“It has been reported,” said Miss Emily. “And I have invited you to proceed.”
“The method, if you will pardon me, Miss Pride, has not been normal. It is not usual to call a meeting on such an occasion.”
“Evidently, I have not made myself clear. I have called the meeting in order that the persons who could have effected an entry into this room, by the means I have indicated, may be given an opportunity of clearing themselves.”
This pronouncement had a marked but varied effect upon her audience. Patrick Ferrier’s eyebrows shot up and he glanced at Jenny, who made a startled grimace. Mrs. Barrimore leaned forward in her chair and looked, apparently with fear, at her husband. He, in his turn, had become purple in the face. The Mayor’s habitual expression of astonishment was a caricature of itself. Dr. Mayne scrutinized Miss Emily as if she were a test case for something. The Rector ran his hands through his hair and said: “Oh, but surely…”
Superintendent Coombe, with an air of abstraction, stared in front of him. He then produced his notebook and contemplated it as if he wondered where it had sprung from.
“Now, just a minute!” he said.
“I must add,” said Miss Emily, “that Miss Jenny Williams may at once be cleared. She very kindly called for me, assisted me downstairs, and to my knowledge remained in the dining-room throughout luncheon, returning to my table to perform the same kind office. Do you wish to record this?”
He opened his mouth, shut it again and actually made a note.
“It will perhaps assist the inquiry if I add that Major Barrimore did not come into the dining-room at all, that Mrs. Barrimore left it five minutes before I did, and that Mr. Patrick Ferrier was late in arriving there. They will no doubt wish to elaborate.”
“By God!” Major Barrimore burst out. “I’ll be damned if I do! By God, I’ll—”
“No, Keith! Please!” said his wife.
“You shut up, Margaret.”
“I suggest,” Patrick said, “that on the whole it might be better if you did.”
“Patrick!” said the Rector. “No, old boy.”
Superintendent Coombe came to a decision.
“I’ll ask you all for your attention, if you please,” he said and was successful in getting it. “I don’t say this is the way I’d have dealt with the situation,” he continued, “if it had been left to me. It hasn’t. Miss Pride has set about the affair in her own style, and has put me in the position where I haven’t much choice but to take up the inquiry on her lines. I don’t say it’s a desirable way of going about the affair, and I’d have been just as pleased if she’d had a little chat with me first. She hasn’t, and that’s that. I think it’ll be better for all concerned if we get the whole thing settled and done with, by taking routine statements from everybody. I hope you’re agreeable.”
Patrick said quickly: “Of course. Much the best way.”
He stood up. “I was late for lunch,” he said, “because I was having a drink with George Pender in the bar. I went direct from the bar to the dining-room. I didn’t go near the office. What about you, Mama?”
Mrs. Barrimore twisted her fingers together and looked up at her son. She answered him as if it were a matter private to them both. “Do you mean, what did I do when I left the dining-room? Yes, I see. I–I went into the hall. There was a crowd of people from the bus. Some of them asked about — oh, the usual things. One of them seemed — very unwell — and I took her into the lounge to sit down. Then I went across to the old house. And—”
Dr. Mayne said: “I met Mrs. Barrimore as she came in. I was in the old house. I’d called to have a word with her about Miss Pride. To learn if she was”—he glanced at her—“if she was behaving herself,” he said drily. “I went into the old bar-parlour. Major Barrimore was there. I spoke to him for a minute or two, and then had a snack lunch in the new bar. I then visited a patient who is staying in the hotel, and at 2:30 I called on Miss Pride. I found her busy at the telephone, summoning this meeting. At her request I have attended it.”
He had spoken rapidly. Mr. Coombe said: “Just a minute, if you please, Doctor,” and they were all silent while he completed his notes. “Yes,” he said at last. “Well, now. That leaves His Worship, doesn’t it, and—”
“I must say,” Mr. Nankivell interrupted, “and say it I do and will — I did not anticipate, when called upon at a busy and inconvenient time, to be axed to clear myself of participation in a damn fool childish prank. Further, I take leave to put on record that I look upon the demand made upon me as one unbecoming to the office I have the honour to hold. Having said which, I’ll thank you to make a note of it, Alf Coombe. I state further that during the first part of the period in question I was in the Mayoral Chambers at the execution of my duties, from which I moved to the back office of my butchery, attending to my own business, which is more than can be said of persons who shall, for purposes of this discussion, remain nameless.”
Mr. Coombe made a short note: “In his butchery,” and turned to the Rector.
“I’ve been trying to think,” said Mr. Carstairs. “I’m not at all good at times and places, I fear, and it’s been a busy day. Let me see. Oh, yes! I visited the cottages this morning. Actually, the main object was to call on that wretched Mrs. Trehern — things have been very much amiss, there, it’s a sad case — and one or two other folk on the Island. I don’t know when I walked back, but I believe I was late for lunch. My wife, I daresay, could tell you.”
“Did you come up to the Boy-and-Lobster, sir?”
“Did I? Yes, I did. As a matter of fact, Miss Pride, I intended to call on you, to see if you were quite recovered, but the main entrance was crowded and I saw that luncheon had begun so — I didn’t, you see.”
“You went home, sir?” asked the Superintendent.
“Yes. Late.”
Mr. Coombe shut his notebook. “All right,” he said, “so far as it goes. Now, in the normal course of procedure these statements would be followed up; and follow them up I shall, which takes time. So unless anyone has anything further to add — Yes, Miss Pride?”
“I merely observe, Superintendent, that I shall be glad to support you in your investigations. And to that end,” she added, in the absence of any sign of enthusiasm, “I shall announce at once that I have arrived at my own conclusion. There is, I consider, only one individual to whom these outrages may be attributed, and that person, I firmly believe, is—”
The telephone rang.
It was at Miss Emily’s elbow. She said, “T’ch!” and picked it up. “Yes? Are you there?” she asked.
A treble voice, audible to everybody in the room, asked:
“Be that Miss Emily Pride?”
“Speaking.”
“You leave us be, Miss Emily Pride, or the Lady will get you. You’ll be dead as a stone, Miss Emily Pride.”
“Who is that?”
The telephone clicked and began to give the dial tone.
Patrick said: “That was a child’s voice. It must have been—”
“No,” said Miss Emily. “I think not. I have an acute ear for phonetics. It was an assumed accent. And it was not a child. It was the voice of Miss Elspeth Cost.”
IV
Fiasco
The persons taking part in the Festival celebrations assembled at four o’clock on Saturday at the foot of the hill in Fisherman’s Bay. There were a company of little girls wearing green cheesecloth dresses and stars in their hair, about a dozen larger girls, similarly attired, and a few small boys in green cotton smocks. In the rear of this collection came Wally Trehern, also smocked, with his hair sleeked down and a bewildered expression on his face. His hands were noticeably clean. The Mayor and City Councillors and other local dignitaries were yet to come.