Mildred sat down to her writing-table and went through the housekeeping books. Terribly particular she was about them. And presently she had out her Post Office Savings book and went through that, and her bank book. Though Miss Ora was the elder, she had nothing to do with the accounts. Mildred was always saying how little they had to live on, and how terribly careful they must be. She certainly never spent anything on herself. Why, that old coat she wore instead of a dressing-gown had been got more than thirty years ago as mourning for poor Papa. And look at her now, in a darned flannel blouse and the dreadful coat and skirt which had come to them with their old cousin Lettice Halliday’s things. She had wanted to send it to a jumble sale, but Mildred had worn it ever since.
Miss Ora looked complacently from her sister’s dingy grey to her own pretty blue shawl. Figures made her head ache, and she was more than willing to leave the accounts to Mildred provided she could have her scented soap, her bath salts, her blue ribbons, her pretty shawls, and her library subscription. She read one sentimental novel after another with the pleasure which comes from a comfortable familiarity. She liked to know exactly what was going to happen. There must be no disagreeable surprises, no unforeseen developments. The lovely ward must marry her disagreeable guardian who is not really disagreeable at all but merely hiding a romantic passion under the cloak of austerity. The unjustly accused hero must be vindicated. Cinderella must have her Prince, and wedding bells-must ring with a deafening persistence. In fact,
Jack shall have Jill,
Nought shall go ill,
The man shall have his mare again,
And all shall go well.
The ambulance came, and went. Knots of people gathered in the street to watch it go. William Jackson had had a glass too much and fallen into the stream and been drowned. The ambulance had taken him away, and Mrs. Ball had gone to tell his wife. There would have to be an inquest.
The morning passed.
CHAPTER XI
When lunch was over Mildred Blake put on her hat and went out. Miss Ora watched her go, and felt herself aggrieved. Why couldn’t Mildred come in and say where she was going? She watched her turn to the left, so she wasn’t going to the Vicarage, or to see Annie Jackson. Miss Ora’s blue eyes, which saw everything, watched her go by old Mrs. Palmer’s-ninety-three and bedridden, and Mrs. Wood’s-Johnny was the naughtiest child in Greenings and the subject of just suspicion if anyone missed their apples.
Mildred went past both cottages without so much as a turn of the head, right on and out of sight. Well, that could only mean one thing-she was going to see Emmeline Random. And without so much as changing out of that old coat and skirt! Miss Ora clicked with her tongue. Really Mildred was quite hopeless!
Mildred Blake did not turn in at the south lodge. She walked past Emmeline’s bright, untidy garden without giving it a glance and went on up the long drive to the Hall, where she rang the bell and asked for Arnold Random. She had a little black book in her hand with a pencil hanging from it by a piece of string. Everyone in Greenings knew that book. Miss Mildred was a rigorous collector. When it wasn’t the Sunday School outing it was the Children’s Christmas Treat, or the Mothers’ Outing, or an Institute Tea. Doris Deacon who opened the door wondered which of them it was this time. A bit early for Christmas, and the mothers had had their treat in August. She was hesitating in her own mind, when Miss Blake said abruptly, “Mr. Random is in the study? Then I will just go in,” and went past her without waiting for an answer.
“And I was going to put her in the morning-room and go and let Mr. Arnold know,” she told Mrs. Deacon afterwards. “Gentlemen don’t like people walking in on them that way, but I couldn’t stop her.”
“Nobody can’t stop Miss Mildred, not when she takes it into her head she’s going to do something,” said Mrs. Deacon.
Arnold Random looked up, and wasn’t pleased. He had had an excellent lunch and a particularly good cup of coffee. An intolerable pressure had been lifted. He could sit back and be at peace. William Jackson had been a menace. He was a bad husband, an unsatisfactory employé, and a blackmailer. He was most satisfactorily dead. There was nothing to worry about.
And then the door opened and Mildred Blake came in in her shabby old clothes, her head poking out in front of her and her eyes fixed on his face. She had her black collecting-book in her hand, and he supposed he would have to give her a subscription. It went through his mind to wonder whether all those pennies and sixpences and halfcrowns, to say nothing of larger donations, did really reach the object for which they were subscribed. It was a quite involuntary thought. Since all these sums were written down, they would have to be accounted for, but if there had been any way of getting round that accounting-well, he wouldn’t trust Mildred Blake not to avail herself of it. Hard as nails and too fond of money by half. Predatory-yes, that was the word-a predatory female.
She refused the seat he offered her, drew a chair up to the table, and sat down, laying the black collecting-book on the corner between them. There was a hole in one of her cotton gloves. A bony finger poked through. With her eyes still on his face she said,
“I have come to talk to you about William Jackson.”
A faint uneasiness touched him. Ridiculous of course, because she couldn’t know anything. It lay between him and a man who was dead. Two men who were dead. Billy Stokes lost at sea, and William Jackson drowned in the splash within a bare half mile of his home. Mildred Blake would be getting up a collection for the widow. She certainly wasn’t losing any time about it.
He had got as far as that in his thoughts, when she said,
“I was in the church last night.”
It hit him like a blow. He saw her sitting there, leaning forward over a corner of the table, her hand on the black collecting-book. The torn bit of the glove stuck up with a ragged edge. The bare forefinger seemed to point at him. Her eyes had a dark fire. He saw them recede into a mist. They burned there. She spoke, but he couldn’t see her any more. The words meant nothing.
And then the first shock passed. The mist began to clear. Mildred Blake came back into focus again, sitting there with her hand on her collecting-book. He found himself saying,
“I don’t know what you mean.”
In her deep, resonant voice she said,
“You know perfectly well. I thought you were going to faint just now. You don’t do that for nothing. Would you like a glass of water?”
“No, thank you.”
“Very well then. I was in the church last night. I came on from the Vicarage work-party. I was going to speak to you about the hymns and chants for Sunday week. I came in through the side door, and you were talking to William Jackson. I heard everything that was said.”
He sat and looked at her. Her face showed a kind of fierce pleasure. He couldn’t think of anything to say. There wasn’t anything to say.
After what seemed like a very long time he said,
“He was drunk.”
She nodded.
“A little. Enough to put the words into his mouth, but not enough to make him invent them. He said your brother James made a later will than the one under which you inherit, and that he made it because he had become convinced that Edward was still alive. James said he had had a dream. Well, people had dreams in the Bible, didn’t they? Anyhow he made another will, and he called Billy Stokes and William Jackson in from the garden to witness it. Very inconvenient for you of course. What did you do with that will?”