The Girl in the Cellar (The Miss Silver Mysteries Book 32)

by Patricia Wentworth

  Miss Silver spoke in a low voice.

  ‘Why is it not dusty like the floor?’

  Jim Fancourt frowned. The small bead lay on his palm. There was no dust on it. He moved his hand, and the bead on the palm moved. He did not speak, but he stooped down and touched the floor outside the space where the boards had been piled. There was no dust outside, no dust at all. Under the shelter of the boards which he had just moved there was a soft thick layer which spoke of years of neglect. But the bead itself was clean. The months or years during which the dust had gathered had not troubled its brightness. If it had lain there for those months or years, the dust would have silted into it and over it and through it. It had lain there no more than a few days. It was a witness. His mind went back to Anne as he had seen her just before she stepped into the plane and left him. She had about her neck a chain of little beads like this one. He put the bead away in his pocket.

  As they came up the cellar steps Miss Silver did all the talking. She thanked the young man and said they would have to ask the lady for whom they were acting.

  ‘Oh, no, it is not for ourselves. We shall have to let my sister know, but I am afraid the house may be a little too large for her, and she did not really wish to take a furnished house.’

  ‘The furniture could be removed,’ said the young man with bright hopefulness.

  ‘Ah, well. I will let you know if she thinks that this will suit her, but I am very much afraid—’

  When the young man had taken his departure they walked on to the far end of the road in silence. As they turned to come back Miss Silver spoke.

  ‘You recognise the bead?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It was Anne’s?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He walked beside her in silence until they came to the house again. Then he said, ‘The bead was from a necklace she wore. She wore it always. This means that the other Anne’s story is true – not just a dream or anything like that. She did see a girl’s dead body in that cellar. It doesn’t just rest on the bag any more. This bead is Russian. Anne was wearing a Russian necklace – don’t you see – don’t you see—’

  Miss Silver said, ‘Yes, I see.’

  FOURTEEN

  ANNE WOKE UP on the following morning with the curious feeling that she had known something in her sleep which had gone from her again. With the light of returning consciousness it had gone, but it had been there. She wondered where things went to when you forgot them. Perhaps it meant that her memory was not gone but was merely sleeping. Perhaps it would come again suddenly and she would remember all those things which she had forgotten.

  When Thomasina came in with the tea she lifted a bright face to meet her. Thomasina shook her head.

  ‘There’s no cause for you to look as if there was a present for you on the tray,’ she said.

  Anne laughed.

  ‘I feel as if there was, you know.’ She sat up, snuggling her knees. ‘Do you believe in presentiments, Thomasina? I’m not sure if I do or not. Tell me, do you ever wake up and feel as if all the bad things had happened and were passed away and done with?’

  Thomasina looked at her in a pitying way.

  ‘I can’t say I do. And if I did I wouldn’t dwell on it, nor yet talk about it.’

  ‘Why wouldn’t you?’

  Thomasina set down the tray.

  ‘Because I wouldn’t. And if you’ll take my advice you won’t do no such thing.’

  Anne laughed again.

  ‘Why Thomasina – why?’

  Thomasina stepped back. Her solid arms hugged one another. She stood and delivered herself.

  ‘Now just you listen to me, my dear. There’s times when you wake in the morning and everything looks black to you. No harm in taking a pinch of cheer-me-up those days – no harm at all. But when you wake up and everything’s going right and you feel like skipping out of bed and dancing whilst you put your clothes on, that’s the time to take a check on yourself and go easy. That’s all, my dear. And I’m a quarter of an hour late with the tea through Mattie having forgot to put the kettle on, so I’m all behind – and don’t you keep me talking or it’ll be the worse for all of us.’

  Anne laughed again when the door was shut upon Thomasina. The laugh echoed in her head and left a little shiver behind it. She drank her tea and jumped up. The fatigue of the last few days was gone and she felt ready for anything.

  She went downstairs, looked out at the day, found it brilliant and beautiful, and began to wonder what she should do with it.

  There was sunshine on the lawn. The birches in the distance were golden, and nearer, the clumps of azaleas were crimson and flame-colour. As she stood looking out of the window of the dining-room she thought about gardening – about putting in bulbs. And then suddenly she became aware that that was what she had been used to doing in her old life, the life that was gone. A horrible feeling of loss swept over her. It was just as if she had been at home, and quite suddenly there wasn’t a home any more, only this strange place, bare and empty of everything she knew and loved. Past and present rocked together and she felt physically giddy for a moment. Then it was gone again, and she was left wondering, and a little breathless.

  When breakfast was over she went out and began on the border again. More and more she found the garden a refuge. It was work she was in the way of doing. Her thoughts went down accustomed paths without effort. Some day she was going to find what she had lost. When she was in the garden she could feel sure of that, and she was content to wait.

  It was about an hour after she had gone out that she found her new peace first touched by something alien and discordant. The feeling grew until it became so strong that she turned right round and looked up and down the border to find the cause for it. She had not heard any step, but there, a dozen yards away, was a man watching her.

  She rose to her feet instinctively. The man was leaning over the gate which admitted to this part of the garden. He was leaning there, and he was smiling. He had a type of cheap good looks, and his smile was offensive. Her brows drew together as she said, ‘If you are looking for the house, you have taken the wrong path.’

  He continued to smile. For a moment she was angry, and then she was frightened. Her heart began to beat violently. She turned pale. She said sharply, ‘Do you want anything?’

  He produced a cigarette and tapped it on his knuckles.

  ‘Ah, now we’re getting at it!’ he said. There was a trace of an accent. It was no more than a trace. She couldn’t tell what it was.

  She said, ‘If you want the house, it’s behind you. If you go straight along the path you’ll see it.’

  ‘How nice that’ll be.’

  He was still smiling, but he didn’t move from where he stood leaning over the gate, only he got a box of matches out of his pocket and quite slowly and deliberately he lighted the cigarette. There was something, she didn’t know what, that kept her there watching him and waiting for him to speak. It seemed a long time before he did so. When the cigarette was lighted, he took two or three puffs at it before he spoke. Then he said, ‘You and me’ve got to have a talk. I gather you wouldn’t want to have it in public.’

  A rushing, dizzying cloud of feeling came over her. She didn’t know what she did, or how she looked. When it was gone again, she hadn’t moved, but all the blood had left her face. She felt drained and faint. He was speaking, but she had lost what he had said. Only the end of it came to her, faint and thin like something recalled out of the long ago past.

  ‘– never met before—’

  She repeated it.

  ‘I’ve never met you before.’

  He laughed. It was a very unpleasant laugh.

  ‘Is that what you’re going to say?’

  ‘It’s true.’

  She hoped with everything in her that it was true.

  He drew at his cigarette.

  ‘That’s what you say. I might say different. I might say—’ He paused, drew on the cigarette again, and let go a
long curling trail of smoke. ‘Oh, well, I take it you know what I might say.’

  She didn’t know. She didn’t know a thing. She looked into her own mind, and it was dark. There was nothing there.

  He went on just leaning on the gate and smoking with that impudent jaunty stare. She made a great effort.

  ‘I don’t know you. I don’t know who you are, and I don’t want to. Will you please go away.’

  He took no notice of that at all. He seemed to be considering something in his own mind. In the end he said, ‘Well, I’ll go for now, but you’ll please to remember that we know where you are. And there are some orders for you. You’ll not tell anyone you’ve seen me, or what I’ve said! And when you get your orders you’ll do what you’re told right away – no niminy piminy nonsense! Do you understand?’ he paused, said, ‘You’d better,’ and turned round and went away without a single backward look.

  When he had gone she went down on her knees by the border and began to turn the earth. She was planting bulbs. The ground had to be cleared for them. You can’t put tulips in on the waste patches of mignonette and snapdragon and the blue, blue flax that looks like sea-water. You can’t put anything in on the wrecks of last summer’s planting. You must clear the ground for the bulbs, or else they won’t grow.

  She went on kneeling there, but her hands were idle. The tears were streaming from her eyes. After a time she groped for a handkerchief and dried them. And went on planting the bulbs for the next spring.

  FIFTEEN

  DETECTIVE INSPECTOR FRANK Abbott looked up.

  ‘Well, that’s that,’ he said in a tone of heartfelt satisfaction. He was about to pack up and be off, when a card was brought to him. He looked at it, said ‘Jim Fancourt—’ half to himself, and got to his feet.

  ‘Where is he? Show him in. No, wait a minute – I’ll come.’

  Ten minutes later he was back in his room, with Jim Fancourt saying, ‘That’s about all I can tell you. The last I saw of her was getting on board the plane. And that’s all, until I got here and went down to my aunt’s house, and there’s another girl, a complete and total stranger who has turned up instead of Anne. She’s Anne too. What do you make of it?’

  ‘Funny business,’ said Frank slowly.

  Jim nodded.

  ‘This Anne’s lost her memory. The first thing she remembers is being on the cellar steps in the dark. She says she was giddy and sat down. There was this bag she speaks of, and when she got over being giddy she picked it up, and there was an electric torch inside.’

  ‘Did your Anne have an electric torch?’

  ‘I don’t know – I don’t think so. I don’t know what she had. She came out ready to go with a little bundle of things. I don’t know what was in it, but I’m sure she didn’t have the bag, because when I gave her ten pounds English money she put it in the front of her dress. She must have got the bag later, after she got home.’

  ‘You think it was hers?’

  Jim nodded.

  ‘I think so. The other Anne thinks so too. She didn’t know anything about it – not about the money or anything. There was about ten pounds left—’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Well, this is what Anne says. She put on the light, and she saw a dead girl lying at the foot of the steps.’

  ‘How does she know she was dead?’

  ‘Head injuries – very extensive. And she was cold. She went down the steps and felt for a pulse. There wasn’t any – she’s quite clear about that – and she was quite sure the girl was dead. She began to think about getting away. She put out the torch and waited until her sight cleared. Then she came up the steps into the hall of the house. The door was ajar and she let herself out into the street and shut it behind her. Then she walked down the street until she came out on to the main thoroughfare, where she got on a bus. Two streets along Miss Silver got on to the same bus.’

  Frank cocked an eyebrow.

  ‘Miss Silver?’

  ‘Miss Maud Silver. She noticed the girl. She got out with her at Victoria and spoke to her. She gave her tea, and she got in return this extraordinary story.’

  ‘And what does Miss Silver say to it?’

  ‘Miss Silver thinks it’s true. By the time they’d had tea together she had made up her mind and told Anne what to do. She was to go down to Haleycott to my aunts and wait till I arrived, or till her memory came back. I got in this morning and went down there. My aunts are’ – he made a face – ‘well, they’re old-maidish.’

  Frank held up a hand.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ he said, ‘you’re going too fast. You haven’t said how she knew where to go.’

  Jim bit his lip.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I keep thinking I’ve told you more than I have. I did say she’d got a bag, didn’t I – the bag the money was in and the torch? Well, there was a letter in it too from my aunt Lilian, inviting her down there. You see, I’d written to her. They’re old-fashioned, she and Harriet – lived at Haleycott all their lives, or most of them – and I thought it best to give them a little warning, so I sent Anne to this Mrs Birdstock, an old parlourmaid of ours. She was to post the letter I had written to Lilian as soon as she arrived and wait with Mrs Birdstock for an answer. Well, she didn’t do any of those things. That is, she must have sent my letter to Lilian, because the answer to it came there to Saltcoats Road. But she didn’t go there, and she didn’t wait there. I don’t know where she went or what she did. And someone – someone turned up on the third day at Saltcoats Road, said she was Anne, and took away the letter from Lilian. It may have been Anne, or it may have been someone else. If it was Anne, it’s the last time she appeared alive as far as we know. There’s one thing, the bag Anne – the Anne who is alive, not the poor girl who was dead in the cellar – the bag that had the money in it… No, I’m getting this all wrong, and it’ll fog you. Wait a minute. Anne – the living Anne, the girl who is down at Haleycott now – when she turned up in the bus and Miss Silver met her, she had a handbag. It’s the first appearance of a handbag, so it’s important. Anne, the one who’s alive, doesn’t think that the bag belongs to her.

  ‘She thinks it belonged to the dead girl. I think it was one of the things she bought when she landed. She had very little with her – I don’t know what she had, but she didn’t have a bag.’

  ‘You don’t know that the bag didn’t belong to the other girl?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know anything – but I’m guessing. It seems reasonable the way I’m telling it.’

  ‘Look here, what actually was there in that bag?’

  ‘A handkerchief, a letter from my aunt Lilian, notes to the amount of ten pounds in the middle, and a little change in the small purse at the side. There was a torch. Anne said she got it out and looked at the dead girl, then she put it away again. That’s the lot.’

  Frank was silent for a moment. Then he said, ‘And you found this bead in the cellar of a house in Lime Street?’

  ‘Yes – 37 Lime Street.’

  ‘And you’re sure that bead you found is from the girl’s necklace?’

  Jim said, ‘Look here, I’m not sure about anything. If we were in Russia, there wouldn’t be anything to be sure about – every second girl might be wearing a necklace of that sort. As we’re in London—’ He made a gesture with his hands. ‘It tots up, doesn’t it? There’s this Russian bead on the floor of an empty house, just out of sight – doesn’t that say anything to you? And the floor had been swept and washed as far as the boards leaning up against the wall in the corner. I tell you the girl was murdered there, and I want to know who murdered her. And why.’

  SIXTEEN

  JIM CAME DOWN to Chantreys the following morning. He was received by Harriet with indifference, by Lilian with an intensification of her usual somewhat fluttered and inconsequent manner.

  Left alone with Anne for a moment, he said in a low voice, ‘I want to talk to you. Get your hat on and come out.’

  When Lilian reappeared he said, ‘We’re
going out.’

  Lilian said, ‘Oh?’ and then quickly, ‘Well, it’s not very convenient, not at all convenient, but if you want – only after lunch would be much better.’

  ‘I shan’t be here after lunch. I’ve just come down for an hour to see Anne. It is Anne and I who are going out.’

  ‘Oh?’ Lilian looked cross and offended. ‘Of course, if that is what you want you must do just as you like.’

  He turned to Anne.

  ‘Put on your things and come along, will you?’

  Lilian said in a quick waspish way, ‘You’re very sure of who you want, aren’t you? You’re very sure about everything.’

  Anne hurried to be gone. She heard Jim’s voice behind her as she went, but she couldn’t hear what he said. She fetched a scarf and her coat, and came back to find Lilian writing and Jim looking out of the window. There was a heavy feeling in the air as if there had been a quarrel between them. At the sound of her light footstep he turned and went out with her, up through the garden and out through a low wicket gate upon the green empty slopes of the hill.

  They had not spoken until they were clear of the garden. Then he turned to her and said, ‘This is a first-class place for confidences. Ideal. I don’t like doors and walls very much. And I don’t like bushes and trees where you can’t see – there may be nothing, or there may be anything. The best place for talking secrets is a mountain top with no trees, or a boat on the sea without anyone to overhear what you are saying. But this is good enough.’

  If he had been a little uncertain about Anne, her presence was convincing. She had walked beside him in a silence which was without constraint. It was most like the silence of intimacy, the silence into which two old friends may fall when they walk together. There was a restful quiet about it. She did not answer him now, only waited, looking not at him, but at the slopes of bare green turning rusty, and at the trees which surrounded the house which they had left. He had not been able to make up his mind what to say to her, and then all at once his mind was made up, set, and fixed. What he knew she could know – it was as simple and as easy as that. He said, ‘I went to see Miss Silver yesterday.’