“Well,” said Charles pleasantly, “what do you know? Or shall I say, what do you think you know?”
Miss Silver took up her knitting. She had arrived at the toe of the little white bootee.
“I will tell you what I think. You stumbled upon a conspiracy. You saw a number of people whom you did not recognize. They were men. Well, I think, Mr. Moray, that you saw another person whom you did recognize. I think this person was a woman-I think it was Miss Langton.”
“What a remarkably vivid imagination you have, Miss Silver!” said Charles.
Miss Silver counted her stitches-three-four-five-six- seven. After a moment’s pause she spoke again:
“I think so because I cannot account otherwise for your allowing Miss Standing to run so many risks. She should be under police protection. You know that, I think.”
“She’s under Miss Langton’s protection, and mine.”
Miss Silver looked at him sorrowfully.
“You have confidence in Miss Langton’s protection?”
“Complete confidence. Besides, they don’t know where she is.”
“I’m afraid they do.”
Charles was really startled.
“What makes you think so?”
“You mentioned a name when you came in, Mr. Moray- you asked me if I knew anything about Ambrose Kimberley. Why did you ask me that?”
There was a silence. Miss Silver broke it.
“Pray, Mr. Moray, be frank with me,” she said. “In a matter as serious as this, I must warn you that concealment is a very dangerous policy for yourself, for Miss Standing, and, in the long run, for Miss Langton too.” She coughed in her gentle ineffective way. “I will tell you about Ambrose Kimberley. I spoke of him yesterday; but not, I think, by name.”
“Yesterday?”
“I told you that William Cole had been for three months with Mrs. James Barnard, and when you asked me whether there had been any trouble in the family during that time, I mentioned that a nephew of Mr. Barnard’s had left the country in disgrace.”
“What about it?”
“The nephew’s name was Ambrose Kimberley.”
There was a long pause. Charles stared at the bare wall in front of him, which was not bare to him; he saw pictures on it. He turned from the pictures to Miss Silver.
“Ambrose Kimberley called at Miss Langton’s flat yesterday. He found Miss Standing alone there. By the way, as you know everything, you probably know that we thought it wise to change her name.”
“To Greta Wilson-yes, I know that.”
“ Kimberley introduced himself as a friend of Miss Langton’s. As a matter of fact, she met him twice last winter at dances. When was he supposed to have left the country?”
“I think it was in June. The affair was kept very secret, you understand. There were no proceedings. Mr. Barnard pocketed his loss, and only about half a dozen people knew anything had happened. Now, Mr. Moray, I asked you just now whether you thought Miss Langton was to be trusted. Do you still think so after hearing what I have just told you?”
“Why not?”
“Who gave away Miss Standing’s whereabouts?”
“Someone saw her, I suppose,” said Charles.
“Someone? You have to remember how very few people know her by sight. She had not been in England for a year. She had not been photographed. She only came to Miss Langton late on Friday night.”
“She was at a cinema on Saturday.”
“In a hat that practically hid her face. I saw her, you know; and I should be hard put to it to remember her. Between that hat and her big fur collar there was very little to recognise.”
Charles moved impatiently. Miss Silver went on:
“Ambrose Kimberley turned up on Monday. Do you believe that he came to see Miss Langton? Mr. Moray, you are playing a very dangerous game.”
Charles Moray’s face was cold and hard.
“You had better speak plainly,” he said.
“I am speaking plainly-I am warning you that Miss Langton is not to be trusted-I am warning you that Margot Standing is in serious danger.”
“Not unless one of those certificates turns up,” said Charles quickly. “They won’t bother with her if she’s illegitimate-why should they? Egbert Standing gets the money. That’s all they want, isn’t it?”
“They wanted him to marry her, didn’t they? And she refused. Why don’t you tell me what you know about that?”
Charles got up.
“Miss Silver-”
“You had much better tell me everything.”
A bitter gleam of humour crossed his face.
“If I don’t tell you, you find out. Is that what you mean?”
“It saves trouble.”
“If I tell you-” He burst into hard laughter.
“Sit down, Mr. Moray.”
Charles walked up and down.
“I’ll tell you what she told us. You’re right-you’d better know-I don’t want to keep you in the dark. You’re wrong about Miss Langton-utterly wrong. I’ve known her for years. She is incapable-”
“Of letting anyone down?”
The colour rushed violently into Charles Moray’s face.
“Sit down, Mr. Moray,” said Miss Silver.
Charles sat down, and told her Margot’s story as Margot had told it to Margaret.
CHAPTER XXIV
When he had finished, Miss Silver laid her knitting in her lap.
“Just a moment, Mr. Moray. I think we want to get things clear. We have a conspiracy, and there are a number of persons whom we suspect of being involved in it. You have the advantage of having seen some of these people. I would like to go back to the night of October 3rd and just see whether any of these people can be identified. You looked into the room where the man in the grey mask was transacting his business. You saw him-”
Charles shrugged his shoulders.
“I saw nothing that anyone could recognise. I can think of no one whom I suspect of being Grey Mask.”
“I have come across him before,” said Miss Silver
“-not as Grey Mask of course; but in the last five or six years I have constantly come across small bits of evidence which have led me to suspect that there is one man behind a number of coordinated criminal enterprises. He pulls a great many strings, and every now and then I have come across one of them. Well-there was a second man sitting with his back to you.”
“In an overcoat and a felt hat,” said Charles.
“You didn’t see his face?”
“Not a glimpse.”
“You heard his voice?”
“A very ordinary one,” said Charles, “no accent.”
“What make of man?”
“Fairly broad in the shoulders. Not tall, from the way he was sitting.”
“It might have been Pullen,” said Miss Silver meditatively.
“It might have been ten thousand other people,” said Charles with impatience.
Miss Silver went on in a placid voice:
“Then there was another man keeping the door. They alluded to him as Forty. Well, we know that Forty is Jaffray, who was Mr. Standing’s valet and on board the yacht when Mr. Standing was drowned. You did not actually hear Mr. Standing’s name mentioned; but you picked up a piece of paper with the last syllable of his name, and you heard one of the men speak of Margot. Grey Mask spoke of Forty having been at sea, and made a number of allusions to his connection with an unnamed man afterwards drowned. It is clear that the late Mr. Standing was meant. Now we pass to the fourth man-Twenty-seven. He came in to report. I think he was William Cole. And I think the man with no number was Pullen. A fifth man, who was described as a jellyfish and as being unwilling to marry the girl, is certainly Egbert Standing.”
Charles nodded.
“I give you Egbert. But as to the rest, it’s the very purest conjecture.” He laughed. “You ask me when I’m going to the police. What do you suppose they would make of those surmises of yours? Pullen is secretary of a criminal conspiracy because Lady Perringham didn’t lose her pearls whilst he buttled for her. You see? William Cole has been in prison; therefore he is Number Twenty-seven, with a roving commission to murder inconvenient heiresses. Good Lord! You ask why I don’t go to the police! What sort of fool should I look if I did? I saw hats, overcoats, a muffler, a mask, and a shirt-front. I should be making a prize ass of myself, and you know it.”