“Why should there have been a plan of that kind? To put it bluntly, why should Mr. Craddock desire to make away with Miss Ball? You see, this theory of yours would implicate him up to the hilt. The Miss Tremletts, Miranda, and Augustus Remington and the stationmaster are one thing-Craddock is quite another. Whoever was deceived, he couldn’t have been. If the girl he saw off at Dedham wasn’t Anna Ball, he must have known that she wasn’t.”
“Certainly he must have known it.”
“Well then, we’re back at the question of motive. Why the play-acting? Why any of it?”
“Yes-that is what I have been asking myself. And more particularly, why the gift of the red hat? I do not say there is not a satisfactory answer to these questions, but up to now none has presented itself.”
Frank Abbott said with half a laugh,
“The best answer would come from the girl herself. Pity she hasn’t been traced.”
Miss Silver answered him gravely.
“And that takes us back to the point from which we started. Where is Anna Ball?”
CHAPTER XX
As they turned in at the road-house, a small car passed them, heading for Ledstow. There were two people in it. Frank Abbott noticed a couple of the figures on the number-plate. Miss Silver was aware that the driver was a woman. There was no reason why either of them should have noticed more than that. It was only a good deal later when the car had been found deserted in Miller’s Lane that they realized it was the Ledlington bank murderer and his accomplice who had passed them. The car was going very fast indeed.
Inside the café they drank tea and went on talking. The place, as Frank Abbott had said, was well adapted for private conversation. There were nooks, there were alcoves, there were comfortable chairs, and discreetly shaded lights. Having listened to all that Miss Silver had to tell him, he had a contribution of his own to make.
“You haven’t asked me how I come to be here.”
Miss Silver smiled.
“Are you going to tell me?”
“Yes, I am. Do you remember my talking to you about a bank robbery at Enderby Green a month ago?”
“A very shocking affair. The bank manager was shot dead. But there was a clerk-I hope he recovered.”
Frank nodded.
“He was lucky-the bullet just missed everything that mattered. I think I told you he had been rather clever. He was making entries in red ink at the time, and he managed to get some of it on to a bundle of notes they made him hand over. Well, of course everyone has been warned to look out for those notes. The murderer naturally wouldn’t try to pass anything that was badly marked, but what the clerk did was to get a finger in the ink and smear the edge of the packet. If the colour didn’t run in beyond the edge, it might have been just possible to shave it off, so all banks were told to be on the look out for this. Well, two notes have turned up this week. A young chap called Wayne in the County Bank here spotted them. It was bright of him, because the shaving had been very carefully done. I can’t say I’d have noticed it myself if I hadn’t been on the look out for it, but under a magnifying glass you can see that the edge has been tampered with, and there is even a trace of the red ink. The Chief sent me down, and we’ve been in a huddle over it most of the morning.”
“And have you been able to trace the notes?”
“Up to a point, yes. Or at any rate one of them. They were paid in separately, and when this fellow Wayne noticed one of them he reported it to the manager and they went through all the lot and found another. Only of course by that time no one could say where it had come from, so except as an indication that someone in the district is passing these notes, the second one is a wash-out.”
“And the first?”
“Well, that was paid in by a Miss Weekes who has a fancy-work shop at Dedham. Jackson and I went over to see her about it. She hasn’t any regular day for banking her takings, because she has relations in Ledlington and when she comes over she likes to spend the day with them, so it’s a matter of mutual convenience. There’s a friend who looks after the shop when she isn’t there.”
Miss Silver smiled.
“Fancy-work shops are often run in quite an easy-going way. It is considered a refined occupation by those who have had no business training.”
He laughed. “Miss Weekes is nothing if not refined. I think you’ve met her?”
“She has wool of a very good quality. I bought some two days ago.”
“And you paid-how?”
She said soberly,
“With a pound note. My dear Frank, you are not going to tell me-”
“I don’t know-I wish I did. Miss Weekes banked four pound notes yesterday. Of those four she herself took three-one from you. She described you as the lady who is staying at Deepe House, and added that you did a lot of knitting.”
“Oh, yes, I was recommended to go to her by Mr. Hawkes, the postman. She is, I believe, a connection of his.”
His very fair eyebrows rose.
“Whoever it was who said that one half of the world doesn’t know how the other half lives obviously had no experience of an English village. Talk about the fierce light that beats upon a throne-it simply isn’t in it with the light that beats on rural England.”
Miss Silver coughed.
“I have often thought so. But let us return to Miss Weekes and the four pound notes. One of them came from me. What about the others?”
“She says Mr. Augustus Remington came in for embroidery silks. He is a frequent customer and she knows him well. He came in the same day that you did. His bill amounted to thirty-two and sixpence, and he paid it with a pound note, a ten shilling note, and a half-crown. Later on in the afternoon Miss Gwyneth Tremlett came in for canvas and raffia. She also paid with a pound note. So there are three of them accounted for. But no one seems to know anything about number four. Miss Weekes became quite tearful over it and said her friend must have taken it on Tuesday morning whilst she was out doing the shopping. The friend’s name is Hill, and she is a dreep. She has nervous prostration if more than two people come into the shop together. On Tuesday morning there was apparently an avalanche of six, and she became completely disorganized. By the time Jackson and I had finished with her the only thing she was sure about was that she had put all the money in the till, and if there was an extra pound note there someone must have given it to her, but if it was her last dying breath she couldn’t say more than that, and if we were going to take her to prison, she was ready to go, and all she wanted was to be allowed to die quietly of the disgrace and not have to face the neighbours. You know the kind of thing.”
“It is extremely difficult to deal with.”
“That’s putting it mildly. Jackson says he has an aunt like it, and there’s nothing you can do. As he put it, by the time they’ve finished working themselves up they don’t know black from white, nor chalk from cheese. So there we are-one pound note from you, one from Augustus Remington, one from Miss Gwyneth, and one from wherever you please. Where did yours come from?”
She said in an expressionless voice,
“Mrs. Craddock pays my salary weekly.”
“Oh, she does, does she? And that pound note was part of it-you’re sure about that?”
“I am perfectly sure.”
“Then three out of the four notes come from the Colony.”
Miss Silver coughed.
“It is more than a month since the robbery at Enderby Green, and there has therefore been a good deal of time for the notes to circulate. The one paid over the counter to Miss Weekes may have passed through a number of hands before it reached her. Since I myself cannot be sure that I did not handle it, the same may be the case with regard to Mr. Remington and Miss Gwyneth Tremlett. Any of us could have passed one of the stolen notes in complete innocence.”