Mrs. Larkin said in her quiet way that the weather was very seasonable indeed, and put the rolled-up dress with the other things to be handed over to the police.
When she had finished she went round to the front door of the other house and rang the bell. Admitted by Eliza, who had reached a state of disapproval which gave her the appearance of being by far the likeliest person in either house to have committed a murder, she was handed over to Miss Silver, who immediately offered herself as the first subject for search.
They had quite a pleasant little conversation whilst this was going on in Miss Silver’s bedroom. Mrs. Larkin, being passionately addicted to crochet, became quite warm in her admiration of the edging which decorated Miss Silver’s high-necked spencer and serviceable flannelette knickers, which had three rows on each leg, each row being a little wider than the last. On being informed that the design was original she was emboldened to ask for the pattern, which Miss Silver promised to write down for her. After which they parted on very friendly terms.
Since Miss Silver had submitted to being searched, even Eliza could not manage to feel that she was being singled out for insult. Her demeanour was, however, that of a martyr about to be put to the question. In a voice of awful indignation she invited Miss Silver to be present, observing darkly that there were those she wouldn’t name but she wouldn’t put it past them to make up something against you if there wasn’t anything without they did. After which she stalked up to her room and gave Mrs. Larkin and even Miss Silver the surprise of their lives when the removal of her black afternoon dress displayed pink silk cami-knickers with French legs. Nothing more compromising than this came to light.
Marian Brand also asked Miss Silver to be present. She went through the unpleasant business with dignity and simplicity, and was glad when it was over.
Ina Felton was last on the list. She undressed, and afterwards dressed again as if she hardly noticed what she was doing. There was no stain on any of her things. But in the bathroom between her room and her sister’s a pale blue dress had been washed out and hung up to dry. It was the one she had worn at the picnic. She declared that she had not worn it again. Marian Brand said that it was she who had washed it out before lunch, and Miss Silver was able to confirm that it had been hanging there when she came home from church. She was a little vexed when the Chief Constable remarked later on that if Mrs. Felton had intended to kill her husband she could very easily have slipped on the still damp dress, and after stabbing him have rinsed it out again and put it back on its hanger to dry. He was perhaps not unwilling to get some of his own back, since she had once more been advancing with earnestness a theory which he could not help regarding as being farfetched, and for which he could see no evidence at all. As a result, she became a little remote and addressed herself to casting on the requisite number of stitches for the first of another pair of stockings in the sadly uninteresting grey wool which is the schoolboy’s universal wear.
Chapter 37
There was an eventual departure of the police, with the exception of Constable Wilkins, who remained behind to clutter Eliza’s kitchen until such time as the family repaired to their rooms for the night, when he had instructions to be on duty on the bedroom landing and on no account to allow himself to be overtaken by sleep. Everyone was only too anxious for the day to be over. Violent events have much the same effect upon the day in which they fall as a bomb has upon the surrounding country. The bomb itself may provide a brief excitement, but it reduces all about it to a condition of arid dullness. As the dust settles, everything within its reach is blighted.
Eliza served a cold supper out of a tin-one of the more depressing so-called lunch loaves, with a marmoreal corn-flour shape and some rather grey apple to follow. In the kitchen Constable Wilkins partook of herrings and cocoa under the watchful eye of Mactavish, who exasperated Eliza by repeating his almost soundless mew until she left off her own supper to bone a nice piece of herring for him, and then intimated that it wasn’t good enough by backing away from it and continued to mew. Eliza said “Drat!” but she fetched shredded meat and breadcrumbs from the larder and warmed up the gravy that had been left from lunch. After which Mactavish condescended to partake and Eliza was able to go on with her own supper.
By the time that Constable Wilkins was well away with his third herring and his second cup of cocoa she was preparing him for his night’s vigil by narrating the really horrid tale of her grandfather’s experience in a haunted house. It had so many uncomfortable similarities to the present situation that Joe Wilkins wasn’t really able to relish that last herring. Like himself, Eliza’s grandfather had been obliged to sit up all night on the landing of a house where there’d been murder done. It was an old house and it creaked something dreadful, and right in the middle of the night there was a footstep where no lawful footstep ought to be. Down in the hall, and all the family upstairs and abed. It was Eliza’s best story, and she told it very well, dwelling with loving care on how her grandfather could feel the short hairs on the back of his neck prickling. When she came to the bit about his taking the candle and coming down to the turn of the stair, Joe Wilkins found himself very resolute that he would do no such thing. Asking for trouble, that was what it was, and why couldn’t her grandfather stay where he was, the silly old fool?
Eliza dropped her voice to a frightening whisper.
“And round the turn of the stair the candle came out of the socket and went rolling down afront of him. There was my grandfather, and there was his shadow on the plaster, and the last thing he saw when the candle went rolling down was his own shadow come off of the wall and standing there on the mat at the foot of the stair looking up. And the candle went out.”
“Wh-what happened?”
Eliza’s voice became brisk.
“What should happen? My grandfather come back and got another candle, and when he went down again there wasn’t anything there.”
When supper was over in the dining-room Miss Silver announced her intention of stepping in next door.
“Poor Penny-a trying experience for a young girl, being searched. And Mrs. Brand and Miss Remington-really most unpleasant and disturbing. I think it would console them to know that we have all been subjected to the same ordeal. But I shall not stay long.”
Penny opened the door. She was pale under her tan, but she had lost what Eliza called her heart-rendering look. She was tired, and everything was dreadful, but Felix had gone off to the drawing-room with the score of his quartet, laid aside for months. Upon the blank of thought images and combinations had begun to take shape. Every now and then he touched the keys of the piano, every now and then he wrote. Penny was so thankful to see him working again that nothing else really mattered.
She took Miss Silver into the parlour, and listened to the aunts animadverting on a system which allowed the police to penetrate into private houses and search the occupants.
Miss Silver was most sympathetic. She herself had been searched.
“Oh, yes, indeed, Mrs. Brand. Not at all pleasant-most distasteful in fact. But I felt it my duty. It is, after all, for our protection. We shall none of us feel safe till this dreadful business is cleared up. I am sure you must feel that.”
Florence Brand said heavily,
“I have lived here for nearly twenty years. Nothing happened until my brother-in-law made that unjust will.”
Cassy Remington tossed her head.
“Miss Silver won’t be interested in Martin’s will,” she said in an acid voice. “And really, Florence, I can’t see how you can make out that it has anything to do with Helen Adrian or Cyril Felton, neither of whom came in for a penny or ever expected to.”