Frank Abbott’s colourless eyebrows rose. He gazed at an upper shelf of the book-lined walls, where the Waverley Novels had stood unread these sixty years except by Julia Vane, and said,
“Doctor’s daughter, wasn’t she?”
Nothing could have been more casual, but Lamb looked at him hard.
“What do you mean by that?”
“Village doctor’s daughter. Village doctors usually dispense their own drugs. I was wondering what happened to the late Mercer’s stuff-the morphia, you know. Smerdon says he took away a medicine-chest out of Miss Mercer’s room-the police surgeon was going to go through it. I asked what about fingerprints, and he was inclined to be huffy- said of course they’d thought of that-been over everything before they turned it over to the surgeon. I asked what they’d found, and he said he hadn’t had time to check up, but he’d let us have the results this evening.”
He got up as he spoke and wandered to the farther of the two windows. One looked upon the terrace, the other commanded a view of the drive and its approach to the front of the house. It was from this window that Frank Abbott watched the progress of a car which was coming slowly up the winding drive-Antony Latter’s car, with Antony Latter at the wheel. A clump of shrubs obscured the passenger beside him. The car emerged from the shrubs. Frank Abbott gave a long, low whistle. The car passed out of sight. He turned round with a gleam in his eye and said drily,
“Latter went to meet someone at Weston, but nobody told us who it was. Now we know.”
The Chief Inspector stared. His mind, which Frank had once irreverently compared with a tram, ran very efficiently upon its own lines but was not equipped for a rapid side step. He was considering morphia in connection with Miss Mercer and a village dispensary. Antony Latter and the person he had been meeting at Weston constituted an intrusion. They broke the thread of his thoughts. He stared, took hold rather angrily of Frank’s last words, and said,
“So now we know? What are you talking about?”
“Maudie,” said Sergeant Abbott.
The purple colour rose in Lamb’s cheeks. His eyes bulged.
“Not Maud Silver!”
Frank smiled maliciously.
“The one and only Maudie,” he said.
CHAPTER 20
Miss Silver heard the schoolroom door close behind her. That was Mr. Antony going away, an action she very much approved. She always preferred to be alone with a client, and in a case like this it was more than usually desirable.
Jimmy Latter was sitting at the schoolroom table. He had lifted his head from his hands when his cousin opened the door and said her name, but he had made no attempt to rise. She came forward with her hand out, saying, “How do you do, Mr. Latter?” and after a moment’s hesitation he took it. She was not prepared for a grip that was both painful and prolonged. She released herself at what she considered a suitable moment and took a chair on the other side of the table. He continued to stare at her with red-rimmed eyes which had a lost, bewildered look. His first words were those which he had used to her on the telephone.
“You said it was a trick-but she died. She’s dead, you know-last night. It seems much longer ago than that. Why did you say it was a trick? She’s dead.”
She looked at him kindly.
“Yes, Mr. Latter. I am deeply sorry for you. Since you have asked me to come down here, it seems that you think I can help you.”
He shook his head.
“Nobody can help me,” he said.
“Then why did you send for me, Mr. Latter?”
He put up a hand and rubbed his nose-the old gesture, but with something forlorn about it.
“I want it cleared up-I want to know how it happened. The police are here-from Scotland Yard. They seem to think-I don’t know what they think-” His voice trailed away.
Miss Silver looked at him very directly. She said in a clear, firm voice which held his attention,
“Mr. Latter, will you listen to me? I should like to help you. I will do so if I can. You say you want to know how this thing happened. That is, you desire to know the truth. Sometimes the truth is painful. It may be so in this case. Remember that there will be police officers in charge. If your wife did not die a natural death, I may be able to be of some assistance in discovering how it came about, but I can give no pledge that what I discover will not be painful to you, nor can I undertake to conceal any material evidence from the police. Do you really wish me to take the case?”
He said doggedly, “I want it cleared up.” And then, “It wasn’t natural. They say it was morphia-an overdose of morphia. She didn’t take things like that-she never took them. If she took it herself, it was done on purpose. If someone else did it, then she was murdered. It’s got to be cleared up.”
Those red-rimmed eyes had not moved from her face. They looked as if they had forgotten how to sleep. There were marks like bruises under them. All the rest of the skin had the ghastly pallor of a normally fair, freshly coloured complexion from which the blood was withdrawn. He kept his eyes on her and said without any change of voice,
“You see, I’ve got to know whether I killed her.”
In her time Miss Silver had heard more than one startling confession. She appeared undisturbed, though the gravity of her expression deepened. She said in a quiet voice,
“Would you like to tell me just what you mean by that?”
He nodded.
“That’s why I wanted you here. The police don’t care about that part of it, but it’s what matters to me. I’ve got to know whether I killed her.”
Miss Silver coughed.
“That has a strange sound, Mr. Latter.”
He nodded again.
“Yes, I suppose it has. You see, we had quarrelled. It hadn’t ever happened before. I don’t suppose that many people who have been married two years can say that. But all I ever wanted was for her to be happy and have things the way she liked them.”
“What did you quarrel about?”
He ran a hand through his hair and said vaguely,
“It was about one of the cottages. It must have been a misunderstanding, because she told me old Hodson wanted to go and live with his daughter-in-law in London. But it seems he didn’t, and of course I couldn’t turn him out-his family has always lived there. Lois was vexed because she’d promised the cottage to some friends of hers-for week-ends. Of course it was just that she didn’t understand. But she was angry with me-that’s how it all began.”
“Yes, Mr. Latter?”
He rumpled his hair again, thrusting nervously at it as if it was something that he would like to brush away. He said,
“Something happened after that. It’s not easy to tell you, but I’ve got to. The police know about it, because there was a girl who listened at the door-Joe Marsh’s wife. She’s no good, and I’m sorry for him. I don’t know what Lois saw in her, but she would have her here. I never cottoned to her myself-and she listened at the door-”
“What door, Mr. Latter?”
His eyes shifted. They looked past her.
“My cousin Antony ’s-the one who met you. He came down on business. I asked him to-made rather a point of it-so he was here. It was just after the quarrel. Lois was angry. She must have been very angry, or she wouldn’t have done it. Antony says so, and I think he’s right.”
Miss Silver coughed.
“What did she do?”
“I think she wanted to make me angry by flirting with him. He’d been in love with her, you know, but she refused him and she married me. I’m sure I don’t know why- Antony ’s a much better chap. I don’t want you to think any of it was his fault, because that wouldn’t be fair. He asked her to marry him, and she said no, and that was the end of it as far as he was concerned. He went away and got over it, and-well, now he’s engaged to someone else-to Julia-Julia Vane, you know.”