Silence in Court

by Patricia Wentworth

  “Yes.”

  “There was, I suppose, some glass or tumbler either in the cupboard or by the side of the wash-basin?”

  “There was two tumblers.”

  “It would have been possible for Mrs. Maquisten to open the cupboard, reach down the bottle of tabloids, dissolve some of them in one of the tumblers, and put tumbler and bottle back in the cupboard?”

  “That’s not for me to say.”

  “I am not asking you whether you think she did this. I am asking you whether she was physically capable of doing it.”

  Ellen continued to look blank.

  “She could have walked to the basin and stood there for long enough to have done these things?”

  “She could if she wanted to.”

  “Now, Mrs. Bridling—are you prepared to swear that Mrs. Maquisten was not in the bathroom after twenty past eight when you last noticed the depth of the liquid in the medicine-glass?”

  For the first time Ellen hesitated. Her lips moved as if she were about to speak, then closed again.

  Hugo Vane smiled in his most encouraging manner.

  “Please take as long as you like. Ah—I see you are beginning to remember! Molly James came up with the savoury, didn’t she, and saw Mrs. Maquisten returning from the bathroom? You remember that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Mrs. Maquisten was alone in the bathroom?”

  “Yes. She wasn’t gone any time.”

  “It wouldn’t take very long to tip a little liquid out of a tumbler into that medicine-glass, would it? To use your own words, it would hardly take any time, would it? Thank you, Mrs. Bridling.”

  In re-examination Ellen, guided by Sir Wilbury Fossett, asseverated that she had never heard Mrs. Maquisten say that she wanted to die, or that she was tired of life, or anything to give rise to the slightest suspicion that she was contemplating suicide. There was a ring of conviction in the harsh voice.

  “Many’s the time she said to me it was a thing that passed her how anyone could do such a thing as take their life. ‘I’m much too fond of mine,’ she’d say, ‘and I mean to hang on to it just so long as I can.’”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  With the end of the third day the case for the prosecution closed.

  “Well, they’ve shot their bolt,” said Mr. Mordaunt.

  Jeff Stewart did not find much comfort in this remark. He said nothing.

  Mr. Mordaunt observed that Ellen Bridling was the worst type of witness to have against you—too tough to be nervous, and too stupid and opinionated to be shaken.

  “And wherever she gets it from, she makes what she’s saying at any rate sound like the truth.”

  Jeff turned aside.

  “Did you think it struck the jury that way—do you think they believed her?”

  Mr. Mordaunt continued to be cheerful.

  “You can’t tell with juries,” he said. “She was vindictive—they don’t like that. She’s got her knife into the girl all right, but when you come to ask why—well, she’s got her answer, hasn’t she? She’d been thirty-five years with Mrs. Maquisten. She was fond of her—I should say she really was fond of her. When she cried it looked like the real thing. Of course you can’t tell, but her eyes swelled up and got red, and if she can do that to order she’s cleverer than I think. It looked genuine to me, and I’m afraid the jury thought so too. Well, once you admit that, she’s got a reason for hating Miss Silence, and she made it quite clear what the reason was. She thinks Miss Silence did it, and she stuck at nothing to make the jury think so too. Vane did his best, and I don’t say that he didn’t score a point or two, but I’m afraid that what the jury are going to remember is that someone who knew Mrs. Maquisten very well was quite sure she was speaking about Miss Silence. And unfortunately that doesn’t stand alone—Hood had the same conviction, and stuck to it just as tenaciously.”

  “They’re lying!”

  “Well, you know, I wouldn’t say that. To start with, what motive could they possibly have in common? If they knew each other by sight and by name it’s about as far as it would go, and if you can think of a common motive, I can’t. Mrs. Bridling had her annuity under either will, and Hood had never been down for anything. Besides, if they were lying, how easy to go a step farther and say that Miss Silence was mentioned by name. That’s what sticks in my throat, you know.”

  Jeff bent a sudden frowning regard upon him.

  “They might be keeping a line of retreat. Have you thought of that? There’s that letter—we don’t know who wrote it, and it doesn’t look as if we ever should, but since someone did write it, there must be a chance somewhere that it might come out. Suppose it did—suppose someone were to come forward and say, ‘All right, I wrote that letter, and I don’t feel justified in holding my tongue about it any longer. The person I accused to Mrs. Maquisten was—well, not Carey Silence.’ It wouldn’t be a bad plan to leave yourself a get-away just in case that happened. You couldn’t be proceeded against because you had misunderstood what an angry and excited person had said, could you? Not as long as you kept clear of swearing to a name which didn’t turn out to be the right one.”

  Mr. Mordaunt gazed at him with more than a shade of cynicism in his expression.

  “You are suggesting a conspiracy between these two people?”

  “I’m not suggesting anything. I only know that Carey hadn’t anything to do with Mrs. Maquisten’s death, and that anyone who tries to make it appear that she had is ignorant, malicious, or guilty.” The voice which delivered this was slow and drawling. The eye which observed Mr. Mordaunt’s change of countenance was compelling.

  The solicitor hastened to speak.

  “You knew Mrs. Maquisten. From your knowledge of her, what would you say about the accounts given by Hood and Ellen Bridling of what she is supposed to have said? Some of the expressions used were a bit unusual. Were they the sort of things Mrs. Maquisten might have said?”

  There was quite a pause before he got his answer. Jeff said slowly,

  “Yes—I think so.”

  “All this about going up with the rocket and coming down with the stick, and ‘Those that go up quick can come down quick’? Was that the sort of thing she would be likely to say?”

  There was a most unwilling “Yes.”

  “Very unusual expressions for anyone to invent,” said Mr. Mordaunt drily. Then, as if to bridge an awkward gap, “Vane’s line will be suicide. He’s made that clear.”

  “I don’t believe that Honoria Maquisten committed suicide. Why should she? She had a family scene all planned. Ask any of the nephews and nieces, and they’ll tell you how much she enjoyed that kind of thing. The person who wasn’t going to enjoy it was the person who was to be cut out of the new will. And it wasn’t Carey Silence.”

  Mordaunt stared.

  “Can you suggest who it was? Mrs. Hull—Mr. Harland—Mr. Robert Maquisten—Miss Honor King?”

  “I don’t know which one of them it was, but it wasn’t Carey.”

  “Robert Maquisten was never inside the house all day. Harland was on confidential terms with his aunt as late as half past six, smoothing her down about the nurse going out, so it is obvious that her anger was not against him. Also, if Ellen saw the glass less than half full as late as twenty minutes past eight, and saw him coming along on his crutch from the corner and going into the bedroom when he came up after dinner, he had no possible opportunity of tampering with it. The same applies to Honor King. She was with Mrs. Hull or under Ellen’s eye from the time they left the dinner table until she reached the bedroom. In the same way, Mrs. Hull was first with Miss King and afterwards heard running down the stairs and seen coming along the passage.”

  “By Ellen. There’s rather a lot of Ellen, isn’t there?”

  “Well, she couldn’t help seeing who came along that passage, could she?”

  Jeff’s jaw set grimly.

  “Not if she wanted to. I could bear to know just why she wanted to.”

 
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Carey Silence came into court on the fourth day. It was the beginning of a new week. Monday morning. The strangest Sunday of her life lay between her and the last time she had gone down these stairs from the dock. She came up them now. Sunday was behind her. Always when she looked back upon it she had a picture in her mind of grey water dreaming under a grey mist, endlessly becalmed. Because it was like that. For a timeless space everything had stopped—fear, hope, grief, past, present, and future, all muffled into calm, all hidden by that merciful mist. She slept for hours and waked as you wake from an anaesthetic, vague and uncaring.

  Everyone was very kind. She hardly knew how the time passed, but it did pass. It was Monday.

  She came back into the court. As she took her accustomed place and looked across the sea of faces she had a grave little smile for Jeff and Nora. Then she sat back and listened to Hugo Vane making his opening speech for the defence. She thought it was a very good speech. She wondered what she would have thought of it if she had been in the jury box instead of in the dock. And then she wondered what the jury were thinking about. For the first time she gave them her attention. The women first. The sharp-faced spinster was sitting bolt upright with a critical eye and a slightly superior expression. The little person with the bleached hair and the odd flyaway hat was gazing at Sir Wilbury Fossett’s profile. The stout woman with the heavy face was listening attentively. She looked kind and sensible. Carey thought, “That’s what I’m thinking about her, and it doesn’t matter at all. What matters terribly, terribly, is what she is thinking about me.” The curious thing was that though these words were in her mind, she couldn’t really feel that it mattered, only she was glad that the woman looked trustworthy and kind.

  She came next to the foreman—goodlooking, middle-aged, well set-up, with a fresh complexion and stiff fair hair that looked fairer than it really was because it was turning grey. She thought, “He might have daughters of just about my age,” and she thought he would keep them in order, and that if he once made up his mind about anything he would never change it. She wondered if he had made up his mind about her. There was a little man like a white rabbit sitting next to him. His ears stuck out, his nose twitched, and he never took his eyes off Hugo Vane. She went on looking at them one by one—the man with the beard—the man with the ginger moustache which was much too big for the rest of him—the man with the shiny bald head—the man who looked as if he’d never thought about anything in his life, heavy and red in the face, with little piggy eyes—the red-haired man who appeared to have given up having his hair cut for the duration, and who managed to keep one eye on Hugo Vane whilst the other roamed at will. There they were, all attentive, all listening, except possibly the red-faced man and the little faded blonde.

  Just for a moment she was glad to be where she was, and not to be one of them, with the awful responsibility of judging whether someone was to live or die. No, not someone—Carey Silence. Even then she didn’t feel anything. Only she didn’t want to look at the jury any longer.

  Hugo Vane finished his speech, and the first witness for the defence was called.

  “Eleanor Field!”

  For a startled moment Carey was back at school, with Miss Field coming into Hall to read prayers. The illusion persisted while she took the oath. In just such a manner and in just such a voice had those faraway devotional exercises been conducted, and except for the fact that she wore a coat and hat Miss Field looked just the same. Three immaculate grey curls on either side and a long grey roll at the back, thin eagle face, dark piercing eyes, upright slender figure, air of majestic authority—none of these things had changed.

  When she had finished taking the oath she turned easily to Mr. Telfer, junior counsel for the defence, who had risen to his feet, and awaited his first question. It was put in a suitably respectful voice, and replied to in beautifully clear tones. Carey Silence had been under her charge between the ages of fourteen and eighteen and a half, when she left to take a secretarial course. During that time her character and her influence in the school were uniformly good. Her principles and ideals were high.

  “I had no hesitation in giving her an extremely warm testimonial when she was applying for the post of secretary to my old friend Mr. Andrews. She obtained the post and remained in it until Mr. Andrews’ death from enemy action last August.”

  “Thank you, Miss Field.”

  Mr. Telfer sat down, and Mr. Lanthony rose for the Crown.

  “When did Miss Silence leave your school?”

  “Four years ago.”

  Mr. Lanthony said, “Thank you.”

  As Eleanor Field left the box, there was no one in the court who was not thinking of all the things that can happen in four years, and especially in those four years which separate eighteen from twenty-two. Carey was thinking that herself. School was a world within a world. Its laws, its rules, its loyalties, its customs, and its standards, so all-important during those adolescent years, faded, receded, and were of no account when you passed into the other world outside. As she sat there in the dock she could remember being lifted to the heights of bliss by being chosen to play in the tennis singles. She could remember the agony of her conviction that she had failed in her matric, and the pure heavenly joy of learning that she had passed with honours. In their day and in their world these things had called forth the extremity of feeling. And now they didn’t matter at all. She was in the dock on a murder charge, and presently those twelve people whom she had been looking at before Miss Field was called would say whether they thought she was a murderess or not. You can come a long, long way in four years.

  “Call Emmeline Andrews!”

  Carey came back from her thoughts to watch Mrs. Andrews come up into the box, roundabout and dumpy, her rosy face a little paler than it used to be, but otherwise just the same. Even her clothes. That was her pre-war black coat, with the brown fur collar taken off and one of black astrakhan put on. Carey even knew where the astrakhan had come from, because every spring while she was with the Andrews, she had helped to put away the winter clothes in camphor, and right down at the bottom of the chest there had been an old-fashioned pillow muff of very good astrakhan. Well, there it was, framing Mrs. Andrews’s round anxious face. And she was wearing the unbecoming three-cornered hat which she had insisted on buying last winter in spite of all that Carey could say or do—a smart, sophisticated hat that belonged to quite a different type of person. It was never straight, because it had been made to sit on a lot of piled-up curls, and Mrs. Andrews had nothing but a straight, wide parting and a little iron-grey knob behind. Carey thought, “Someone ought to have put it straight for her,” but of course there wasn’t anyone to do it now.

  And then Mrs. Andrews was taking the oath and gasping out replies to Mr. Telfer, who was doing his best to encourage her. It was obvious that she was going to need a great deal of encouragement. She kept on taking breath, but no matter how much she took there never seemed to be enough to support the words.

  Mr. Telfer was very patient and respectful.

  “Miss Silence was employed by your late husband as his secretary?”

  “Yes.”

  “He was a Member of Parliament?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Just a little louder, Mrs. Andrews, if you will. How long was Miss Silence in Mr. Andrews’ employ?”

  “Three years.”

  “Was she still in his employ at the time of his death last August?”

  Mrs. Andrews’ round blue eyes became suffused with moisture.

  “Oh, yes—she was with him.”

  “The train in which they were travelling was machine-gunned by enemy aircraft?”

  In a voice that was suddenly loud Mrs. Andrews pronounced an opinion. She said, “Very wicked!” and stared challengingly at Mr. Telfer, who said, “Certainly.”

  Having found her voice, Mrs. Andrews continued.

  “And he saved her life. He covered her with his own body and saved her life.”


  Mr. Telfer looked respectfully sympathetic.

  “Very gallant conduct, Mrs. Andrews. You must feel very proud of him. And now just a few questions about Miss Silence. During the three years that she was your husband’s secretary, did she live with you?”

  “Like a daughter,” said Mrs. Andrews, her voice still loud.

  “Will you tell us how you found her during those three years of close relationship.”

  Mrs. Andrews took her breath and expelled the words.

  “A very sweet girl.”

  “Had you any fault to find with her conduct?”

  “Oh, no—we shouldn’t have kept her if we had. My husband was very strict indeed. I don’t mean that he was unkind—you mustn’t think that. He was the kindest of men, but he expected a very high standard of moral conduct. He was a true Christian himself, and he expected Christian principles in the home.”

  “And you were both satisfied with Miss Silence?”

  Mrs. Andrews took another breath.

  “Sometimes a little heedless,” she said—“but of course young. She did not always remember to see that Mr. Andrews put on his scarf after an evening meeting. I know he could be very obstinate about it, but he should have been made to put it on.”

  Mr. Telfer turned his pleasant smile upon the jury and found about half of them smiling too. He turned back to Mrs. Andrews.

  “And was that the only complaint you had to make?”

  The three-cornered hat slipped a little farther to the left as Mrs. Andrews shook her head.

  “She didn’t always make him take his ovaltine when he came in. And whether he preferred tea had nothing to do with it, because it isn’t the same nourishment, and it’s no good anyone saying it is.”

  Two more jurymen smiled.

  “But apart from these, shall we say, venial omissions, you had no fault to find?”

  “A little worldly in her dress.”

  Mr. Telfer was unable to suppress a look of astonishment.

  “Worldly?”

  Mrs. Andrews nodded, bringing the hat forward with a jerk.