Patricia Wentworth: Wicked Uncle

Lamb said, “The two passages are directly opposite one another. You were looking right across the hall into the passage which runs over the drawing-room. I suppose it was lighted?”

“There was a light at the end, opposite Mr. Carroll’s room. I could see the whole of the passage. Miss Masterman knocked again, then she turned the handle and went in. She left the door open behind her. I went to the end of my own passage and turned out the light so that I could continue to watch without being seen. I had hardly done this before Miss Masterman came out again, still leaving the door open. She stood there in a very undecided manner, and I formed the opinion that Mr. Masterman was not in his room. After a little while she went back into the room, coming to the door every now and then and looking out. It was obvious that she intended to wait for her brother’s return. There did not then seem to be any reason for me to continue my watch. I went back to my room, and a few minutes later Pearson came to report Mr. Carroll’s telephone conversation with Mr. Oakley. I did not see Miss Masterman again till after the alarm had been given, when she came out of her room in her dressing-gown.”

“You think she may have seen something?”

Miss Silver coughed.

“I think she must have done so. Consider, Chief Inspector. She was there in her brother’s room, watching for him and very much on the alert. The door of the room was open. If anyone came out of Mr. Porlock’s room, she could scarcely avoid knowing who it was. A back stair comes up between Mr. Masterman’s room and that occupied by Mr. Carroll. If Mr. Masterman went down that stair, she must have seen him go. If Mr. Carroll used it, she probably saw him too. She was, in my opinion, almost at breaking-point after a long period of strain. She was desperately anxious to see her brother-perhaps desperately hoping that he would be able to reassure her. In these circumstances, do you think that anything would escape her?”

Lamb grunted.

“What’s she doing now?”

“When I went in to fetch Mrs. Tote she was sitting shivering by the fire. The room is very hot and she is warmly dressed, but she cannot stop shivering. If you question her, I think she will break down. The man is her brother, but he has murdered two men who stood in his way. When you come to inquire into the death of the old cousin from whom he inherited, it may be found that there is a third murder on his conscience. Miss Masterman’s trouble lies deep and is of long standing. She may have suspected what she did not dare to let herself believe. Now, I think, she knows, and if she knows she must speak, for everyone’s sake-even for her own. If Mr. Masterman suspected her knowledge, I believe that she would be in great danger. The man is a killer. He is crafty and skilful. No one who threatens his safety is safe. I believe that you will find his fingerprints on the telephone extension and on the billiard-room window below. I believe that they will correspond with those taken in the hall from the mantelpiece and staircase.”

Frank Abbott said, “She was right about those, sir. Hughes told me just now-they’re Masterman’s.”

Lamb turned a stolid gaze in his direction.

“And they don’t prove a thing,” he said.

The Chief Inspector shifted his gaze to Miss Silver, who continued to knit. After a moment he repeated his last remark.

“They don’t prove a thing, and you know it. Anyone staying in the house could have left those prints without having anything more to do with the murder than you-or me. Think of trying them on a jury-” he gave a short bark of laughter- “well, I see myself! I’ll go a step further. Say we find his prints on the extension in Porlock’s room-what does it prove? That he went in there and put through a call. Most likely everyone in the house telephoned some time today or yesterday. Masterman will say he used the nearest instrument. Say we find his prints on the billiard-room window-by all accounts he’s spent most of his time in that room since he came-he’ll say he opened the window to get a breath of air.”

Frank Abbott said, “It accumulates-doesn’t it, Chief? Even a jury might begin to think that there was rather too much Masterman.”

The gaze came back to him and became a repressive stare.

“If you’re going to count on a jury thinking, you’ll be heading for trouble. I’ve told you before, and I suppose I shall have to tell you again, that what a jury wants is facts-plain solid facts, with plain solid witnesses to swear to them. Juries don’t want to think, because they know just as well as you and me that they’re liable to think wrong. They don’t want to wake up in the night and wonder whether they were right or wrong when they voted guilty in a murder case-it’s the sort of thing that gets a man down. Juries want facts, so they can go home and say, ‘Well, he did it all right-there’s no doubt about that.’ ” He pushed back his chair. “Now what I’m going to do is this. There’s evidence enough against Oakley to justify taking him down to the station and charging him-”

“But, Chief, you said he couldn’t have done it.”

Lamb got to his feet.

“Never you mind what I said-I’m saying different now.”

Afterwards Frank Abbott was to wonder how much difference there had really been. Lamb could be deep when he liked. Frank came to the conclusion that he might, in retrospect, regard his Chief and Maudie as two minds with but a single thought.

Meanwhile the Chief Inspector was staring at Miss Silver, who responded with a faint, intelligent smile.

“It is considered a woman’s prerogative to change her mind, but I have never been able to see why a gentleman should not have the same privilege.”

She was putting away her knitting as she spoke, in the flowered chintz bag which had been a birthday gift from her niece Ethel. Ignoring Frank Abbott’s raised eyebrow, she followed the Chief Inspector from the room and across the hall.

In the drawing-room there was one of those silences. It must have been a quarter of an hour since anyone had spoken. Mr. Tote was in the armchair which he had occupied after dinner. He had a newspaper across his knees, but it was a long time since he had looked at it. Moira and Dorinda were on the sofa to the right of the fire, with Justin Leigh half sitting, half leaning, on the end next to Dorinda. On the opposite sofa Miss Masterman was in the place formerly occupied by Miss Silver, her thick duffle dressing-gown clutched about her. She held it to her in a straining clasp, as if to steady herself against a strong recurrent shudder.

In the other corner Mrs. Tote leaned back with her eyes shut.

There was no colour in her face except in the reddened eyelids. She kept thinking of Mrs. Oakley screaming out about Glen. It wouldn’t be hard to break her. If the police arrested Mr. Oakley and he was tried and hanged, she’d break all to bits- “And I’d have to stand up and swear to what I heard.” It was worse than the worst bad dream she had ever had. She kept her eyes tight shut so as not to look at Martin Oakley, who walked continually to and fro in the room like a creature in a cage.

Mr. Masterman was in the chair where his sister had sat after dinner shielding her face and thinking her thoughts. He sat easily and smoked one cigarette after another but without haste.

Moira Lane was smoking too. A little pile of cigarette stubs lay in the ash-tray balanced beside her on the padded sofa arm. Her colour was bright and high. Dorinda was very pale. She leaned into the corner, and was glad when Justin dropped his hand to her shoulder and left it there. It was warm, and it felt strong.

Police Constable Jackson, on a stiff upright chair by the door, was thinking about his sweet peas. He had sown them in the autumn in a sunk trench and they were all of four inches high, very hearty and promising. He was going to train each plant up a single string, and he aimed at taking a prize at the flower-show in July. Five on a stem, you got them that way-great strong stalks as thick as whipcord and twelve to fourteen inches long-whacking great flowers too. His imagination toyed with a gargantuan growth.