She passed to his daughter Violet, a pretty girl with a habit of getting engaged to highly unsuitable young men, the more recent of whom had included a South American dance-band leader and a long-haired crank with an enthusiastic belief that only the British Navy, Army, and Air Force stood in the way of universal brotherhood and perpetual peace. These two young men had almost brought the Chief Inspector to the point of manslaughter, from which only the calming influence of Mrs. Lamb and his other two daughters had restrained him. Miss Silver was relieved to hear that they had now faded from the scene, and that Violet’s current boy friend was an atom scientist.
“And what she sees in him, I don’t know. Head full of figures and no thought for anything else. But Mother says not to worry, it won’t last. There’s one thing, Myrtle never gives us any trouble except that she thinks of nothing but her nursing, and we’d like to see her happy in a home of her own.”
Appropriate and sympathetic comment having been made, Miss Silver came to the point.
“You are always so kind, Chief Inspector, so I hope you will forgive me for taking up your valuable time. The fact is, I have had a caller with a story which has left me uneasy, and I thought I should feel happier if I could pass it on to you.”
He listened while she repeated what Miss Paine had told her. When she had finished he exhibited some of the scepticism that Paulina had anticipated.
“You’re not asking me to believe that a couple of men would meet in a public gallery to discuss a robbery and a murder for anyone to hear!”
Miss Silver gave a gentle cough.
“That is the point, Chief Inspector. My caller’s seat was too far removed from the men for them to be within earshot of her, and there was no one else in the gallery at the time. Also the two men were not together. They arrived separately, and to an ordinary observer would have appeared to be merely exchanging a few casual remarks about the pictures in front of them.”
“You say she was too far off to have heard anything?”
“That is my information.”
“And she asks you to believe that she can tell what a man is saying at such a distance by the movement of his lips?”
Miss Silver said steadily,
“She sat in my own room and conversed with me as if she could hear every word I said.”
Lamb’s hearty laugh came to her along the line.
“And what makes you think that she didn’t?”
“Mrs. Charles Moray told me that she was stone-deaf. Charles Moray’s cousin, a young artist, rents a studio in her house.”
He said gruffly,
“Well, well, it’s all one. Seems to me a pretty fancy sort of thing, and nothing we can do about it. Suppose it’s all genuine, or she thinks it is, what does it amount to? There isn’t a clue to the men, and as she describes them you could pick up a dozen like them anywhere. There isn’t a clue to the bank, or to the stuff that’s being removed from it. A secretary is mentioned, but there isn’t a clue to whose secretary he might be. How many banks do you suppose there are in London alone? And from what you’ve told me this one could be in Edinburgh, Glasgow, York, Leeds, Birmingham, Hull, Manchester, or any one of dozens of other places. No, no, I’d follow up anything if there was anything to follow, but there isn’t. If you give me the address of the gallery, I’ll send someone round to make enquiries about the two men who are said to have been there at-what time did you say?”
Miss Silver said,
“Just before five. But they were not known at the gallery. My informant enquired.”
“Well, well, that’s that, and nothing we can do about it. I’ll be surprised if we hear anything further. But I’d better have that address.”
Miss Silver gave it to him, after which he said goodbye and rang off. She had done what she could. She could neither do nor suggest anything more. She completed the letter which she had been writing to Ethel Burkett.
The next day was very fully occupied. She travelled down to Blackheath to see Andrew Robinson, the husband of her niece Gladys, and found that she would have her work cut out if a reconciliation was to be effected. Mr. Robinson was nearly twenty years older than his wife and had indulged her whims and condoned her extravagances for a very long time. Gladys was now over forty, and he expected a more reasonable standard of conduct and some peace and harmony in his home. But if this was not forthcoming, he contemplated a separation, and his income being no longer what it had been, the sum he was prepared to allocate to Gladys was one which would necessitate the strictest economy. Miss Silver returned home persuaded that the situation was indeed a serious one, and that Gladys must be made to realize the fact. She wrote a long letter to Ethel Burkett and another to Gladys herself. She wrote to Andrew Robinson.
Her mind, being thus taken up with family affairs, had neither the leisure nor the inclination to concern itself any farther with the problem presented to her by Paulina Paine, yet waking suddenly and unexpectedly in the night, she found it vividly present. So much so that it was a long time before she fell asleep again.
Chapter 6
ARTHUR HUGHES came down the steps of the County Bank at Ledlington, a goodlooking young man and very well aware of the fact. If Lucius Bellingdon was dispensing with his service as assistant secretary after a comparatively short trial, it did not occur to him for a moment that there could be any reason for this beyond the carping disapproval with which Lucius was practically bound to regard a penniless young man who had found favour in his daughter’s eyes. He would have to come round of course. The irate parent, stock figure of countless romances and now in these modern times a mere shadow of his former self, always did come round in the end. He would be a laughingstock if he didn’t. Besides, even if the worst came to the worst, Moira had money of her own, settled on her when she married Oliver Herne.
Arthur frowned as he walked in the direction of the Market Square, where he had parked the car. He had known Olly Herne, and he hadn’t liked him at all. He had actually been at his wedding when he married Moira Bellingdon. He hadn’t minded then because he wasn’t in love with Moira at that time. There had been a girl called Kitty. She had married someone else, and he could hardly remember what she looked like. And after her there was Mary, and Judy, and Ann, and quite a lot more. But none of them was like Moira. She did something to you, he didn’t quite know what. He used to think of her as cold-icy and unapproachable. And then quite suddenly she wasn’t icy any more, she was a flame in the blood. Even if she hadn’t had a penny… No, of course that was nonsense-you can’t get married without money. Anyhow it would be all right because she had her settlement. And she might say what she liked, she couldn’t very well go back on him now, not whilst he had her letters and those photographs. He wouldn’t have to use them of course. It would be quite enough to let her know that he hadn’t burned them after all-and a lover’s excuse ready to his hand, “Darling, I just couldn’t bear to part with them.” It was all perfectly simple, safe, and water-tight. But the time had come to get a move on. Once they were married his position would be secure. And Lucius Bellingdon would come round. You didn’t cut your only child out of your will-not nowadays.
All the time he was walking down to the car and getting into it and starting up he went on thinking about Moira Herne. It pleased him immensely to be taking her the Queen’s Necklace. A bit of luck that old Garratt should have had one of his attacks and not have been able to go for it. He had a pleasant picture of himself throwing the sealed packet into Moira’s lap and saying, “There you are!” After which she would open the packet and take out the necklace and put it on and he would kiss her. The fact that this pleasant daydream deviated in every possible particular from what was in the very least bit likely to happen had no power to detract from the pleasure it gave him.