Patricia Wentworth - The Listening Eye

Miss Silver said clearly and firmly,

“What did he say?”

Paulina went on.

“He said, ‘It’s for tomorrow. The secretary leaves the bank with it at twelve noon. Nothing can be done whilst he is on the main road, but as soon as he turns into the lane, that will be the time. It should be quite easy. When I’ve got the stuff I meet you as arranged, and there we are.’ He stopped there, and the other man said something. I could see the muscle moving in his cheek, but I couldn’t see his lips. When he stopped, the first one said, ‘I’m not taking any chances of being recognized, and that’s final. Give me a clear stretch of the lane and no one on it to turn his head at a shot, and leave the rest to me.’ The other man spoke again, and the first one said, ‘I tell you I won’t touch it on any other terms. This way it’s a certainty.’ The other man put up his hand with a catalogue in it and said something, and the first one said, ‘Then there will be two of them for it, that’s all,’ and he laughed and got up and went over to look at one of the pictures. And I got up too and went away. I didn’t know what to think, I didn’t know what to do. I was afraid they would notice me. I went into a tea-shop and sat down. They were planning a robbery and a murder, and I felt I must do something to stop them. I felt better when I had had a cup of tea, and I went back to the gallery. Both the men had gone. I talked to old Mr. Pegler, the man in charge there. I said I thought I might have dropped a handkerchief near the seat where the two gentlemen were. He told me one of them had noticed my picture-it’s a very good likeness. Mr. Pegler said he had told the gentleman about my being deaf and about the lip-reading. He said I wouldn’t believe how interested he was.” Miss Silver was knitting quietly. She said, “Did Mr. Pegler imply that this man had recognized you as the original of the picture?”

“I am sure he recognized me. He pointed to the seat on which he had been sitting, and he said, ‘You don’t mean to say she could be standing over there and she could tell just what we were saying by looking at us?’ And Mr. Pegler said that he had heard Mr. Moray who had painted the picture put it that very way when he was talking to the gentleman who had bought it!”

“Mr. Moray’s name was mentioned?”

“Yes, it was.”

“But not your name?”

“No. It wouldn’t be difficult for him to find it out if he wanted to.”

Miss Silver supposed not. She said,

“You may have to tell this story to the police, but there is, of course, no means of identifying what was to be stolen, or in what locality the theft was to take place. Can you describe the two men?”

Paulina did her best. She had seen one of the men full-face, and the other in profile. One had had a drab raincoat, and the other a dark one. When she had described them, they sounded like any two men whom you would meet before you walked the length of any street in any part of London. All she could say was that she had seen them, that she remembered what she had seen, and that she would know them if she saw them again.

Miss Silver pulled on her pale blue ball.

“Miss Paine, do you think that you were followed after you left the gallery?”

“No-no-I don’t think so. You see, I had gone away first. It was only afterwards that one of them saw my picture and Mr. Pegler told him about my being deaf and about the lip-reading.”

“I see. And when you came here?”

Paulina looked at her oddly.

“Why do you ask that?”

“Why do you not answer what I asked you?”

“Because I’m not sure. The fact is, I’m not a nervous person, but I’ve behaved like one. I opened the front door to go out, and there was a taxi just beyond the Square with a man in it. He was just sitting there. I didn’t like it. I went back into the house, and I got Mrs. Mount who had the basement flat to come up and telephone for a taxi for me.”

“And did the other taxi follow you?”

“It came along after us. I think we lost it in the traffic, but I don’t know. One taxi looks very like another, and I couldn’t see the man’s face.”

Miss Silver said in a very thoughtful tone,

“Miss Paine, I think you should take your story to Scotland Yard.”

But Paulina shook her head.

“There’s nothing for the police to go on, is there? And you know how they would be about the lip-reading-they wouldn’t believe it could be done, and they would just think I had been making it up. People do that sort of thing to get themselves noticed. And even if they believed me, what could they do?”

Miss Silver spoke firmly,

“Nevertheless it is your duty to tell them.”

Paulina got to her feet.

“You have been very kind, but I think I have been foolish to speak of it at all, except that doing so has shown me how very little there is to go on. It is not like me, but I feel that in this case I have given way to a nervous impulse. I was startled, and I think perhaps I have made a mountain out of a molehill. The men may have been discussing the plot of a book or of a film. I may have been mistaken in a word or words which would alter the whole sense, and of course only one side of the conversation reached me.”

The rapidity with which these phrases sprang to her lips surprised her. Whereas all her energies had been bent upon reaching Miss Silver, she now desired nothing so much as to take leave of her without being pushed or persuaded into going to the police.

But if Paulina was surprised, Miss Maud Silver was not. It was not the first time that she had encountered the reaction which follows upon the shifting of a burden. In such a case there is very often an immediate sense of relief and a lessened sense of the importance of what has been described. She did not feel that there was anything she could do about it. It was possible that Miss Paine might return. But she could not force her to go to the police, she could only once more and with the utmost gravity advise her to do so.

Paulina shook her head.

“Talking to you like this has done me good. It was most kind of you to see me. It is of course a professional visit, and you must let me know what I owe you.”

“For advising you to go to the police? My dear Miss Paine, since I have done nothing more than that, you do not owe me anything at all. You will let me ring up for a taxi?”

But Paulina said no to that too. The evening was fine, her spirits had risen. She felt quite convinced that any idea that she might have been followed was a trick of the imagination. She said goodbye with a smile and went down the stairs and out into Marsham Street.

MISS SILVER stood at the window and watched Paulina Paine until she was out of sight. This was quite soon, because she took the first turning to the left, which would bring her out upon a busy bus route. She was uneasy. She did not know when she had felt more uneasy about a case on which she could not really be said to be engaged. Miss Paine had reached out for help, refused to be guided by her advice, and then gone away, leaving nothing between them except the words which, once spoken, could not be taken back. She looked down at the people passing along the opposite pavement, half a dozen perhaps, who had gone by since Miss Paine had done so-an elderly man, a young one, two middle-aged women, a young girl, a man in a black felt hat. From opposite the side street a man crossed over. He turned off as Paulina Paine had done. So did the two women, the young girl, and the man in the black felt hat. When she had watched them out of sight Miss Silver sat down at her writing-table. But she did not immediately go back to her interrupted letter. There was a moment when she picked up the pen she had laid aside to greet Miss Paine, but it was almost immediately set down again. A few moments passed during which she finally made up her mind to an unwonted course of conduct. A client’s confidences were sacred, but in a case where a violent crime might be contemplated there must be an over-riding public duty. She put out her hand to the telephone, dialled Scotland Yard, and asked to speak to Chief Inspector Lamb.