He laughed again. He was fighting desperately for Margaret, and fighting in the dark. They were lovers no more, and friends no more; but the instinct to fight for her survived both love and friendship; it rose up in him hard and stark. He plunged on:
“What beats me is why they should have pitched on my house as a rendezvous.”
“Oh-” said Miss Silver mildly, “I think I can explain that. It is a point I was about to mention. You have a caretaker called Lattery. He is a married man. Do you happen to know Mrs. Lattery’s maiden name?”
“No, I don’t.”
“It was Pullen,” said Miss Silver,-“Eliza Pullen.”
Charles exclaimed.
“Pullen!”
“Pullen the butler is her brother. It would be easy for him to find out just when the house would be empty; and a big empty house would make a very good meeting place. Your house offers peculiar advantages. Thorney Lane is not much frequented, and the alley-way by which access may be had to the garden is very dark and lonely.”
Charles whistled.
Miss Silver waited a moment. Then she said,
“Yes, Mr. Moray. To continue-On the night of October 3rd Miss Langton was in your house, and it would help me very much if you would be frank about this. I know that you were once engaged, and if Miss Langton’s visit was, if I may say so, a personal one, it would of course alter the whole situation-No, Mr. Moray-a moment. I will say nothing that is not necessary; but if Miss Langton had come there to meet you, it would account for a good deal-it would account for your reticence and for your desire to keep the matter out of the hands of the police. It is even possible that Miss Langton was seen by Pullen or one of the others, and that this increases your apprehension on her account-it would be very natural, and, if I may say so, very pardonable.”
She smiled a little deprecating smile. Charles met it with a blank expression.
“And if Miss Langton had come to see me, would there have been anything very strange or compromising in that? She has been free of the house since she was a child. I have known her since she was ten years old, Miss Silver. Will you say there was any reason why we should not have met? Wouldn’t it be perfectly natural in the circumstances?”
“Oh, yes,” said Miss Silver. Then she coughed. “You really tell lies very badly, Mr. Moray.”
“Do I?”
“Oh, very badly indeed. It would have been better if you had been frank with me-much better. You see, you have told me what I wanted to know. I was not quite sure about Miss Langton.”
Charles pushed back his chair.
“I think we won’t discuss Miss Langton.”
Miss Silver sighed.
“That is foolish of you. You see, I know now that you saw her with Grey Mask, because if you had not done so, you would certainly have denied my suggestion that she came to the house to meet you.”
“Miss Silver!”
Miss Silver shook her head mournfully.
“You would have been very angry indeed if you had not thought I was offering you a way of escape. You know that.”
“Miss Silver!”
“Mr. Moray, have you ever asked Miss Langton for an explanation of what you saw?”
Charles was silent. He felt a sort of horrified fear of this gentle nondescript person.
“Mr. Moray, I am most earnestly anxious to help you. Have you asked Miss Langton for an explanation?”
“Yes,” said Charles, “I have.”
“Did she give you one?”
“No.”
“None at all?”
“No.”
“Will you now tell me where you saw Miss Langton, and in what circumstances?”
“She came into the room, walked up to the table, and put down a package. She said something, and Grey Mask said something. I couldn’t hear what they said. She only stayed a moment. I didn’t see her face.”
“But you were in no doubt as to her identity?”
“No.”
“I see,” said Miss Silver. “Just one more question. Was she announced in any way?”
Charles did not answer. He heard Jaffray’s voice, a little husky, pitched in a Cockney whisper: “Number Twenty-six is ’ere, guvnor.”
Miss Silver asked another question:
“The men had numbers. Was Miss Langton designated by a number?”
Charles was silent.
Miss Silver was silent for a moment too. Then she said very gently,
“I see that she was, Mr. Moray. It must have been a great shock to you. I think it is probable that these people have been blackmailing her. I have come across indications of this sort of thing before. The man you call Grey Mask works by means of blackmail-only instead of money he demands service. That is his method. You see, it gives him a hold over his tools-they are bound to obey.”
Charles lifted his head.
“In Miss Langton’s case there could be no question of blackmail. There could be nothing-”
“There is often something that no one dreams of. Think, Mr. Moray! Go back four years. She broke her engagement a week before her wedding day. Does a girl do that for nothing? Did she ever tell you why she did it?”
Charles Moray turned abruptly and walked out of the room. The door shut behind him. The outer door shut behind him.
Mis Silver put away the brown exercise-book and took up her knitting.
CHAPTER XXV
Having posted a letter to Stephanie on Monday, Greta wrote another on Tuesday:
My dear, I keep on meeting young men. It’s really too thrilling. I must tell you about it. Oh, Stephanie, it is such fun not being at school, and having men simply glaring because you’ve just been polite to someone else. I think Charles must have a most awful temper really, because he glared in the most frightful way you ever saw. I’ve never seen anyone glare like it before, except on the films when they’re just going to murder somebody, or the girl has been carried away by Bad Pete or someone like that. Of course Sheikhs glare nearly the whole time. I think Charles is awfully like a Sheikh really. He would look frightfully handsome in that sort of long nightgown thing they wear and the thrilling thing over their heads that looks like a sheet tied round and round with a twisty, knotty kind of rope. It would suit Charles like anything- only of course Archie is taller. But he wouldn’t make nearly such a good Sheikh, because he’s got rather a funny sort of face and he laughs a lot-and of course Sheikhs don’t. Charles was a Sheikh about Ambrose Kimberley. I’d only just finished my letter to you yesterday, and was putting on my hat to go out and post it, when the bell rang. And when I opened the door, there was a most awfully good-looking man standing there.
And he asked if Margaret was in, and I said she wasn’t ever in till half-past six, and sometimes later. And he said wasn’t that frightfully dull for me? And I said, yes, it was. He was frightfully nice. I think he is a little bit taller than Archie really, and he had the most lovely dark eyes and chestnut hair, and if he had been a girl, he would have had a lovely complexion. And he said might he go and post my letter with me, so we did. And then he said it was such a fine day, wouldn’t I come for a walk? So we walked as far as Kensington High Street, and we looked at the shops. All the skirts are quite full. Ambrose Kimberley was frightfully nice. He said he didn’t often meet a girl like me. And when I said why didn’t he, he said “Because there aren’t any more.” He said a lot of other things too. It is frightfully nice to have people saying things like that and being most awfully admiring and respectful. He said, wouldn’t I have lunch and go to the pictures with him? But I couldn’t, because Charles was coming to take me out. He wasn’t at all pleased about Charles, but I stood firm. I had one fright whilst I was out. I thought I saw Pullen across the road. He’s Papa’s butler, you know, and I don’t want anyone to know where I am, and if it was Pullen, he’d tell Egbert-and I most particularly don’t want Egbert to know. I do hope it wasn’t Pullen.