“Madame disguises herself,” said Célestine, with a sniff. “And the walking-shoes will go by themselves, apart from the rest of the trousseau. Georges has put ready the golf clubs, and Henri is preparing food for madame to eat on the journey. There may not be good wayside food at English hotels so early in the year. In France, of course, it is different. There we are civilised people. It is curious what brutes are the English.”
Mrs. Bradley, accustomed to this criticism, did not reply. In twenty minutes she was off, and, before darkness fell, George had drawn up the car outside a village inn not far from Ferdinand’s convent. But for the reek of petrol which came from a garage near by— for the village was on a main road—they might have fancied that they could smell the sea; it was less than a mile away. The host was not surprised to hear them enquire about the convent.
“Had a mort of people,” he said, “come in their cars since Tuesday to have a look at the place. Taken the public fancy, this case has, as though it had been a murder. ’Course, there’s them as says it is a murder, and holds to it, but what I says is, if Coroner don’t know what he be at, no business to be coroner, I says; and after that holds my peace.”
“So the convent has a bad name?” said Mrs. Bradley.
“Didn’t have—no, not a murmur. More to the contrary, like, in the village before. But a few folks wagging their tongues can soon make mischief, and there’s them in the know that says charity may cover a multitude of sins, but where there’s children they ought to be very careful, and not go exposing them where there’s been temptation.”
Behind the inn was a garden, and beyond the garden the rolling common, deep woodland and misty pools of what had been a royal forest from the time of the Norman Conquest to the days of Henry III. The road through the village ran beside it, mile after mile.
Opposite the inn a spread of moorland mounted a mile-long hill to great cliffs sheer to the sea.
Mrs. Bradley washed and dined, and after dinner walked across the moor in search of the convent. The white path, wide enough for small cars, but boulder-strewn here and there and deeply rutted by cart-wheels, led to its gates, she was told.
The evening was cool, and the climb up out of the village fairly steep, but she took the slope briskly and soon was warm. It was easy to find the way. A bright half-moon lit the path, and against its light the convent church stood bold and black and solid, a landmark to pedestrians on the moor. As she drew nearer she could see, between her and the church, a huddle of lower roofs. Some part of these, she surmised, must belong to the convent guest-house, and the rest to buildings abutting on to the cloister.
Whilst she was standing still at the top of the slope before exploring further, she was aware of the approach of an elderly man with a bicycle. She noticed him first when he was still some distance away because of the headlamp of the bicycle, which appeared to bob up and down owing to the uneven surface of the stony moorland track. She did not move, and in a minute or two he came up beside her, and both of them stood gazing at the buildings.
“Death-traps,” said the man.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Yes, and death-traps is what I mean. Lures little children to their doom.”
“What does?”
“Nuns.”
“Interesting.”
“I call it ’orrible. Soon as I ’eard, I said to my old girl, ‘I’ll be off and hold an inspection of that there lazar-’ouse,’ I said. Come be road in seven hours and a quarter, less two hours’ rest and refreshment. Always give yourself a chance when you’re on your old jigger, and you’ll still be cycling at ninety.”
“You follow up sinister happenings, Mr.—?”
“Gossage. Ah, I do. ’Obby of mine this twenty-four year and seven months, ever since me and the old girl found ourselves next-door neighbours to a man what cut seven throats in the one ’ouse between ten-thirty-seven, when the other next-door was speaking to one of the corpses, engaged in putting out the cat, and six-fifteen, when the early-round milkman see the blood on the front-door step, it having run that far in the interval between the ’orrid deaths and their dramatic discovery.”
“And you suspect that a horrid death—?”
“Took place with that little girl in that sinister bathroom? Ah, that I do. And I’ll tell you for why. That inquest was in our paper. Perhaps you never see it—ah, you did, though, or else you wouldn’t be ’ere. Kept very small, at first, to the bottom bit of the page, but even then what I call suggestive, and look how it’s ’otted up now. The whole place was wrecked last night by ’furiated villagers. And the coroner’s remarks, if you noticed, were what I calls—what’s the word— muffled? No, that ain’t quite it. Now, what do you call it—?
“Vague?”
“Vague, that’s the word. Ah, vague. And the coroner’s name was ’Iggins.”
“Higgins?”
“That’s right. The only other ’Iggins I ever knowed was a absconding slate-club treasurer. Now what do you make of that?”
“Coincidence.”
“Not a bit. It was like an ’and pointing. I swallowed me breakfast, pumped up me tyres, tested me brake-blocks, told the old girl to expect me when she see me —retired last year, I did, so free to indulge me fancies —and then, to prove ’ow right I was, I find you ’ere a-gazing your fill by moonlight. I meant to ’ave a read of the Sunday paper, but mother lit the fire with it by mistake.”
“And what do you think really happened in that bathroom?”
“ ’Ad ’er ’ead ’eld under.”
“Really?”
“Not a doubt of it. Easy enough to do, and leaves no trace. That little girl was a heiress, near enough. Only one life between ’er and ’er grandfather’s money, and that was the grand-dad ’imself.”
“Are you sure of your facts?”
“They says so, down at the pub.”
“Who say so?”
“A couple of chaps I run into. Nobody round these parts is talking of anything else. Irish, that little girl was, and her grandfather went to America and made his pile in the Prohibition trade. Champagne was ’is lay, and whiskey. Done well, and cleared out. Never copped. Not even suspicioned, so far as he knew. And now collects art treasures, like any other millionaire. Very tidy placed, ’e is. It’s common talk in the village. There’s another girl at the convent, so far un’armed. Two other girls, I believe. But what will the ’arvest be?”
Mrs. Bradley could not tell him. He remained in earnest contemplation of the buildings for a minute or two and then looked at his watch, and asked her what she made the time.
“A quarter to ten,” she said, as she held out her arm to throw the light of his head-lamp on to her watch.
“Crikey! They’ll be shut,” he remarked, as he turned the bicycle about and headed in the direction of the village. “So long! And you take the advice of one what knows, and keep well away from them gates. You never know who might be lurking.”
He swung his leg over the bicycle with an ease remarkable in an elderly man, and wobbled unsteadily over the stony path. As he carried no rear lamp, but only a red reflector, she soon lost sight of him. With a little cackle, for the chance encounter had amused her, she approached the convent buildings more closely. They seemed to be surrounded on every side by a very high brick wall which rose behind the guest-house garden and the gardens of two private houses which adjoined the guest-house on the west, and completely enclosed the other buildings. The gatehouse was set some yards farther back than the gates to the houses, and was in the ancient form of a small room over an archway closed by a massive door. The window looked over the hill. A building to the left of the gatehouse, larger than any of the private houses, but again in a line with them, Mrs. Bradley later discovered to be the convent Orphanage. There were lights in several of the buildings—sure sign of untoward happenings, for the convent hour of lights-out was nine-thirty. Even the gatehouse window showed a glimmer, like that of a candle, to wayfarers coming from the village.