“Oh, yes, she was quite dead, lying there on the floor-I suppose you saw her. I didn’t touch her except to feel her pulse, and the minute I took hold of her wrist I knew that she was dead.”
“Why didn’t you give the alarm, Mrs. Willard?”
She looked worried for a moment.
“I suppose I ought to have, but-I expect it was the shock- and I didn’t know where Alfred was-”
“You thought he might have done it?”
She actually smiled.
“Oh, not really-he wouldn’t, you know. It was just the shock, and not knowing where he was. Why, he was at his brother’s by a quarter past eight. I rang up my sister-in-law and asked just now, but of course I didn’t know any of that last night.”
Lamb sat there grave and solid, a hand on either knee. The overhead light picked out his bald patch and the strong black hair growing round it. He said,
“Go on-tell us what you did.”
Mrs. Willard fingered her wedding ring.
“Well, after I’d felt her wrist I just stood there. I didn’t know what to do. It was a shock, you know, seeing her like that, and not knowing where Alfred was. I didn’t seem to be able to think properly. I’d never seen anyone murdered before-it was dreadful. It seemed as if I ought to do something, but I didn’t know what. There was that silver statue she had on the mantelpiece- a girl dancing-it was lying on the sofa all over blood. I couldn’t bear to see it like that. It had made a dreadful stain on the cover- I couldn’t bear to see it. Well, the next thing I knew I’d got it in my hand taking it into the bathroom to wash the blood off. There was some nice hot water, and I gave it a good scrubbing with the soapy nailbrush. I suppose that’s when I stained my sleeve. The blood had dried and I’d a job to shift it. Why, the basin and the taps and all were stained. I had to go over them with the brush and fresh hot water.”
“And then?”
“I put the statue back.”
“On the mantelpiece?”
“Oh, no-on the sofa.”
“Why did you do that?”
A slightly bewildered expression came over her face.
“I don’t know-I found it there. Does it matter?”
He shook his head.
“I just wanted to know-that’s all. Now, Mrs. Willard-the whole time you were in the flat, did you handle anything except Miss Roland’s wrist, and the statuette?”
“There were the taps, and the soap and nailbrush-”
“They would be too wet to take fingerprints, or if there were any on the taps you scrubbed them off. What about the bathroom door?”
“It was open-I didn’t have to touch it.”
“And the light?”
“I had to turn it on, but I found I’d left a smear there, so I took it off with the brush.”
“Did you happen to notice Miss Roland’s rings whilst you were in the bathroom?”
“Oh, yes-they were lying by the side of the washbasin. I didn’t touch them.”
CHAPTER 43
They came out of the flat and stood for a moment on the landing. Lamb said,
“There’s another queer start.”
“Think she was speaking the truth?”
“If she wasn’t she’s the best hand at a tale I’ve ever struck. It all fits in, you see. The statuette-well, the way she told about that, it all seems natural enough. And there being none of her fingerprints in the flat-well, that all fits in too. There’s always a place where a patched-up story comes away from the cloth, but this story of hers doesn’t. She’s either a very clever woman or else she’s telling the truth-and she don’t look clever to me.” Then, with an abrupt change of voice, “Where’s Miss Silver?”
“In the Underwoods’ flat, I suppose. That’s where she told me she’d be.”
Lamb gave a sort of grunt.
“Well, go and get her! I’m going to take her along. If this Garside woman hasn’t been eating anything for the best part of a week, as likely as not she’ll be fainting on our hands-I’d like to have a woman there. Go and get Miss Silver-just say I want to see her. And look out for the door being shut after she comes out. That’s the worst of flats-everybody looks into everybody else’s front door. Cut along and get her!”
They stood at Miss Garside’s door and rang the bell. Frank Abbott could hear the faint buzzing sound of it. He thought the kitchen door must be open. At the third or fourth repetition the sound began to remind him of a fly buzzing on the window pane of a deserted room. Something in Maudie’s favourite Lord Tennyson… “The blue fly sung in the pane”… Mariana in the moated grange-“ ‘He cometh not,’ she said.”
Lamb put his thumb on the bell and kept it there. The buzzing was continuous. Nobody came.
The Inspector’s hand dropped. He said over his shoulder,
“Go and get Bell! He’s got a key-tell him to bring it along! And just see where he gets it from. I never heard of such a thing as letting them hang on the dresser! I told him he was to keep them locked up. Just you see if he’s done it!”
Miss Silver stood grave and prim beside the door whilst they waited for Abbott and Bell. The Inspector leaned his big shoulder up against the jamb, his face heavy and stern.
Two or three minutes can seem a very long time. A cold draught came up the well of the stairs, bringing with it a smell of cellar-damp and mist. Then the lift shot up and the two men emerged from it, Bell first, with the key, his face puckered, and his hand not quite as steady as usual, because if they couldn’t get an answer out of No. 4 there must be something very badly wrong. Miss Garside, she’d never go out at this time in the evening with a fog coming up like it was.
They opened the door and went in.
Two doors faced them. The sitting-room door on the right was open, the bedroom door on the left closed but not latched. They went into the sitting-room and found it empty and full of shadows. It was not dark outside yet, but with the mist hanging like a curtain at the windows there was very little light to see by.
The Inspector pulled down the switch and a ceiling light came on. There was no sign of the tea-tray which had been set two and a half hours before. The tray was back in the kitchen, the teapot washed and put away, the cup and saucer clean and in its place. The biscuits, which had been laid out upon a plate, were back in their airtight tin. Everything was in order, and there was no one in the room.
It was Miss Silver whose eyes picked up a single crumb upon the hearth-rug. She pointed it out to the Inspector. He looked round with some impatience.
“A crumb? Well, I daresay! What of it?”
Miss Silver gave her slight cough.
“She had had her tea. It is a biscuit crumb, and you can see that a stool has stood just here on the hearth-rug. That stool over there by the wall, I should say.”
He looked at her sharply, grunted, and went through the hall to the bedroom door. After knocking on it he pushed it open and went in, switching on the light. Abbott and Miss Silver followed him, but old Bell stayed in the hall and said his prayers. He didn’t know what things were coming to-he didn’t indeed. It wasn’t what he was accustomed to, and he didn’t know what to do.
Inside the light shone down upon a clean, bare room. What furniture there was stood stiffly in place. The bed with its old-fashioned brass knobs and rails faced the door. The counterpane had been neatly folded back and the faded eiderdown pulled up to cover Miss Garside to the waist. She lay there fully dressed in an attitude of profound repose, her left arm bent with the hand lying across her breast, the right arm stretched out straight.
Lamb stood over her, frowning, and spoke her name.
“Miss Garside-”
His deep voice filled the room but did not touch the stillness on the bed. With a sudden ejaculation his big hand went out to the left wrist. His fingers felt for a pulse, and did not find it.
He laid the hand back again, rapped out an order to Abbott, and began to look about him. On a table beside the bed there was a tumbler with a little water in it. Between the tumbler and the edge of the table a small glass bottle with one or two white tablets.