Frank said,
“Well, well. I think she would have done better to hold her tongue.”
Miss Silver turned the cherry-coloured leggings.
“That was Miss Crewe’s remark. She then capped Mrs. Merridew’s story with one about Lady Melbury, who appears to have suddenly discovered that a necklace supposed to be extremely valuable and worn by her great-grandmother at Queen Victoria’s coronation was in reality a mere imitation. Miss Crewe commented very unfavourably upon Lord Melbury’s folly in talking about the matter. Lady Melbury would, I gather, have remained silent, but her husband, who is one of those easygoing sociable men, went about telling everyone and rather openly wondering which of his ancestors had effected the substitution.”
Frank said quickly,
“The necklace would have had to be valued for probate. I’m afraid he can’t put it on the ancestors.”
Miss Silver coughed.
“That does not seem to have occurred to him. Lady Melbury is an extravagant woman, and has been a beauty. He is probably the only person in the county who does not believe that she disposed of the necklace herself. These grand jewels appear so seldom, and then only in circumstances where they are unlikely to be exposed to the eye of an expert, that a substitution could be made with very little risk of discovery.”
He laughed.
“And by the time it came to valuation for probate Lady Melbury wouldn’t have to worry! Just between you and me, I wonder how often it has been done. Most of the great families are broke, and why keep capital locked up in jewels which only the expert can tell from a copy? Well, all this is very interesting, but where does it get us?”
Miss Silver extracted a new ball from her knitting-bag. The joining of the strands of wool took up her attention for a moment. Her reply when it came was in her most persuasive voice.
“If you could see your way to making some enquiries of Lady Melbury and Lady Muriel Street -”
“My dear ma’am-on what grounds!”
She said,
“I supposed you would raise that point.”
“What have you got at the back of your mind-a hunch?”
“My dear Frank!”
“It will do just as well by any other name. Shall we say a suspicion?”
“It is hardly that.”
“What is it then?”
She stopped knitting and looked at him with a kind of earnest diffidence.
“I do not know quite how to put it. I have a feeling that when a number of curious things have been happening they may be connected with one another. I cannot at the moment bring any evidence to support this feeling, but I have wondered whether an interview with Lady Melbury and Lady Muriel might not produce some. The substitution of a copy for the original must have been made by someone able to obtain a drawing or photograph of sufficient accuracy to enable that copy to be made. There must also have been an opportunity of effecting the change. This opens up three possibilities. A member of the family. A confidential servant! A friend or a relative with the requisite access. All these possibilities should be tested. The one which occurs to me is the last of them. I may be wrong-I don’t know. There is a name that comes to my mind. I would like some enquiries to be made.”
He said in a doubtful voice,
“What name?”
“I would rather not say. The person of whom I am thinking is related to many people in the county. As a young woman she amused herself with sketching. She worships her house and her ancestry, and has been put to it to maintain the family tradition. One of the missing women was in her employment.”
Frank Abbott said,
“Miss Cunningham? Miss Crewe? The official eye has been rather fixed upon the Dower House. Henry was off the map for more than twenty years, Nicholas works at Dalling Grange, and Miss Cunningham was the employer of Maggie Bell-whom I suppose we may now regard as the late Maggie Bell.”
Miss Silver was knitting again, and quite briskly. She said in a decided tone,
“Something of a very disturbing nature occurred here last night. I think I had better tell you about it.”
“I think you had. When you say here-”
“I do not mean in this house.”
He felt some relief, and showed it.
“Thank goodness for that! Who was disturbed, and in what way?”
She said, “Miss Cunningham,” and proceeded to give him a very clear and succinct account of what Mrs. Hubbard had observed and deduced. It raised a frown, and some scepticism.
“What it amounts to is that Miss Cunningham burned some string-probably after tripping over it somewhere-and that Mrs. Hubbard found the bit that got away.”
He was instantly aware of being a pupil who had not given the right answer. Her glance rested on him in mild rebuke.
“Not string, Frank-garden twine.” She stopped knitting for long enough to produce a gummed-down envelope from her chintz bag and hand it over to him. “Here are the fragments found by Mrs. Hubbard. You will observe that the twine has been treated with tar, doubtless as a preservative, and that this would make it unsuitable for normal use inside the house. If, however, it was to be used as a trip-cord on the stairs, the dark colour would render it extremely inconspicuous. In the second case, Mrs. Hubbard reported that the balusters about six steps down from the landing were marked as if something had been tied tightly between them, and that some of the paint had flaked off.”
He said more soberly,
“This is third-hand evidence.”
She was knitting with a certain briskness to which he was no stranger.
“Not quite, Frank. Mrs. Merridew took me to call at the Dower House this afternoon, and Miss Cunningham was kind enough to take us over it. There are many points of historical interest, in addition to which I had the opportunity of checking Mrs. Hubbard’s story. The stair runs up to the bedroom floor, and there is a balustrade on either side. The woodwork has been painted a dark chocolate brown. Miss Cunningham said what a pity it was, but it was like that when they came, and the stair being not oak but some much softer wood, they had never liked to risk injuring it by having it stripped. Whilst this conversation was going on I was able to observe the balusters, and to verify Mrs. Hubbard’s story. There had been a recent flaking of paint from the two balusters she had mentioned and the square corners distinctly showed the marks of the twine. Furthermore, I could see for myself that there was some swelling above Miss Cunningham’s right ankle, and a weal which could be plainly discerned through her rayon stocking. It was also quite obvious that she had had a shock of some kind. She had tea with Mrs. Merridew yesterday, and there was no sign of it then. This afternoon she looked as if she had not slept all night, and it was plain that there was something on her mind. She was most kind in showing us over the house. I think she may even have been glad of something that would distract her thoughts, but she had difficulty in keeping them to the point, and on more than one occasion corrected herself in what she was saying.”
“You think an attempt was made to injure her?”
“I believe it may have been more serious than that. The stair is a steep one, and the hall is paved with stone. If she had lost her balance on the sixth step she would have had another fourteen steps to fall, and she would have pitched down them headfirst on to stone flags.”
“Who was in the house?”
“Her brother, Henry Cunningham, and her nephew Nicholas.”
“No one else?”
“No one else.”
After a pause he said,
“What makes you think it was Miss Cunningham who was aimed at? What about Henry wanting to get rid of Nicholas, or Nicholas wanting to get rid of Henry? That sort of thing has been known to happen.”
“Because I am convinced that Miss Cunningham herself believes it was she who was intended to fall, and her distress is occasioned by the conviction that either her brother or her nephew is attempting her life. There is the question of how she was to be induced to run down those stairs in such a hurry as to trip over the cord without noticing it. I do not think that a summons from below would have been risked. The next possibility which presents itself is a telephone call. The fixture is in the hall. Henry Cunningham will not speak on the telephone, so Mrs. Merridew informs me, and Nicholas only when the call is for him. It is, therefore, always Miss Cunningham who hastens to it in the first place. But to suppose a prearranged telephone call would be to assume an outside accomplice, a thing which would greatly increase the risks. How much easier and safer to place an ordinary alarm clock in the hall. It could be set to any hour of the night, and the bell would be indistinguishable from that of the telephone.”