, and she brought it back to me. Anyone who saw what was inside that envelope could ruin us all. Well, you know what Lucy is.”

Henry Cunningham’s voice said, “She is my sister.”

“She’s a babbling fool. She has only to open her mouth once and it’s the end for all of us.”

“Why should she open her mouth? She is your friend, isn’t she-she always has been?”

She made some quick movement.

“Henry, you are a fool! She wouldn’t do it purposely-I’m not saying that she would. I don’t suppose the Holiday woman took that envelope purposely. It must have slipped down the side of my chair. Mrs. Bolder found her poking about there, and I expect she had it in her hand and just stuffed it into a pocket.” She went on in a measured way. “Yes, that is what must have happened, because when Lucy met her at the bottom of the drive she was tugging to get her handkerchief out from under her coat, and the envelope came out too and fell down between them. Lucy picked it up, saw that it had my name on it, and said that she would take it up to the house and give it to me. Which she did. It was-” She paused and drew a long breath. “It was something of a shock.”

“Why?”

“If you must know, there was my first sketch of the Melbury necklace inside that envelope. I work to scale, but I make a rough sketch first. And that envelope was open. It was a used one, and I had pushed the sketch inside. Someone had come into the room-I think it was Rosamond. Just one silly accidental happening after another!”

“I don’t see what all that has got to do with Lucy.”

She said with an odd quietness,

“You never do see very much, do you? Now listen! The envelope was open. If Lucy took one look, just one look inside it-”

“She wouldn’t!”

“Are you prepared to gamble on that? I’m not! Have you ever thought about going to prison, Henry? You like wandering about-when you like, where you like-picking up your moths, your butterflies, your cocoons. That spider everybody thought was extinct-you got a lot of pleasure out of finding a couple of specimens and breeding from them, didn’t you? You like your easy life-no one to harry you, and nothing to do for it except a little of the one thing you really are good at. That is all that is asked of you, and it is all you need to know anything about.”

He said on a shuddering breath,

“Miss Holiday-”

“Well, Henry?”

“She’s dead-” Then, after a frightening pause, “Like Maggie-”

“Really, Henry-what a thing to say! Maggie got bored with Hazel Green and those exigeant parents, and went off, as no doubt she would have said, to better herself. As to Miss Holiday, she was always touched in the head, and I’m afraid she got the rough side of Mrs. Bolder’s tongue on Sunday. A very faithful creature, Mrs. Bolder, and properly scandalized at anyone poking about in my room. It was, of course, unfortunate that Miss Holiday should be upset to the point of committing suicide. Or was it? I wonder!”

“ Lydia -”

“My dear Henry, don’t you think you have asked enough questions? There is an excellent proverb about the shoemaker sticking to his last. You stick to your specimens! Miss Holiday committed suicide, and that is all there is to it.”