Justin looked at her straight and said,
“Did she kill Porlock?”
Dorinda’s eyes became quite round.
“Oh-she wouldn’t!”
He said, “I don’t know about that.”
Chapter XXVIII
Miss Maud Silver arrived at tea-time in the black cloth coat, the elderly fur tippet, and the black felt hat with its purple starfish in front and its niggle of purple and black ruching behind. Having partaken of what she described as a most refreshing cup of tea, she was conducted to her room, where she removed her outer garments and had a conversation with Dorinda.
“It’s very good of you to come.”
Miss Silver smiled.
“It is certainly more suitable that I should be here with you than that you should be here alone… My room is next to yours? That is nice, very nice indeed. And now, Miss Brown, tell me just what happened on Saturday night.”
When Dorinda had finished Miss Silver coughed and said, “Very clear, very succinct.” She looked at the watch she wore pinned on the left-hand side of her bodice. “And now I think I will go down. Sergeant Abbott said he would be here by five o’clock, and it is just on the hour.”
Sergeant Abbott was punctual. He rang the front door bell as they came down the stairs, greeted Miss Silver a good deal more like a nephew than a policeman, and carried her off to the study, leaving Dorinda conscious for the first time that he was not only a very personable young man but quite human.
Inside the study he was less like a policeman than ever. He put an affectionate arm round Miss Silver as he guided her to a comfortable chair, after which he took an informal seat on the arm of another.
“It’s a good thing you rang me up,” he said. “The Chief was hopping mad at first, but I’ve got him soothed. The fact is, there are just about half a dozen people up to their necks in this case- and when I say up to their necks I mean up to their necks. And any blighted one of them could have knifed Gregory Porlock- and had every reason to.”
Miss Silver said, “Dear me!” She had brought down a flowery chintz knitting-bag, the gift of her niece Ethel. She opened it now and took out a half-made infant’s vest in the pale pink wool which she had bought on the occasion of her visit to the De Luxe Stores. The four needles clicked. The vest revolved without detracting in any way from the attention with which she was regarding Frank.
He nodded.
“As you say-‘Dear me!’ it is. One might almost call it the theme-song. I take it you know more or less what happened on Saturday night?”
“Miss Brown has given me a commendably clear account.”
“Would you like to read the statements first? They won’t take you very long. The Chief let me bring them, after blowing off the customary steam.”
Miss Silver laid down her knitting and perused the typewritten sheets in a silence which he did not attempt to interrupt. When she looked up from the last word he had another sheaf to offer her.
“These are my notes of the various interviews. There’s quite a lot of information in them.”
She read these too.
“It all fits very well into the framework given me by Miss Brown.”
“Yes, she’s got a head on her shoulders, and in spite of being the late unlamented’s sole legatee she is one of the few people who isn’t a suspect. Now for the ones who are. I’ve tabulated them for you, and you’ll see how nice and simple it all is. Here we go.”
He handed her some more of his neat typing and leaned over her shoulder to read aloud, with occasional excursions in the nature of comment or explanation.
“1. Leonard Carroll. Cabaret artist. Clever, slick, thoroughly unreliable.”
Miss Silver coughed gently.
“I have met him.”
“In fact you have him taped! Well, he had a very compelling motive. Porlock was blackmailing him. Their conversation was overheard by Pearson-you know about him. He was here to try and get something on Porlock because Porlock was blackmailing a client of his firm. The Chief knows him, and says he’s all right. He was doing all the listening at doors he could, and as he said himself, a butler really has excellent opportunities. Well, Pearson heard Porlock talking to Carroll. He told him he had evidence that he had given information to the enemy when he was out at the front with a concert-party in ’forty-five. Carroll went right off the deep end-very much rattled, very abusive. You’ve had that-it’s in my notes. An hour or two later Porlock is knifed. Now if you look at this plan of the hall you can see where everyone was when Justin Leigh turned on the lights. It’s his plan, and nobody disputes it. Gregory Porlock’s body was lying with the feet a couple of yards from the newel-post at the bottom of the stairs. He had gone over there from the group about the hearth, and just before the lights went out he had turned round and was coming back. That is to say, at the time he was stabbed he was facing the hearth and had his back to the staircase and the drawing-room door. If you look at the plan you will see that Carroll was on the stairs, third step from the top, and Tote was in the drawing-room doorway. Now, taking Carroll as the murderer, the theory is that on his way up to wash after impersonating the devil in his charade he left a spot of luminous paint on Porlock’s back as he passed, and subsequently turned out the hall lights from the top of the stairs. He then slid down the banisters, stabbed Porlock right in the middle of the bright spot, and got back upstairs a couple of steps at a time. It could have been done. There were no fingerprints on the dagger. He may have worn a glove, or he may have taken a moment to wipe it clean.”
Miss Silver gave her slight cough.
“What about the switch?”
“Wiped clean. And that’s one of the most damning bits of evidence against Carroll. A switch like that ought to have been a perfect smother of everybody’s fingerprints. It was as clean as a whistle. Why should anyone have wiped it? Well, there’s only one answer to that, and only one person who had a motive for doing it-the person who turned out the lights. If it was Carroll-and I don’t see that anyone else was in a position to reach that switch-then Carroll is the murderer. So much for him. Now we come to Tote. Porlock was blackmailing him over activities on the black market. One of our leading operators. He was by all accounts very angry. Now, as you will have gathered, Tote wasn’t one of the party who went out to play the charade. He stayed behind in the drawing-room with Porlock, Miss Masterman, Justin Leigh, and Dorinda Brown. What we don’t know is whether he went on staying behind after the others came out to do audience in the dark hall. He says he did. Nobody else says anything at all. Gregory Porlock was last out of the room. He was the only person who would know for certain whether Tote followed him. He could have followed him. He could have marked him with the luminous paint. Everyone in the party knew the pot was standing handy in the cloakroom. And he could have crossed the hall without being seen and lurked behind the service door until the charade was over and everyone was moving about. Then he would only have needed to open the door a very little way in order to put out the lights. Of course there’s no proof that he did anything of the sort-that switch has an absolute crisscross of fingerprints. And when Leigh turned on the lights from over by the outer door, Tote was in the open drawing-room doorway, apparently about to emerge into the hall. Look at the plan.”