Patricia Wentworth - The Case of William Smith

‘What did Emily say?’

Abby wasn’t eating at all. She folded her hands in her lap and looked at him.

‘I’m going to tell you. But you’ve got to make up your mind to look at it the way you would if it wasn’t Emily. You’ve got to judge righteous judgment, Abel, and not just think the way you want to. You’ve never liked Emily, but you’re a just man, and you’ve not got to let it weigh with you. You’ve got to judge the way you would if I was telling you this about somebody else.’

Abel wagged his head.

‘That’s not possible, Abby. You’ve got to judge people according to what you know about them. There’s things I know about Emily. If I’ve got to use my judgment about her, it’s no use telling me I’ve got to put those things out of my head, because I don’t believe the Lord means us to do that, and anyhow it can’t be done. But I’ll do my best to be fair.’

Abigail gave a quiet sigh. Abel always had been set in his ways. She said,

‘Well, I’ll tell you. And you mustn’t make too much of it, for she was clean out of her head. She woke up crying out, and when I went to her she didn’t know me – only stared and said, “I did it – I did it.” So I said, “I’ll get you a drink, my dear.” But when I came back with it she was talking nineteen to the dozen. All a lot of rubbish it sounded like.’

The picture came up in her mind as she spoke – Emily wild enough to frighten you, with her eyes fixed and burning, and a hot, shaking hand. She hadn’t been frightened at the time – she had known too many sick people for that – but when she looked back it frightened her a little more each time.

‘What did she say, Abby?’

She could give the words, but she could never give the horrid way they had come – sometimes in a cold whisper that chilled your blood, sometimes, and quite suddenly, in a scream which made you feel thankful there wasn’t anyone else in the house. Under that habitual look of calm Abigail Salt was deeply perturbed. She said in her quiet voice,

‘She was angry about your will.’

‘She had no call to know anything about it.’

Abigail nodded.

‘She heard you telling me. I couldn’t get her to see, that it was all right for me, and nothing to do with her. She’s got the kind of mind that takes hold of things and can’t let go. She got worked up to feel that William Smith was doing me an injury – and her.’

Abel continued to eat buttered toast. He said with angry contempt,

‘She’s crazy! You’re not telling me what she said.’

Abigail sighed again.

‘I’m trying to make you understand.’

He pushed over his cup, and she filled it. Even with the trouble she was in, she took care that it should be just to his liking. If it came to that, she wasn’t in any hurry to tell him what Emily had said. She wouldn’t be telling him at all if it wasn’t that her conscience wouldn’t let her hold it back.

He sipped from his newly filled cup, fixed his eyes upon her severely, and said,

‘Now, Abby.’

Miss Silver had had a busy two days. On Saturday morning, after a short telephone conversation, she put on her hat and coat and went round to New Scotland Yard, where she was received by Sergeant Abbott and presently conducted by him into the presence of Chief Detective Inspector Lamb.

Frank Abbott, as always, derived a sardonic amusement from the ensuing ritual. Having met as old friends, with a hearty handshake on one side and a ladylike one on the other, Miss Silver hoped that the Chief Inspector was well, and enquired after his family.

‘And Mrs. Lamb? I trust she is in very good health… And your daughters? Lily’s little boy must be at a most delightful age.’

His daughters were the Chief Inspector’s weakness. He permitted himself to expatiate on the infant talents of little Ernie.

‘They would call him after me, and they say he looks like me too, poor little beggar.’

Miss Silver beamed.

‘He could not, I am sure, have a worthier ambition. And your second daughter, Violet? Her engagement – ’

Lamb shook his head.

‘Broken off-and just as well, if you ask me. Naval officer and a nice enough chap, but when he’d been away two years and come back they didn’t want to go on with it. She’s got a good confidential job at the Admiralty, and too many friends to want to make up her mind again in a hurry.’

‘And Myrtle?’

His youngest daughter was the core of Lamb’s heart.

‘Wants to train as a nurse,’ he said. ‘Her mother worries over it. Thinks she’ll catch something, but I tell her nurses don’t.’

Miss Silver opined that it was a noble profession. They came to business with a ‘Well now, what can we do for you?’ and one of her delicate coughs.

Seated in an upright chair, her own back as straight, her neatly shod feet in black woollen stockings and Oxford shoes planted side by side upon the office carpet, her hands in their black knitted gloves folded in the lap of a well worn cloth coat, a little tippet of elderly yellowish fur about her neck, and a hat of several years’ standing enlivened by a bunch of purple pansies on her head, Miss Silver gave her whole attention to the case of William Smith.

‘I find myself in a difficult situation,’ she said.

‘Well, what can we do to help you?’

This was Lamb at his most accessible. There had been times in the past when it was he who had been the recipient of help which, however tactfully proffered, had slightly ruffled his temper and their relations. It was not disagreeable to have Miss Silver asking for assistance.

She said, ‘You are so kind,’ and then got briskly to her case.

‘I have some reason to believe that an elderly clerk of the name of Davies was murdered on the seventh of December last. The death followed on a street accident after which he was taken to hospital and is said not to have recovered consciousness. I believe that he was pushed. Here is a memorandum of his place of employment, his private address, and the hospital to which he was taken. I should like to know whether he said anything at all before he died, and I should like to see a transcript of the evidence at the inquest.’

Lamb turned his eyes upon her. Brown in colour and slightly protuberant, they had been compared by his irreverent subordinate to the sweets known as bull’s eyes. He asked,

‘Why do you think he was murdered?’

‘He had just recognized someone who had been missing for seven years, and whose return may prove to be a serious embarrassment to the firm for which he was working.’

The Chief Inspector’s face assumed a tolerant expression.

‘Well now, I should call that a bit far-fetched. There are quite enough accidents to elderly people without calling in murder to account for them.’

Miss Silver coughed.

‘That is very true. But in this case the life of the person recognised by Mr. Davies has been attempted, certainly on three, and possibly on a fourth occasion. One of these attempts was witnessed by Sergeant Abbott.’

Lamb shifted in his chair, brought a refrigerating gaze to bear upon that elegant young man, and said in tones of disfavour,

‘So you’re mixed up in this, are you? I might have known it!’

‘Well, sir – ’

Miss Silver interposed.

‘Permit me, Chief Inspector – ’

She presented the case of William Smith in as short and concise a manner as was possible – the loss of memory and identity; the recognition by Mr. Davies, by Katharine, by Frank Abbott; Mr. Tattlecombe’s ‘accident’; the first and second attacks on William; the tampering with the wheel of his car.

When she had finished Frank took up the tale. He described the attack, telling the Chief Inspector, as he had told Miss Silver, that he was convinced a second blow had been intended, and that in the circumstances it would almost certainly have proved fatal.