Ellis introduced himself and Gilkison, and her voice, as she acknowledged the introduction and asked them to sit down, strengthened the feeling that her appearance had given him. The voice was a deep contralto, but with a thread of harshness that marred its music and robbed it of warmth.
“Cigarette?”
She offered an elaborate wooden box. A thick, smooth bangle encircled her wrist.
“Neither of us smokes, thank you.”
“You don’t mind if I do?”
Ellis held a light for her. She was nervous, and needed the cigarette.
“I’ve been given the task of enquiring into the circumstances of Mr. Baildon’s death, Miss Caunter. I came here for quite another purpose, in my private capacity as a lover of books. Then—this happened.”
She drew strongly on her cigarette.
“It was an accident, wasn’t it?” she said.
“We should all like to think so. But I won’t conceal from you that there are one or two odd circumstances about it which, in the opinion of Scotland Yard, demand an enquiry.”
“That means,” she said, puffing between words, “in your opinion, doesn’t it?”
Ellis put a hand on each of his knees. He sat with his thick legs apart, facing her, upright, dogmatic.
“You see, Miss Caunter, the police force of this country has two main duties. The first is to prevent crime. If, in spite of them, a crime occurs, their job is to detect and punish those responsible for it. That means that we are on duty all the time. Our attention is continually being called to a hundred and one things which on investigation turn out not to be crimes at all. This may be one of them. But, if we didn’t look into each and every one, and if in the vast majority of cases we weren’t able to reassure people and show that no crime had been committed there would grow up such an atmosphere of uneasiness and suspicion that the public could never feel safe.”
“Yes,” she said. “I see that.”
“Good. Now, in a case like this, we don’t want—I’m sure you’ll agree with me—we don’t want formal police procedure, officers going round upsetting people and making them feel that things are all wrong. What we want is to get hold of a handful of really knowledgeable people on whose good sense we can rely, and have a series of quiet, personal talks with them, so as to find out the facts, and how things stand. And when I say ‘the facts,’ Miss Caunter, I don’t only mean times and places and who did what. I mean the facts of character and personality, of inclination and aversion: the atmosphere of the whole situation. I mean, in a word, the inner as well as the outer reality.”
She was listening to him closely. As he paused, she nodded.
“Yes,” she said.
“And that, Miss Caunter, is why I come to you. I come to you first of all, before anyone else in the place, because, like myself, you are a professional judge of character. More than that, you know, intimately, the persons concerned in this unfortunate situation. You can give us help that no one else can.
The girl took out her cigarette, eyed it for a moment, squinting a little as she did so, then looked steadily at Ellis.
“What help do you want?” she asked, “What do you want to know?”
“I want a picture of the family. Of their relations to each other and to those around them. You see, Miss Caunter, an outsider, coming in suddenly with no knowledge, will often seize on points which seem full of meaning to him, but which those who are really acquainted with the situation know are quite untypical, and perhaps misleading. I might call on you twice in three years, and each time you might have a cold in your nose. I’d get a picture of you as the girl with a cold in her nose: whereas those might have been the only two colds you’d had in the whole time.”
She smiled, as if she felt Ellis expected a smile; but she was still wary. Ellis bent forward.
“Look, Miss Caunter. Mr. Gilkison and I arrive here at an exceptional time in the history of the Baildons. Everyone who lives here is convinced that Mr. Baildon’s death must be an accident. We notice one or two things which might point another way. Only someone like yourself, who knows the family closely, can tell us whether these things are fortuitous and right out of the picture—accidental colds in the nose, so to speak—or whether they are regular features of the landscape.”
Eunice Caunter took out her cigarette again, and moistened her lips.
“What have you noticed?”
Ellis smiled, and shook his head.
“No, no. That’s not the right way round. If we start by focusing attention on them, we shan’t see the wood for the trees. Where you can help us best—where you can help the Baildons best—and, believe me, the two things are the same. The police are the allies of an innocent man, not his enemies—where you can help them best is by giving us as full a picture as possible of their family life.”
Still she hesitated, and once more squinted down at her cigarette.
“You said the police are the allies of an innocent man. Why did you put such an emphasis on the word?”
“Did I?”
“I thought so. Does that mean that Mrs. Baildon and Joan are suspected?”
“My dear Miss Caunter.” Ellis grimaced, and spread out his hands. “In a case like this, where no one is suspected, everyone is suspected. We don’t know what happened. If a crime was committed——”
“If Mr. Baildon was murdered, you mean.”
“If his death wasn’t an accident—I prefer to put it that way; there are various degrees before we get to murder—then anyone who could have got into the house might have had a hand in it. Anyone. A tradesman, an errand boy, the doctor, even. You see, it’s a ridiculous position. Nobody is suspected, because we have no definite evidence against anybody. Everybody is suspected, until we have definite evidence against somebody. That’s why we’ve come to you; as the best person to clear the ground for us, and start us off. There’s no catch in it. The more we know about the whole setup, the better. You can see that for yourself.”
With a decisive movement, she crushed her cigarette in the ash tray.
“It would be very cruel if anyone suspected Mrs. Baildon and Joan. Very cruel, and quite absurd.”
Ellis nodded encouragingly.
“For years, that poor woman has slaved to look after him. Joan, too, as soon as she was old enough. Two lives have been sacrificed to the comfort of that old beast: and not a spark of gratitude has either of them got for it. Life in that house has been perfect hell for those two. You can’t imagine it.”
Her breasts were rising and falling fast under the cherry coloured jumper. Her eyes flashed.
“I can make a pretty good guess,” Ellis said. “But that doesn’t tell me why it’s absurd to suspect them. Rather the reverse.”
“Rubbish!” she spat at him. “Mrs. Baildon did everything for that old devil. Got up in the night to fetch him things, coddled him, cosseted him, gave in to him in everything. Joan has more spirit. She’d have fought him back, and told him where he got off. But she held herself in for her mother’s sake, as much as she could. Remember, they were absolutely dependent on him, absolutely. Every penny they got they had to ask him for, and have doled out to them, like children. It was monstrous! the law shouldn’t allow such things.”
The harsh thread in her voice had grown strident. She was breathless with indignation. She sat back, grasping the arms of her chair.
“How they have put up with it all these years, I can’t imagine. I would have strangled the old devil long ago. Yes, I would! and I won’t mind you hearing me say it, or anyone else. If anyone did strangle him, they did a good day’s work, and I honour them. That’s what I say, and I don’t care whether it makes you suspect me or not.”
“It won’t have that effect,” Ellis assured her.