Walk with Care (14 page)

CHAPTER XXI

“YES,” SAID MR SMITH
—“er—yes.” He broke a silence that had lasted for some little time.

A pleasant mellow light filled the room. A pleasant fire burned on the hearth. Ananias had retired into his sleeping-apartment and snored tranquilly under a green baize shroud. Mr Smith sat in his usual chair facing the fire. A little to his left, in the other large chair, was Rosalind Denny. The white fur coat which she had only just discarded trailed across the arm. Jeremy stood looking down on them with his shoulders against the mantelpiece. He spoke now, rather quickly and with a forward thrust of the chin.

“I told you it was an impossible sort of story to believe.”

One of Mr Smith's long decorative hands was propping his head. He made a slight gesture with the other.

“Not at all,” he said with vague politeness.

Jeremy's black eyebrows twitched.

“I didn't realize just how impossible it was until I heard myself paying it out. The only thing is, sir—if I was inventing it, I do believe I'd have produced something a bit more credible.”

“That,” said Mr Smith gravely, “is a point.”

Rosalind said nothing. Her arms lay along the arms of the chair, white smooth arms coming out of sleeves that were like black wings, her head against the dark leather, her hair shining under the light, her lids half closed.

“Well?” said Jeremy.

Mr Smith leaned back and folded his hands. He gazed meditatively at the topmost row of books to the left of the fireplace.

“Let us,” he said, “get down to the—er—bare bones of these impossibilities. I like my impossibilities in the nude. Truth, as you will remember, came naked out of her well. If she had been a skeleton, it would have been a loss no doubt to Art, but the earnest seeker would at least have been sure that there were no more blinding veils. That, of course, is a digression. I should—er—like to ask some questions.”

“Of course, sir.”

Mr Smith nodded.

“Better take the episodes in order. Episode one. … You enter Mr Mannister's house by the scullery window because, in the middle of having supper with Mrs Denny, you remember that you have left some work unfinished. Did you—er—mention this to Mrs Denny at the time?”

“Yes,” said Rosalind, “he did.”

“That might have been a blind,” said Jeremy.

“Er—yes—the point had not escaped me. Well, you did enter the house. Whilst you were at work in the library you saw what you at first took to be a ghost, but which in the light of—er—later events appears to have been a young lady walking in her sleep. You followed her down into some very ancient and interesting cellars, where she disappeared. This, I suppose, explains your interest in the early topography of Marsh Street and its surroundings. The—er—cellars would be the original cellars of the Golden Lyon. Now have you any clear idea of just where the lady disappeared?” Jeremy produced an envelope and a pencil, drew a few quick lines, and came round to the side of Mr Smith's chair.

“It's like this, sir. Here's Marsh Street, and here's Tilt Street running in at right angles. Mannister's house is on the corner and takes up about sixty feet of Tilt Street as well as the Marsh Street frontage. That blob is where the stair goes down to the cellar. The vaulted bit, which is really a sort of hall, is under the kitchen and hall of the house with doors opening off it. Then there's a passage which runs along under the back of the house. It's walled up here on the Marsh Street side, but on the other side it turns at right angles and runs along under Tilt Street. There are cellars opening off it, and one right at the end. Rachel went into the one at the end. By the time I got there, there wasn't any sign of her. I've been back since with an electric lamp, and if there's an opening, I can't find it. The walls and the floor are solid stone blocks.”

“But if there were an opening, it would be into the cellars of some house in Tilt Street?”

“Number One Tilt Street,” said Jeremy with his pencil on the paper at the spot where the side wall of Mannister's house ended.

Rosalind's eyelids lifted for a moment. Jeremy was stooping over the arm of Mr Smith's chair. Both men were looking at the envelope which Mr Smith was holding. Rosalind looked too. Her eyes were bright and startled. A shadow flickered across the brightness, and the lids fell again.

“And who lives at Number One Tilt Street?” said Mr Smith.

“The name in the directory is Dart—Miss P. Dart.”

Rosalind's hands had contracted stiffly. The edge of the chair cut her palms, but she felt nothing until afterwards. She only knew a violent dread of hearing Asphodel's name, and an equally violent relief when it did not come. Her grip relaxed, and in a moment she was wondering whether Miss P. Dart was Phoebe who had let her in, and why the house should be in her name and not in Asphodel's. She had missed something that had been said. Jeremy was going back to the hearth. She caught Mr Smith's eyes upon him in a regard that puzzled her, but by the time Jeremy turned, the dreamy gaze had once more lifted to the cornice.

“Episode number two,” said Mr Smith. … “This—er—includes a number of very important points. I want to be sure that I've got the chronology right. You will—er—correct me if I am wrong. … On Saturday at midday Mr Mannister received an important foreign letter in a blue envelope. He went out of his way to tell you how important it was before he gave it to you to lock up in the safe. Now was that the last time the safe was opened?”

Jeremy spoke, frowning deeply.

“No—he sent me to the safe just before he told me to go off duty. He wanted a letter out of the Geneva bundle. The blue envelope letter was right in front of the same shelf—one end was touching the Geneva pile. I had to lift it to get the letter Mannister wanted.”

“And you put it back again?”

“I certainly put it back again.”

“In the same position?”

“Yes.”

“Was Mr Mannister watching you?”

Jeremy took a moment.

“No, he wasn't—he had his back to me.”

“So you had the opportunity of—er—removing the letter in the blue envelope?”

“I had the opportunity,” said Jeremy soberly.

Mr Smith's gaze passed vaguely over him for a moment and then returned to the top row of books.

“Let us—er—continue. … You gave the key of the safe back to Mr Mannister. You did do that?”

“Yes.”

“He then left the house?”

“Yes.”

“What time was that?”

“It was after four.”

“Was he on foot, or in a taxi?”

“He had ordered a taxi. I saw him drive off. He was catching the four twenty-five to Bournemouth. He must have caught it, or he wouldn't have been in time for his meeting. He certainly addressed the meeting, because it was reported in all the papers.”

“Yet at something after midnight your ghost reappeared with the key of the safe. The safe was discovered to be open and the letter in the blue envelope no longer where you had left it, but locked in the bottom drawer of your own writing-table.”

“Yes,” said Jeremy again. There was an obstinate note in his voice. He was thinking that he had had a nerve to come here with a story like that.

“You cannot account for this?”

“No, sir.”

“Well, well—we are going a little too fast,” said Mr Smith. “Chronology is not—er—my strongest point. Events present themselves to me in—er—groups rather than in sequences. We have omitted to deal with episode number three. … Let us return to the moment before midnight on Saturday when a piece of paper fell out of one of Mr Mannister's books and you discovered that someone had written your signature all over it. I—er—have your assurance that it was not you.”

“I don't think my assurance would go very far with a jury,” said Jeremy in rather a grim tone of voice.

“Perhaps not,” said Mr Smith mildly. “May I ask why you should picture yourself confronting a jury?”

Rosalind's eyelids lifted. Her eyes went from one to the other in a questioning look. Her breath came a little faster.

Jeremy's head went up with a jerk.

“Well, sir, either I'm a liar, or else someone is trying to land me in the devil of a mess. I don't know why anyone should try to forge my name, but I'll swear I didn't write those signatures.”

“Have you—er—had your pass-book lately?”

Jeremy gave a quick half laugh.

“I've only had a banking account for about a fortnight.” He laughed again. “It's really funny to think of anyone picking out my name to forge. I opened my account with twenty pounds out of the post-office savings bank—and I only did that because Mannister paid me with a crossed cheque and was absolutely horrified when I said I hadn't got an account.”

“That,” said Mr Smith, “is very interesting. Let me urge you very strongly to go through your pass-book. I do not think you should lose any time in doing so.”

He paused and slightly shifted in his chair. “We will now go on to episode number four and the young lady who on this occasion not only walked, but talked, in her sleep. … Now you are convinced that she really was asleep?”

Jeremy said, “Yes.” He spoke without hesitation and with a conviction that produced its effect.

“Why?” said Mr Smith.

“She didn't know me when I spoke to her in the Park. She didn't know that she'd ever seen me before. As soon as I told her my name she was terrified. You were watching us, sir. Couldn't you see how frightened she was?”

Mr Smith nodded.

“That is a good point. But that came afterwards. Were you convinced at the time—and if so, why?”

Jeremy frowned with a quick contraction of the brows which meant the effort to get thought into words.

“I was convinced all right,” he said. “Anyone would have been if they'd seen her. She—wasn't there at all. I could see her, and I could touch her, but she wasn't there. You could see that she was in some kind of a dream—tremendously taken up with it—and when she said my name, it didn't seem to have anything to do with me at all—not with the me who was standing there watching her, if you know what I mean.”

“Er—yes—I think I do,” said Mr Smith. “Well then, you are sure that she was asleep. And in her sleep she talked. Now I think we might—er—tabulate the information to be extracted from what she said. You may, perhaps, care to write it down. There is paper on that bureau.”

Jeremy came back with a block. He took a chair and leaned forward to write upon his knee.

Rosalind was so still that she might have been asleep—a pale sleeping woman in a black dress, with a crown of shining hair.

“Are you ready?” said Mr Smith. …

“1. She knew your name.

“2. She stated that the safe was open. She said,
‘He
has left it open.'

“3. Having quoted an unnamed
he,
she now quotes an unnamed
she,
her next remarks being,
‘She
said, leave it open. Put the letter there and leave it open. You can say he pretended to lock it and left it open.
He
left it open.
He'll
say Jeremy Ware took it.'

“4. She stated that the safe was open and the paper gone.

“5. She produced the key of the safe. You had by this time discovered that the safe really was open, and that the letter in the blue envelope was no longer where you had left it when you locked the safe and gave Mr Mannister the key at a little after four o'clock. Upon this, you asked her where the letter was, and without answering you directly she gave you this information.

“6. She stated that the letter was in Jeremy's drawer. She said, ‘They'll find it there.
He
said so.'

“You did find the letter, and put it back in the safe, after which she locked it and went away. Now have you any idea to whom she was referring when she quoted: ‘She said'?”

“No, I haven't.”

“No possibility occurs to you?”

“No.”

“And the ‘he' she quotes—have you any ideas about that?”

Jeremy was frowning at the block on his knee. He looked up doggedly. “I thought it might be Mannister.”

Mr Smith nodded gently. Then he said,

“And that brings us to episode number six. Number five would be your interview with Miss Rachel in the Park, but we can return to that. For the moment it is number six that I would like to consider.” He paused, sat up, and leaned his chin upon his hand. His eyes looked past Jeremy to the fire, where the logs had fallen into a ruin of crimson ash. “Number six,” he said meditatively, “is very important. It is the episode of Mr Mannister's return on Monday evening, and I would like to take it now because it is naturally linked with number two, Mannister's departure, and four, your discoveries with regard to the open safe and the missing letter. Well, Mr Mannister came home yesterday, and when he had had some tea and had gone through the speech he was going to deliver at the Albert Hall that evening, he produced the key of the safe and told you to get out a letter which he wanted to show to the Prime Minister. Was the key loose or on a keyring?”

“On a key-ring, and the ring on a chain. He handed me over the whole bag of tricks.”

“You cannot, of course, say whether the key with which Miss Rachel locked the safe was Mr Mannister's key or a duplicate?”

Jeremy leaned forward.

“Yes, sir, I can. That's what's been puzzling me—it was the same key.”

“That—er—makes things very difficult,” said Mr Smith. “Do you mind telling me your reasons for deciding that Miss Rachel's key was not a duplicate?”

“I'm sure it wasn't. There's a little nick about half way up the stem—oh, more a deep scratch than a nick—I've noticed it every time I've unlocked the safe. You know how that sort of raw scratch on metal catches your eye.”