An expression of interest appeared on her face.
“Indeed? I have heard of him from an old pupil of mine, Randal March, who is Superintendent at Ledlington. He considers him a very able man.”
She got up with the air of the teacher who dismisses a class.
“Very well, then. I will just go across the landing and pack my case.”
Chapter 23
You have brought a detective here-here?” Miss Paradine was quite white, quite controlled, but her eyes blazed and her voice had a cutting edge.
Mark, standing just inside the door of her sitting-room, contemplated his assembled family and said,
“Yes.”
They were all there except Albert Pearson, and they were all looking at him-Frank Ambrose with a heavy frown; Brenda paler than usual, her eyes bolting; Irene with her mouth hanging open; Phyllida startled; Dicky, his lips pursed for an inaudible whistle; Elliot grim; and Grace Paradine with a look of anger which he had seen once or twice before, but not for him. Only Lydia ’s face held any encouragement. She met his eyes, smiled into them with hers, and then looked quickly away. She thought, “It’s going to be a dog fight. Oh, my poor Mark!”
They were all standing. Grace Paradine said,
“I don’t know what you were thinking about. You must send him away at once!”
Mark stayed where he was by the door. He said,
“No.” And then, “It’s a woman, Aunt Grace- Miss Silver.”
She said again, and with no less anger,
“You must send her away!”
“I can’t do that. I’m sorry you don’t like it, but I’ve quite made up my mind. None of you will like it, but there’s been a murder. As I see it, the only person who can reasonably object is the murderer. I’m not saying it’s one of us. The police are quite sure that it is. I hope it isn’t. I’ve brought Miss Silver here because I think that’s our best chance of getting at the truth-I think we’ve got to get at the truth. At the moment we’re all under suspicion. It doesn’t seem possible to us because we’re right in the middle of it-we can’t see what it looks like from outside. The police are going to suspect everyone who hasn’t an alibi. They’re going to dig about until they can turn up a motive. Miss Silver said just now that a murder case was like the Day of Judgment. She’s absolutely right. Most people have got something they don’t want to have ferreted out. Well, it’s no good-we shan’t be able to hide anything. It’s damnable, but there’s something worse, and that is all going on suspecting one another and being suspected by everyone we know. We’ve got to find out who did it, and we’ve got to find out quickly.”
There was a dead silence, broken by a burst of tears from Irene. To her sobbed-out “How-how can you say such things?” Mark replied curtly,
“Everyone’s going to say them.”
Grace Paradine said in her voice of cold anger,
“You’re very ready to accuse your relations of murder, Mark. Perhaps you will tell us whom you suspect.”
He straightened himself up and turned a look of bitter amusement on her.
“Well, I gather that the police favour me.”
This time Dicky’s whistle was audible. Frank Ambrose said, “Why?”
“Oh, this and that. I’m not expected to give evidence against myself, am I?”
“The police will want to know the terms of the will. Do you know them?”
“Do you?”
Frank Ambrose said, “No,” and said it rather quickly. After a short pause he went on. “I suppose you do. And I suppose from the way you’ve taken over that they’re very much in your favour.”
“That’s one of the reasons why the police are going to suspect me.”
Frank went on doggedly.
“Don’t you know how you stand? I think the rest of us ought to know too.”
“Here and now?”
“I think we’re entitled to know as much as you do. I’m not asking how you know.”
Mark said, “That’s damned offensive, Frank.” Then, in a curiously abstracted voice, “He gave me a draft. I can’t remember everything. Phyllida gets five thousand-he was very fond of her. Dicky gets ten and the Crossley shares. Aunt Clara’s diamonds are to be divided between Dicky and myself-two thirds to me and a third to him. Albert gets a thousand pounds free of legacy duty. You and Brenda get two thousand each as a mark of affection. He said he’d settled money on both of you when you came of age. That’s all I can remember offhand.”
Frank looked heavily at him.
“Who gets the rest?”
“I do. I’m the residuary legatee.”
“You get the house?”
Mark nodded.
“Yes. You see why the police are going to suspect me. Let’s get back to the question of Miss Silver. She’s been extraordinarily successful in other cases. She’s easy to get on with-nothing aggressive about her. I’m asking you all to make things as easy for her as possible. I can see how it looks to you, Aunt Grace, and I’m sorry, but you must want this cleared up as much as any of us. As I said before, there’s only one person who doesn’t want it cleared up. I don’t suppose anyone wants to fit that cap on, so I take it you’ll all do what you can to help.”
Nobody answered him.
When the silence had lasted long enough to make it clear that nobody was going to answer he turned and went out of the room, almost running into Albert upon the threshold. A collision having been narrowly avoided, Albert advanced and approached Miss Paradine.
“Mr. Moffat is below. He asked whether you would see him.”
Chapter 24
Grace Paradine waited for Robert Moffat. She had moved nearer to the fire, and stood there facing the door through which he would come. She had not been alone in a room with him for thirty years-not since the brief bitter interview in which she told him that she knew about Carrie Lintott, and gave him back his ring. Across the gap of the years it still pleased her to remember that it was he who had wept, not she. It was just a month before the day which had been set for their marriage. Her wedding dress hung, covered with a sheet, in the room which was Phyllida’s now. Her wreath and veil reposed in the top long drawer of the tallboy. But it was Robert Moffat who contributed all the emotion to that interview. He had gone down on his knees and clutched at her skirt. He had abased himself in penitence. He had begged, implored, protested. She was remembering these things now, as she had remembered them every time she had seen him in the last thirty years.
You cannot live in the same place and never meet. Robert Moffat’s father was a partner in the Paradine-Moffat Works. In due course Robert succeeded him. They were bound to meet. She went away for a time, and then she came back. They were bound to meet. The first time was at the County Ball. She had a new dress, she was looking her best. She bowed and smiled. It was he who flushed and turned away. After that, many chance meetings-in the street; coming out of church; coming out of the theatre; at balls, receptions, bazaars. He ceased to change colour, but she never ceased to remember that she had had him on his knees to her. When he married, she paid a formal call upon the bride, leaving her father’s cards. Mrs. Moffat, a pleasant rosy little person, smiled and dimpled, and made herself very agreeable. Miss Paradine was not at home when the call was returned. Meetings between the two households were few and formal. Never till this moment had there been any approach to a personal relationship.
The door opened and he came in-a big, bluff man, fresh-coloured and hearty. He came up to her with an outstretched hand. He was both shocked and horrified, but he was plainly nervous too. Even a murder in the family didn’t prevent him from thinking how formidable Grace Paradine looked, and what an escape he had had. Extraordinary to think that he had once been so madly in love with her. Thought the world had come to an end when she turned him down. Something in him chuckled. He’d been much better off with his comfortable Bessie. Kind, that’s what she was-comfortable and kind. A woman ought to be kind.