In the Balance

by Patricia Wentworth - Miss Silver 04 - In the Balance

  March smiled.

  “It’s a good story. I’d like to have met your old woman.”

  “She was my nurse’s grandmother,” said Rafe. He turned and led the way along the wall. “We go down here,” he said.

  The steps were at the end of the wall on the headland side. At their foot, above high-water mark, was a bathing--hut painted white and green—two rooms and a wide verandah set with chairs and coloured cushions. A track, trodden hard, ran past it skirting the cliff.

  It was, as Rafe had said, bad going for a bad light The track soon merged into deep soft sand, with here and there a patch of shingle, and here and there a ribbed line of rock.

  When they had come about midway round the half-circle of the bay Rafe stopped and said,

  “I must have turned somewhere about here.”

  March looked at the headland, turned back and sighted the green and white bathing-hut, then faced round to the headland again.

  “If your eyes are as good as mine, you’d see anyone on that cliff plainly enough.”

  “In this light—yes.”

  “How dark was it when you turned? Could you see those cushions in the verandah of the bathing-hut?”

  “No.” Then, with a sudden fleeting smile, “They’re put away at night.”

  “Could you have seen them if they had been there?”

  “How can I tell?” His smile, the slight lift of his shoulder, the sparkle in his eyes, all said, “I’m not going to tell.”

  Randal March said, “I want to go on a little farther.”

  “Just as you like.”

  “There’s a way up on to the cliff path, isn’t there, just beyond those rocks?”

  “It’s a bit of a climb.”

  “But one that you have often done?”

  “Oh, often.”

  “Did you do it on Wednesday?”

  Rafe shook his head.

  “I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I didn’t leave the beach.”

  They left it now, and climbed by the roughest of ways to the path which ran like a shelf along the cliff—about half way up at first, but rising gradually until it emerged upon the headland.

  Hot sun, breeze cool off the water, a scent of heather, a scent of whin —Tane Head was a pleasant place on a summer morning.

  The path became a narrow grassy track and petered out. March walked on, the ground becoming more and more uneven as they made their way along the top of the cliff. Sandy hollows rimmed with dark, scrawny clumps of gorse, great heaped bramble mounds still in bloom but with here and there a cluster of berries for the most part hard and green, low wind-bent trees twisted into every crooked shape.

  “This is where she went over,” said March, coming to a standstill.

  Rafe walked to the edge of the cliff and looked down. There was no sheer drop. If Cissie Cole had been pushed she might have taken the first dozen feet or so at a stumbling run before she went headlong to the rocks below. And just that was what she had done. He said over his shoulder,

  “She must have caught at that bush. See where it’s broken.”

  March’s voice was a little dry as he answered.

  “Yes—we noticed that. I think myself it puts suicide out of the question. If you were going to throw yourself over a cliff you would want to get on with it —you wouldn’t choose a place where you had to run down a slope like that before you could get to the edge.”

  Rafe said, “I suppose not.” He stepped back a pace or two. “Well? What’s the great idea? Why the personally conducted tour?”

  March began to walk away.

  “What’s the nearest way down to the beach from here?”

  “Don’t you know?” He laughed suddenly. “I’m sure you do—and I’m sure that even the most suspicious mind can’t hold it up against me if I know too. After all, I was born and brought up here. So now we both know that there’s a way down the cliff where that path we came by joins the headland. It’s a bit of a scramble, but it’s a perfectly feasible proposition.”

  March looked at him.

  “Did you go down that way on Wednesday night?”

  He got the pleasantest smile in the world.

  “You can’t go down if you haven’t come up. I’m afraid you haven’t got a frightfully good memory. I keep on telling you that I didn’t leave the beach on Wednesday night.”

  March opened his lips to speak and shut them again. A forward step had taken him to the top of a small hillock, and as he gained it his eye caught the sun on a moving whiteness, the flutter of a scarf in the wind. He came down off the rise with a run, rounded a high clump of gorse, and found himself face to face with Lady Steyne. Rafe, behind him, said,

  “Hullo, Alicia!”

  She met them with rather a chilly smile.

  “Why, what are you doing up here? My scarf’s caught, Rafe. Get it off those thorns without tearing it if you can.”

  “It was your scarf I saw,” said March, and waited while Rafe dealt with it.

  “We’re taking a walk—if you don’t stand still, darling, the darned thing will tear. Pleasure and instruction combined—scene of the tragedy—official observations on it. In fact, a thoroughly profitable morning. There—I’m pricked to the bone, but I don’t think I’ve bled on to your scarf.”

  “I don’t know why I put it on—I’m boiled. I’ve been looking for my clip.” She turned to March. “Oh, Inspector, you will ask your men to look out for it, won’t you? I must have dropped it when I was up here with Dale the other night—a big sort of half buckle in emeralds and diamonds. I didn’t miss it till this morning, and I must have dropped it up here, because I know I had it on Wednesday, and I haven’t worn it since.”

  “Is it valuable, Lady Steyne?”

  “I expect so—emeralds and diamonds, you know. But I don’t know what it cost—it was a present. I should simply hate to lose it.”

  “Well, if you can tell me whereabouts you were—”

  She threw out an impatient hand.

  “My dear man, we were all over the place! It’s the old needle and haystack game. I suppose I had better offer a reward.”

  “How near the cliff did you go?”

  “Not nearer than this. That’s why I was looking here. But it’s too hot to go on. I’ve got my car in the lane. Like a lift, Rafe?”

  “If the Inspector has finished with me. Perhaps he would like a lift too.” He turned to March. “How did you come over— motorbike, push--bike, car?”

  “Car. If Lady Steyne will really give me a lift back to Tanfield Court, I shall be very grateful.”

  Alicia said, “Oh, yes.” And then, “And you’ll find my clip for me, won’t you? I expect I’d better say a fiver for the reward.”

  38

  LISLE WENT OUT into the garden and sat under the cedar. There was always shade there even at high noon. She lay back in the swinging canvas chair and closed her eyes.

  Fingerprints on her coat—handprints...She felt sick—and not only with distaste. There was a kind of horror about it. All those unseen, unnoticed prints, starting out with their black accusing stains—handprints —fingerprints—everything handled, damaged, blurred. It wasn’t only a coat that had been spoiled, it was everything. Six months ago when she had stepped into this new world, how bright, and clear, and beautiful everything had been—love, marriage, home, friendship—a family ready made for a girl who had never had one—there couldn’t have been a fairer prospect anywhere. And now it was all dashed and spoiled, the colours faded, the sunlight gone—

  A line that she had heard somewhere came into her head:

  “Thinned into common air like the rainbow breath of a dream.”

  When had that begun to happen? She looked back, and she couldn’t tell. There had been an imperceptible withdrawal, as gradual as the ebbing of daylight or the tide.

  The tears came up under her eyelids but did not fall, and presently they dried there. She began to think what she could do. A wave of terror went over her. Perhaps she could
go away—for a time. But in her heart of hearts she knew that if she went now she would never come back. She shrank at the thought. The world was wide, but it promised her loneliness, not freedom. She found that she was afraid of this promise.

  She sat up, and saw Dale coming across the lawn with an impatient step. He was bare-headed and very good to look at. All at once the things which she had been thinking seemed morbid and foolish. She felt sharply ashamed, and the colour rose to her cheeks.

  Dale flung himself into a chair and said in a voice as impatient as his step,

  “Where do you get to these days? I want to talk to you.”

  “I went into Ledlington with Rafe.”

  He frowned.

  “Why Rafe? I would have driven you. Never mind, we’ll talk about that another time. Look here—I’ve heard from Tatham, and its take it or leave it. He’s got to have an answer by the end of the month, yes or no, and if Robson won’t be reasonable”—he lifted a hand and let it fall again—“well, it’ll just have to be yes.”

  Her heart contracted. She said gently,

  “I’m sorry, Dale.”

  “Are you?” He sat up, leaning towards her eagerly. “Are you really? I believe you are. Lisle—what about having one more go at Robson? Will you? He might relent—you never know—and I should feel we’d done everything we could. Don’t you see what I mean? I don’t want to look back afterwards and think, ‘Why didn’t we do this?’ or ‘Why didn’t we do that?’ or, ‘Perhaps Robson would have given in if we’d had one more shot.’ Darling, don’t you see?”

  She nodded. It was easier than speaking. When he looked at her like that, it brought back all the times when the same look had said, or she thought that it had said, “I love you.” Now it seemed to her that it only meant, “This is something I want. Give it to me.” She had always tried to give him what he wanted. She must go on trying.

  He sprang up and pulled her to her feet

  “You will? Oh, darling! Come along and we’ll see what we can do in the heart-melting line! We’ve got plenty of time before lunch. Everyone else seems to be out. Come along to the study and draft a letter!”

  Lisle was to look back on the next half hour with a bewildered sense of strain. What she could not remember was how many drafts she made for a letter which was never to be despatched. Odd phrases, telling arguments, appeals, dispassionate reasoning—Dale swung from one to the other, suggesting, dictating, adding, altering.

  “Take another piece of paper! Now try this! No, no, no—that won’t do! Take a fresh piece—that’s written on! How does this sound? Take it down!”

  “I think it sounds a little exaggerated.”

  Dale was pacing the room. She remembered how he wheeled round on her when she said that.

  “Exaggerated—exaggerated? How do you think I’m feeling about Tanfield? What sort of tepid milk-and-water stuff do you think I’m made of?”

  “I only meant—it’s supposed to be from me, isn’t it? Mr Robson won’t think so if I write like that. Oh, Dale, please—”

  He came over to her and stood there behind her, leaning down to kiss her hair.

  “Darling, I’m sorry. It means so much to me. If we can only get this damned letter right ...That bit’s no good! Let’s try again. Take another sheet!”

  It always came back to that in the end. The table was littered with discarded sheets, some closely written, some with no more than a single sentence. In the end when the lunch bell rang Dale swept them all up with a groan.

  “No good going on now. We’ll give it a rest. I’ll keep these and sort them through. We’ve gone on at it too long—you look worn out.” He put an arm round her and laid his cheek against hers. “Poor tired child—I’m a brute to you, aren’t I?”

  She said, “No—” in an uncertain voice and slipped away. But his hand dropped on her shoulder, holding her.

  “Lisle—don’t tell anyone we’re having another shot at Robson. I don’t want the others to know—I just don’t feel like going over it all. You know how it is—I’m very fond of Lal, but—she jars sometimes. I don’t want to talk about it to anyone but you.”

  39

  INSPECTOR MARCH CAME back to his office, to be told that a lady had been ringing him up—“Wouldn’t leave a message, only said she wanted to see you and she’d ring again—a Miss Silver.”

  March’s eyebrows went up.

  Ten minutes later the telephone went. A familiar cough came to him on the line.

  “Oh, you are back. I am so glad. I think I had better see you for a moment. Would it suit you if I came round now?”

  March said “Yes,” and hung up.

  A constable presently ushered in Miss Maud Silver, neatly dressed in a grey washing silk printed with a design of small mauve and black flowers. Being her last summer’s dress, it was quite good enough for Ledlington in the morning. Her hat was of the same date, a rather wilted black straw with a small bunch of mauve and white lilac on the left-hand side. A brooch of bog-oak carved into the shape of a rose fastened her collar. She wore black cotton gloves and black shoes and stockings. Her manner was one of extreme gravity. She took the chair that was offered her, listened to the constable’s heavy receding step, and then said without any preliminaries,

  “Mr Rafe Jerningham is a beneficiary under Mrs Jerningham’s will.”

  March swung his chair round to face her,

  “Oh, he is, is he?”

  “To the extent of twenty thousand pounds.”

  He whistled.

  “Well—well—and what do you know about that, as they say across the water?”

  Miss Silver coughed.

  “I am not entirely up to date in American slang, but if, as I suppose, you would like to know the source of my information, well, that is one of the things I came here to tell you. It came from Mrs Jerningham herself.”

  “She told you she had left Rafe Jerningham twenty thousand pounds?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Miss Silver. “You see, when we met in the train and she was so very much upset, she spoke about her will, and I got the impression that she had left everything to her husband. So this morning when I met her in Ashley’s I asked her if this was so.”

  An expression of incredulity appeared upon the well cut features of Inspector March.

  “You asked her about her will in Ashley’s?” His voice was as incredulous as his expression.

  “Oh, yes,” said Miss Silver brightly. “She was buying a bathing-dress, and there was no one else at the counter. A shop is really quite a safe place to talk in, because people are thinking about their own affairs—shopping lists, and whether they can match the ribbon they got two months ago—all that kind of thing. We had quite a private talk while the saleswoman was serving someone at the next counter.”

  March leaned back and contemplated his late preceptress. He was thinking how thoroughly she looked the part—so thoroughly that no matter what she talked about or where she talked about it, no one would dream that her conversation could have the slightest interest for anyone at all. He gave a half exasperated smile and said,

  “Go on—tell me all about it.”

  Miss Silver folded her black gloved hands over a shabby black handbag.

  “Well, I think that was really all. I asked her if there were any substantial legacies, and she mentioned Mr Rafe. That was really all, except that I urged her most strongly to ring up her solicitor and instruct him to destroy her will.”

  March made a movement.

  “He would be very unlikely to act on instructions given over the telephone.”

  Miss Silver coughed in a slightly reproving manner.

  “That would be no matter. What I urged Mrs Jerningham to do was to go home and tell the whole family that she had instructed her solicitor to destroy the will. If anyone was contemplating another attempt upon her life, he would naturally hold his hand until he was sure that the will under which he would benefit was still in existence. He could not afford to run the risk of committing
murder only to find that the money was now irrevocably beyond his reach.”

  “That would apply to Dale Jerningham as well as to his cousin Rafe.”

  “It would apply to Mr Dale Jerningham, to Mr Rafe Jerningham, and also to Lady Steyne.”

  “And you seriously believe that her life has been attempted by one of these three people?”

  “Has been—and will be again.” She paused, and added, “Is that not your own opinion, Randal?”

  He pushed his chair back.

  “Neither your opinion nor mine is of very much value. What we want is evidence, and so far all the evidence in this case is lumped into the scale against the wretched Pell. I went over and saw Rafe Jerningham this morning —that’s where I’ve been—and a more useless, profitless morning I never spent. I saw Mrs Jerningham first. She’s a very good witness, and she was quite clear about the coat. She wore it last on Sunday evening. Rafe brought it to her. Rafe helped her on with it—faint prints on the collar all present and correct. He certainly didn’t take hold of her by the shoulders in the way he would have had to in order to leave those much clearer, fresher prints. And no one else touched her at all. She went straight in, took the coat off, and hung it up in a cupboard in her bedroom. She wasn’t anywhere near her husband. The rather uncertain prints may or may not be his. The one in the middle of the back may have been done at some other time. It’s all mixed up with Pell’s prints. But Rafe Jerningham did take hold of that coat and whoever was wearing it, and as his prints are the freshest of the lot, he took hold of it on Wednesday night. Only I can’t prove that.”

  “Did he offer any explanation?”

  March laughed.

  “Oh, yes—slick as you please. He’d fetched his cousin’s coat and helped her on with it. And that was that. There aren’t any flies on Mr Rafe Jerningham. He knows as well as you and I do just how much of that print stuff would go down with a jury. Can’t you hear him in the box? ‘Of course I touched the coat. I brought it to Mrs Jerningham and I helped her on with it. I should think my prints would be pretty well all over the place.’ I tell you he grinned in my face—and asked me to come up and have a friendly game of tennis when I wasn’t on duty.”