The Gazebo (16 page)

FRANK ABBOTT HAD been gone about half an hour when a knock upon the front door took Miss Silver into the hall to open it. There was a young man standing in the porch with a bunch of pink carnations in his hand. He was good-looking in rather an obtrusive sort of way, and he had the air of being very well pleased with himself. He was in fact Mr Fred Worple, and he had called to see Miss Althea Graham. He imparted these facts in a negligent manner and advanced a step as if he had no doubt that he would be admitted.

Miss Silver stood where she was.

‘I am afraid Miss Graham is not able to see visitors.’

‘It’s been a shock,’ said Mr Worple. ‘Well, of course it would be, wouldn’t it? But not a bit of good shutting herself up, is it? She wants to see her friends and get brightened up a bit. You just go and ask her whether she won’t see me.’

Miss Silver looked at him in a thoughtful manner. Then she said,

‘Miss Graham is resting. You are a friend of the family?’

‘I’ll say I am – and a very good friend too. Come, it’ll do her good to see me.’

Miss Silver stepped back.

‘I am afraid that you will not be able to do that. But if you would care to come in for a moment…’ She led the way to the dining-room.

When the door was shut upon them she moved in the direction of the hearth and remained there standing.

‘Miss Graham has mentioned your name, Mr Worple. She tells me that you wish to settle in Grove Hill, and that you had made Mrs Graham an offer for this house.’

‘That’s right. And a very good offer it was. Here, are you a relation?’

It would be difficult to find anyone more competent than Miss Silver to check a tone of impertinent familiarity. It was, in fact, an art in which she might be said to excel. Chief Inspector Lamb himself, though never a willing offender, had been known to blench. Yet for the moment Mr Fred Worple was spared. She replied quietly,

‘I am staying with Miss Graham as a friend. Does Mrs Graham’s death alter your plans with regard to the house?’

He had followed her to the hearth and was now lounging against the mantelpiece, the pink carnations dangling from his hand.

‘Oh, well, I don’t know. As a matter of fact there was someone else after it, and I had rather given up the idea. Murder – well, it does rather put you off, doesn’t it? Of course it ought to bring down the price a good bit. I shouldn’t think the girl would want to stay on here – not after what has happened.’

‘I do not know at all what Miss Graham’s plans may be.’

Fred Worple laughed.

‘If she knows what’s good for her she’ll take what she can get for the place and clear out!’

The fire in the grate had been laid but not lighted. Miss Silver looked down in a thoughtful manner at the paper, the sticks, and the coal.

‘I suppose these houses are not very old?’ she said.

‘Oh, about fifty years or so. My old dad – stepfather he was really – he used to say he remembered all this part before it was built over. Part of the old Grove Hill Estate it was.’

‘There must have been quite a good view from the top of the garden then. I suppose that is why the summerhouse was built there. Miss Graham calls it a gazebo. She seems to think it might be older than the house.’

His foot slipped from the kerb.

‘Oh, I don’t know – I never took that much interest. I used to think I’d like to live in a house like this – used to pass it coming out this way and think, “Well, I’d like to live there,” the way kids do. But I’m not so sure now – not after what has happened. Not unless it was going for a song.’ He straightened up. ‘Look here, be a sport and tell Miss Graham I’m here. Tell her it’ll do her good to see someone who isn’t mixed up in all this, and say I brought her these flowers.’

Miss Silver shook her head.

‘I am afraid it is no good, Mr Worple. Miss

Graham is asleep, and I could not possibly wake her.’

Althea woke refreshed. Her reactions on being shown the pink carnations sent by Mr Worple were very much what Miss Silver had expected.

‘He’s a dreadful person – he really is. He just pushed himself in with his offer for the house. Mr Jones – he is the other house-agent – hadn’t any business to let him come up here. We hadn’t put the house in his hands – we have always dealt with Mr Martin. Mr Blount, the other man who wanted to buy it, came up from him. Mr Martin shouldn’t really have sent him either, but he did have some excuse, because I’m afraid my mother let him think we’d be open to a really good offer.’

Miss Silver appeared to be very much interested.

‘It seemed to me that Mr Worple wished to find out whether you would now be prepared to sell the house. He wished to make me believe that he was no longer interested from a personal point of view, but I did not find his manner at all convincing. He is a forward and pushing person, but he appeared to be ill at ease.’

Althea said, ‘He is quite dreadful!’

They were having tea when Nicholas Carey rang the front door bell. Rightly considering that her presence could now be dispensed with, Miss Silver put on her coat and hat and went out. Arriving at Warren Crescent, she turned off there and proceeded along it into Warren Road. The houses here stood in gardens of between three-quarters of an acre and an acre and a half. The Hollies, which as the telephone-book informed her had the privilege of sheltering the Miss Pimms, occupied one of the larger plots. It had three storeys and a large Victorian conservatory. The holly bushes from which it took its name had been cut into the shapes of birds and beasts, but with time and diminishing care they had become less and less agreeable to the eye. Miss Silver regarded them with distaste as she turned in at the gate and ascended four wide steps to the porch. She rang the bell, and the door was presently opened by Lily Pimm. That was of course the drawback about having only a daily maid. The Miss Pimms could remember the time when The Hollies was served by a resident cook, parlourmaid, and housemaid, not to mention a woman once a week to scrub the floors and a boy for the boots and knives and to help in the garden, where there was of course a whole-time gardener. Now there was only Doris Wills, and Doris left at half past two. The Miss Pimms greatly disliked opening their own front door, and Mabel and Nettie combining in the matter, it had become one of the tasks allotted to Lily, the only drawback being that if it was a pedlar or someone collecting for a charity she was quite unable to say no.

She now stood gazing blankly at Miss Silver with the door in her hand. Miss Silver smiled.

‘Miss Lily Pimm? We met a few hours ago at The Lodge, where I am staying with Miss Althea Graham. My name is Silver – Miss Maud Silver.’

Lily brightened.

‘Oh, yes – but you’ve got a hat on now.’

Mabel Pimm appeared in the drawing-room doorway. She directed a caustic look at Lily, and changed it quickly to a smile of welcome for the guest.

‘Oh, Miss Silver, do pray come in! How good of you to call!’

It would perhaps be unkind to compare Mabel’s feelings with those of the wolf who, having laid elaborate plans to attack the sheepfold, is gratified by the voluntary approach of one of its choicer lambs, but it is certain that next to Althea herself there was no one in Grove Hill whom she would rather have ushered into her drawing-room. As they entered Miss Silver was saying,

‘I was so much concerned at your kind visit to Miss Graham being so unavoidably cut short by her faintness that I felt I should call and let you know that she was able to get some sleep and is now feeling a good deal better. Of course the whole thing has been a most terrible shock.’

‘Naturally.’ Mabel was about to add other and well chosen words, when Lily broke in.

‘I can’t think what I should have done if I had found Mamma murdered at the bottom of the garden…’

There was a simultaneous ‘Lily!’ from both her sisters, but it had practically no effect, and she persisted.

‘Of course we haven’t a gazebo, and Mamma was bedridden for some years before she died. But if she hadn’t been, and I had found her – perhaps in the shrubbery – it certainly would have been a most terrible shock.’

‘Lily …’ Mabel’s tone had become an awful one.

Lily’s understanding, though not bright, was capable of receiving the impression that she would do better to hold her tongue. She sat therefore in silence for some time whilst the conversation between Miss Silver and her sisters proceeded, merely turning her head from side to side so as to be able to watch the person who was speaking.

Mabel was full of inquiries about Althea.

‘And you feel that she is well enough to be left?’

Miss Silver coughed in a deprecating manner.

‘Oh, I should not have liked to leave her by herself. Mr Carey is with her.’

Nettie and Mabel echoed the name.

‘Nicholas Carey!’

‘Oh, yes. They are great friends, are they not? In fact…’ She hesitated and broke off. ‘But perhaps if it is not given out? And of course at a time of mourning like the present…’

It was a pity that Frank Abbott should not have been privileged to observe his Miss Silver in the role of the well-meaning friend who alternately says too much and too little about the affairs in which she has become involved. In a very few minutes Mabel and Nettie were vying with each other to convince her how intimate they had been with Mrs Graham, and how complete had been the confidence she reposed in them. Between them it became established that Nicholas Carey might be a very charming young man, but definitely unreliable. Look at the way he had suddenly thrown Althea over five years ago and gone off into the wilds!

‘We felt very sorry for her.’

‘Really it quite changed her.’

‘A most untrustworthy young man.’

Miss Silver looked from one to the other.

‘Oh, do you really think so?’

Mabel Pimm’s long nose quivered.

‘Look what has happened as soon as he comes back!’

Lily emerged from her silence.

‘Mrs Graham would not let them get married,’ she said. ‘Mrs Stokes who is their daily told Doris Wills, and Doris told me. She said it was ever so romantic, and now that he had come back she wouldn’t be surprised if it was all on again only Mrs Graham would do all she could to put a spoke in his wheel. That’s what Mrs Stokes said.’

If Mabel had been capable of producing a blush she would have blushed for Lily. It was all very well to be accurate, but there was no need to repeat Mrs Stokes’ uneducated way of speaking. She gave her a look and said in a lofty voice that she never listened to gossip.

When Nicholas Carey’s generally unsatisfactory character had been further dealt with, Miss Silver observed in a diffident manner that she felt herself in a very delicate situation, and that any information which could be given her by such old friends as the Miss Pimms would be most helpful. For instance when friends called to inquire after Miss Graham, since all were strangers to herself it would be of the greatest assistance to know which were really on terms of intimacy with the family.

Mabel Pimm was not one to neglect such an opportunity. Miss Silver heard all about Dr Barrington’s partiality for Mrs Graham.

‘People did say – but you can’t believe all you hear, can you, and a doctor must see too many sick people to be attracted by them. But of course she was always sending for him…’

After which there was a piece about Mrs Justice.

‘There is something rather vulgar about having so much money, don’t you think? The girl Sophy married a distant cousin of ours. They are out in the West Indies. By the way, weren’t you at the cocktail-party Mrs Justice gave the other day?’

Miss Silver smiled a little nervously.

‘Oh, yes, she was kind enough to ask me. There was a time when I knew her quite well. Of course I did not expect to know many people there. Perhaps you can tell me about some of them. There was a woman who seemed to be on very friendly terms with Mrs Graham – rather a striking looking person in royal blue, with that very bright golden hair.’

Miss Mabel’s thin eyebrows rose.

‘If you call it gold,’ she said.

Nettie came darting in.

‘Of course it’s tinted… I believe she doesn’t make any secret of that. People don’t nowadays, do they? They don’t call it a dye any more, they just say they’ve had a brightening rinse. I’ve sometimes wondered lately whether Althea…’

Mabel interrupted her.

‘That was Mrs Harrison. The Harrisons are newcomers to Grove Hill, but Mr Harrison is a cousin of the Lesters who used to own Grove Hill House. He bought it from Miss Lester a couple of years ago, and Emmy Lester asked everyone to call, so we did.’

Nettie took the lead again.

‘She doesn’t fit in very well, but Mrs Graham took her up. Of course the Harrisons have plenty of money. She has a lot of jewellery. Of course we don’t know where it came from.’

‘Perhaps Mr Harrison gave it to her,’ said Lily.

Mabel Pimm sniffed through pinched nostrils.

‘I believe she was once on the stage!’

Nettie continued to prattle.

‘Actresses do get given valuable presents of course. She has a diamond sunburst – quite a big one. She was wearing it at Mrs Justice’s cocktail-party – it made her look rather overdressed, we thought. Perhaps you noticed it.’

‘Oh, yes, I did. A very handsome ornament.’

Nettie went on.

‘And did you notice her rings? There is a ruby and diamond, and a diamond and sapphire, and one which she always wears – five diamonds in a row – great big stones.’

‘She has lost one of the diamonds,’ said Lily Pimm.

Both sisters turned to look at her, and both exclaimed.

Nettie said, ‘A diamond out of that ring!’ and Mabel, ‘How do you know?’

Lily beamed.

‘Because I saw it. She was on the bus on Wednesday morning, and when she pulled off her glove to find some change to pay the fare, there was the ring. And one of the stones was gone! I said, “Oh, Mrs Harrison, you’ve lost a stone out of your ring!” And she said, “Oh, no!” And I said, “Didn’t you know you had lost it?” And she said, “Oh, no, I didn’t,” and she turned the glove inside out to see if it had run down into one of the fingers, but it wasn’t there. And I said, “Didn’t you notice when you put it on?” And she said, “I don’t have to put it on, because I practically never take it off. It’s a little loose, and it is apt to slip round a bit, so I mightn’t notice the stone being gone.” And I said, “Well, it was all right last night when you were playing bridge at the Reckitts, because I always look to see what rings you are wearing, and you had this one and a pearl and diamond one on the right hand, and the ruby ring and the sapphire ring on the left, and the diamonds were all there then.” I don’t know why that should have made her angry, but it did, because she said, “How could you possibly tell?” So I told her.’