CHAPTER 50
It’s about forty miles,’ said Frank Abbott. ’There’s no particular reason why they should be there, you know.’
‘There’s no particular reason why they should be anywhere,’ said Jim. He stood looking out of the window in Frank Abbott’s room, plainly beyond all thought or reason, actuated solely by a frantic desire for action.
Frank turned to Miss Silver. She sat very upright at the far side of his table. She wore the black coat which had endured for many years and would not be discarded whilst it endured. Her neat, pale features were perfectly composed, the lips firmly set, the eyes attentive. The hands in their black gloves were crossed firmly on the handle of a worn black handbag. Her second-best hat of black felt, adorned by a large bow of black and purple ribbon, was tilted a little more over her face than she usually wore it. To Frank Abbott her appearance and demeanour were the clearest indications that she had made up her mind. He might go, or he might stay, but Miss Silver was going down to Swan Eaton. All that depended upon him was whether she went alone, or whether she went accompanied and protected by the forces of the law. He said, ‘I suppose you have made up your mind?’
Miss Silver replied in a most decorous manner.
‘I believe that it would be a good plan to go down to Swan Eaton.’
‘And suppose they are not there?’
‘That we can consider if the occasion offers.’
‘You really think-’
‘I think that there are indications in that direction. I think that we must explore them. And I think that there is no time to be lost.’
Jim swung round on them.
‘Do you realise what may be happening whilst we are talking? Either you go at once, or I go alone! They may be murdering her!’
Miss Silver rose to her feet.
‘It would be better if you would come with us, Frank,’ she said, ‘but Mr Fancourt and I are leaving immediately.’
Frank Abbott nodded.
‘All right, you win. Give me a quarter of an hour, and I’ll collect Hubbard and a car.’
It was a little more than a quarter of an hour before they started. The clock on Frank’s mantelpiece stood, in fact, at eleven-thirty before they left the room. Jim endured. Every moment was an hour of torment. Whilst they fleeted away the time-time went on. It passed-it would not come again. What was happening happened. The dead would not come back to life. They were gone. Jim stood at the window and stared out with eyes that saw nothing. ‘Anne-Anne- Anne-Anne!’ He half cried out her name. He heard nothing else, was aware of nothing else. Time went by.
The first thing he knew was Miss Silver’s hand on his arm and her voice saying, ‘We are quite ready now, Mr Fancourt.’
It was a relief to be in motion. Frank Abbott sat in the front of the car with young Hubbard. Jim and Miss Silver were at the back. She did not speak, but sat there with her hands crossed upon her bag and her face pale and still. Jim did not notice her at all. He sat upright, his hands clenched. However fast the car went, he was pushing it a little faster. When Hubbard slowed down to the traffic, he was pushing with all his strength to get him on again. And all the time his mind ran ahead and called on Anne.
Anne lay on her bed in the room where she had slept as a child. She had prayed, and she had come into peace. She didn’t even know what was going to happen, but she wouldn’t believe that evil would have the victory-she couldn’t believe that. She didn’t know how she would be saved. She only knew that something would save her. She lay on her bed and watched the changing light and the shadows of the trees outside. Presently she slept.
Down in the village the car stopped to ask the way.
‘Yew Tree Cottage?’ That was Frank Abbott.
The first person he asked did not seem to know. He began, ‘I’m a stranger here-’ but Frank did not wait for anything more.
He tried again, and this time got an answer.
‘Yew Tree Cottage? Oh, yes. But there won’t be no one there. Empty, that’s what it’s been these three years ever since Miss Forest was murdered.’
Jim’s hands tightened. The nails dug into the palms of his hands. She wasn’t here-she wasn’t anywhere. Where was she? Anne-Anne-Anne!
The man, who was chewing a straw, went on chewing it.
‘Oh, yes, I can tell you how to get there. But no one’s lived in the house since Miss Forest was murdered. It belongs to her niece, and she’s abroad… Oh, she’s back, is she? Well, she hasn’t been down here.’ He was interminably slow, but in the end they got the direction.
What was the use? She wasn’t here, she wasn’t anywhere.
He had missed his chance. Her name came and went in his mind like a voice calling.
Someone else was calling that name. Anne woke up. For a moment she did not know where she was. She had been in a dream. It had been pleasant in her dream. She walked in a cool wood. There was heat abroad and she was aware of the sounds of traffic, but she was in a quiet place. She heard the sound of wheels, but where she was there was peace and silence.
With the first of her returning sense the sound was clearer. The shadow of the trees wavered and was gone. She opened her eyes and saw a room, windows, the dark branch of a yew tree, and the clock on the mantelpiece. The clock said a quarter past one. The sound of wheels which had waked her had stopped. Her heart quickened. She was here, in Aunt Letty’s cottage, in great danger. That was the first thought. And then there was a second. Had she really heard a car, and if so, what car?
She jumped up and went to the window. The car had stopped. There was a murmur of voices. What voices? Whose?
Downstairs the two men sat frozen. They had heard a car draw up. The car in which they had come was in the garage, with the door shut. Was it shut? Maxton had been in, and had come out, and had shut the door. He was sure about that. What he wasn’t sure about was whether Ross had been in since. He fixed his eyes upon him, and Ross shook his head. He’d do that anyhow. Neither of them spoke. It wasn’t any good. The kitchen fire was on. The coal was damp. It was smoking. No one would believe the place was empty.
Maxton got up and went to the door. He opened it a little way and said, ‘What is it?’
Three men and an elderly woman. Three men, and one of them Fancourt. He said roughly, ‘What is it?’
Frank Abbott was out of the car. The other two men were getting out. Maxton kept hold of the door and nearly closed it. Anger burst in him, leaving no room for fear.
Jim Fancourt said, ‘Where’s Anne?’ and Maxton raised his eyebrows.
‘Why ask me?’ he said.
Jim Fancourt repeated what he had said before.
‘Where is Anne?’
Maxton heard the door of the room upstairs open-the door of Anne’s room. He banged the front door in Jim’s face and sprang backwards. Anne came out on the landing and stood at the top of the stairs looking down. He called ‘Ross!’ but there wasn’t any answer.
Frank Abbott left the car standing and ran round the house. He got in at the back door, to see Maxton charging up the stairs with a pistol in his hand, and Anne standing on the top step looking down. As his feet sounded in the hall, Maxton looked back, his face mad with anger, his pistol in his hand. He fired. The noise of the shot seemed to fill the hall.
Jim Fancourt left battering at the front door and broke the drawing-room window. Inside, Anne ran quickly down the three or four steps which separated her from Maxton and pushed at him with all her might. If he had been still facing her she might have pushed in vain, but he was turned from her, his feet on two levels as he had turned at the sound of Frank Abbott’s rush, and the unexpected thrust pushed him off his balance. He lost it, clutched at her, missed, and fell sprawling. The pistol flew from his hand, knocked on the balustrade, and fell into the hall. By the time Jim emerged from the drawing-room he lay in a heap at the foot of the stairs with Frank Abbott and Hubbard bending over him.