Out of the Past

“My dear Frank! As I have already informed you, Mrs. Maybury has asked for my professional assistance. I have explained to her the terms on which it can be given, and Mrs. Hardwick has suggested that I should transfer my things from Sea View. Proximity with the members of the house-party and the opportunity which this will give for a more intimate observation than can be afforded by any casual meetings-”

He threw up his hands.

“Oh, yes-you will see them all from the inside! Which is just what we poor policemen never do. What we get is a carefully decorated outside with all the garbage tidied out of the way.”

Miss Silver allowed it to appear that she considered this metaphor to be lacking in refinement. Without a spoken word, Inspector Abbott stood rebuked. After a brief but impressive pause she said,

“There are certainly great advantages in being within the family circle. No one is always on his guard, or if he is observed to be so, it would in itself be a highly suspicious circumstance.”

He nodded.

“And that, as I said, is where you have the pull. Now will you tell me just what you make of Pippa Maybury’s story?”

Miss Silver dipped into her gaily flowered knitting-bag and produced a fresh ball of wool. She had hoped to finish this little pink coatee for her niece Dorothy’s expected baby from the one at present reposing in her lap, but since it was now reduced to a few filmy strands, she would have regretfully to break into a new ball. This would leave her with just too little for another coatee, but perhaps some small white stripes could be introduced. Her attention had not really wandered, but she now brought it fully back to the question she had been asked.

“What do you think of it yourself?”

One of the colourless eyebrows lifted slightly.

“Well, she is either such a natural born liar that she can reel it off without so much as having to stop and think, or-she is telling the truth.”

“Yes, I think so.”

“You think she is telling the truth?”

“Yes, Frank.”

“Would you mind telling me why?”

The pale grey needles clicked.

“She made no attempt to impress me. There were many points in her story where a very slight alteration of the facts would have shown her in a more favourable light, but I could detect no tendency in this direction. In the second place, she was shocked, upset, and frightened, but her chief preoccupation was not lest she should be arrested for murder, but whether her husband would come to know that she had once put herself in a very false position.”

“Well, I noticed that myself. We didn’t press her as to just what she had done, but it was plain that it had given Alan Field a hold over her. And that supplies her with a pretty strong motive for the murder.”

Miss Silver inclined her head.

“On the surface, yes. But actually I do not think so. She told me the whole story, which she need not have done, and the preoccupation of which I spoke was very noticeable. It was her husband of whom she was thinking. She really did not seem to notice that she was furnishing evidence which might deepen the suspicion against her. I should like to say that she did not carry her foolish behaviour to its logical conclusion- her real feelings for her husband stopped her in time. But she had placed herself in a position which could have been exploited by Alan Field.”

Frank whistled.

“He really had something on her then, and he was blackmailing her! She was terrified that he was going to tell her husband. She had an assignation with him at twenty past twelve in the beach hut where he was murdered, and she comes in some time after that with her dress soaked and drips blood all up the stairs. You know, my dear ma’am, it’s quite a formidable case.”

Miss Silver smiled.

“I do not need to point out to you that it would be extremely difficult to prove the blackmail.”

He laughed.

“As always, you touch the spot! Now let us for the moment adopt your view of the engaging Pippa and review the alternatives. This evidence about Mrs. Field’s paper-knife, which at first sight appears to fasten the crime upon someone in this house, quite fails to do so if we are to accept Pippa Maybury’s further evidence-and I’m afraid we’ve got to accept it, because it has quite a lot of backing. She says the dagger was sticking in the book Mrs. Field had down on the beach on Wednesday, Pages From the Lives of Great Victorians. This is corroborated by Mrs. Hardwick, Lady Castleton, Mrs. Trevor and by Mrs. Field herself.”

“As far as the morning is concerned, I can add my own testimony.”

“When it comes to the late afternoon, Mrs. Hardwick says the book was still there, and so does Mrs. Field. They left all their things there and locked the hut. Pippa Maybury says she saw the dagger there after midnight when she stumbled over Field’s body, and she also says that the book was there on the floor beside his outstretched hand. Which is perfectly true, because that is where it was when Colt arrived on the scene after being rung up by Colonel Anthony. So I think we have got to accept her evidence as to the dagger and the book. Which means that the dagger was there in the hut and could have been used by absolutely anyone who came along. Let us now see who that someone might have been.”

Miss Silver coughed.

“You are not, I suppose, forgetting Mr. Cardozo?”

“Certainly not. He shall be Provisional Suspect Number One. He could have done it of course. There was plenty of time between his leaving the Jolly Fishermen and midnight. He says, and Marie Bo

Miss Silver gazed at him in a meditative ma

“It would have been quite possible for him to be aware of Alan Field’s presence at the hut. He states that Marie returned to Sea View, remained there long enough for Miss A

“Yes, that’s possible. But how are we going to prove it if the girl sticks to her story?”

“I do not know.”

“Nor I. Let me offer you another suspect. What do you say to James Hardwick?”

“Dear me-you surprise me!”

“Well, I don’t often do that, so I had better make the most of it. Just take a look at him. Mrs. Hardwick was brought up with Field, and they were going to be married. He walked out on what was to have been their wedding day and went off in a hurry to South America, leaving quite a dust behind him. When Cardozo told me the name of the man he was after, I had heard it before. A couple of drinks with the biggest gossip of my acquaintance, and I knew a lot more. He was full of information about Alan Field. Had actually run into him on the eve of his departure. Said he was jingling with money and standing drinks all round. As the evening wore on, he got very chatty indeed and practically told my friend that it was being made well worth his while to clear out. George inferred that someone thought Carmona Leigh would be better off without him, and when she married James Hardwick three months later he came to the conclusion that he knew who that someone was. Now, do you see, if all that is true-and George really has got a knack of picking things up-Hardwick might not be altogether pleased to find that the prodigal had returned. He comes back on the Wednesday and finds Field actually in the house. There are indications that he was, well, let us say restrained in his greeting, and that Field left almost at once. The butler’s evidence is that Mrs. Hardwick had quite a colour, but was quiet at di