“Queer,” thought Miss Climpson, “that Vera has never come and told me about her trouble. But perhaps she is ashamed, poor child. I haven’t seen her for nearly a week. I think I’ll call and see her and perhaps she’ll tell me all about it. In which case”- cried Miss Climpson’s conscience, suddenly emerging with a bright and beaming smile from under the buffets of the enemy- “in which case I shall know the whole history of it legitimately and can quite honourably tell Lord Peter about it.”
The next day- which was the Friday-she woke, however, with an unpleasant ache in the conscience. The paper- still tucked into the office-book- worried her. She went round early to Vera Findlater’s only to hear that she was staying with Miss Whittaker. “Then I suppose they’ve made it up,” she said. She did not want to see Mary Whittaker, whether her secret was murder or mere immorality; but she was tormented by the desire to clear up the matter of the alibi for Lord Peter.
In Wellington Avenue she was told that the two girls had gone away on the Monday and had not yet returned. She tried to reassure the maid, but her own heart misgave her. Without any real reason, she was uneasy. She went round to the church and said her prayers, but her mind was not on what she was saying. On an impulse, she caught Mr. Tredgold as he pottered in and out of the Sacristy, and asked if she might come the next evening to lay a case of conscience before him. So far, so good, and she felt that a “good walk” might help to clear the cob-webs from her brain.
So she started off, missing Lord Peter by a quarter of an hour, and took the train to Guildford and then walked and had lunch in a wayside tea-shop and walked back into Guildford and so came home, where she learnt that “Mr. Parker and ever so many gentlemen had been asking for her all day, and what a dreadful thing, miss, here was Miss Whittaker and Miss Findlater disappeared and the police out looking for them, and them motor-cars was such dangerous things, miss, wasn’t they? It was to be hoped there wasn’t an accident.”
And into Miss Climpson’s mind there came, like an inspiration, the words, “ South Audley Street.”
Miss Climpson did not, of course, know that Wimsey was at Crow’s Beach. She hoped to find him in Town. For she was seized with a desire, which she could hardly have explained even to herself, to go and look at South Audley Street. What she was to do when she got there she did not know, but go there she must. It was the old reluctance to make open use of that confession paper. Vera Findlater’s story at first hand- that was the idea to which she obscurely clung. So she took the first train to Waterloo, leaving behind her, in case Wimsey or Parker should call again, a letter so obscure and mysterious, so lavishly underlined and interlined that it was perhaps fortunate for their reason that they were never faced with it.
In Piccadilly she saw Bunter, and learned that his lordship was at Crow’s Beach with Mr. Parker, where he, Bunter, was just off to join him. Miss Climpson promptly charged him with a message to his employer slightly more involved and mysterious than her letter, and departed for South Audley Street. It was only when she was walking up it that she realised how vague her quest was and how little investigation one can do by merely walking along a street. Also, it suddenly occurred to her that if Miss Whittaker was carrying on anything of a secret nature in South Audley Street, the sight of an acquaintance patrolling the pavement would put her on her guard. Much struck by this reflection, Miss Climpson plunged abruptly into a chemist’s shop and bought a toothbrush, by way of concealing her movements and gaining time. One can while away many minutes comparing shapes, sizes and bristles of toothbrushes, and sometimes chemists will be nice and gossipy.
Looking round the shop for inspiration, Miss Climpson observed a tin of nasal snuff labelled with the chemist’s name.
“I will take a tin of that, too, please,” she said. “What excellent stuff it is-quite wonderful. I have used it for years and am really delighted with it. I recommend it to all my friends, particularly for hay fever. In fact, there’s a friend of mine who often passes your shop, who told me only yesterday what a martyr she was to that complaint. ‘My dear,’ I said to her, ‘you have only to get a tin of this splendid stuff and you will be quite all right all summer.’ She was so grateful to me for telling her about it. Has she been in for it yet?” And described Mary Whittaker closely.
It will be noticed, by the way, that in the struggle between Miss Climpson’s conscience and what Wilkie Collins calls “detective fever,” conscience was getting the worst of it and was winking at an amount of deliberate untruth which a little time earlier would have staggered it.
The chemist, however, had seen nothing of Miss Climpson’s friend. Nothing, therefore, was to be done but to retire from the field and think what was next to be done. Miss Climpson left, but before leaving she neatly dropped her latchkey into a large basket full of sponges standing at her elbow. She felt she might like to have an excuse to visit South Audley Street again.
Conscience sighed deeply, and her guardian angel dropped a tear among the sponges.
Retiring into the nearest teashop she came to, Miss Climpson ordered a cup of coffee and started to think out a plan for honey-combing South Audley Street, needed an excuse- and a disguise. An adventurous spirit was welling up in her elderly bosom, and her first dozen or ideas were more lurid than practical.
At length a really brilliant notion occurred to her. She was (she did not attempt to hide it from herself) precisely the type and build of person one associated with the collection of subscriptions. Moreover, she had a perfectly good and genuine cause ready to hand. The church which she attended in London ran a slum mission, which was badly in need of fuds and she possessed a number of collecting cards, bearing full authority to receive subscriptions on its behalf. What more natural than that she should try a little house-to-house visiting in a wealthy quarter?
The question of disguise, also, was less formidable than it might appear. Miss Whittaker had only known her well dressed and affluent in appearance. Ugly, clumping shoes, a hat of virtuous ugliness, a shapeless coat and a pair of tinted glasses would disguise her sufficiently at a distance. At close quarters, it would not matter if she was recognised, for if once she got to close quarters with Mary Whittaker, her job was done and she had found the house she wanted.
Miss Climpson rose from the table, paid her bill and hurried out to buy the glasses, remembering that it was Saturday. Having secured a pair which hid her eyes effectively without looking exaggeratedly mysterious, she made for her rooms in St. George’s Square, to choose suitable clothing for her adventure. She realised, of course, that she could hardly start work till Monday- Saturday afternoon and Sunday are hopeless from the collector’s point of view.
The choice of clothes and accessories occupied her for the better part of the afternoon. When she was at last satisfied she went downstairs to ask her landlady for some tea.
“Certainly, miss,” said the good woman. “Ain’t it awful, miss, about this murder?”
“What murder?” asked Miss Climpson vaguely.
She took the Evening Views from her landlady’s hand, and read the story of Vera Findlater’s death.
Sunday was the most awful day Miss Climpson had ever spent. An active woman, she was condemned to inactivity, and she had time to brood over the tragedy. Not having Wimsey’s or Parker’s inside knowledge, she took the kidnapping story at its face value. In a sense, she found it comforting, for she was able to acquit Mary Whittaker of any share in this or the previous murders. She put them down- except, of course, in the case of Miss Dawson, and that might never have been a murder after all-to the mysterious man in South Audley Street. She formed a nightmare image of him in her mind- blood-boltered, sinister, and- most horrible of all-an associate and employer of debauched and brutal black assassins. To Miss Climpson’s credit be it said that she never for one moment faltered in her determination to track the monster to his lurking-place.