Miss Silver cleared her throat and said precisely,

“Thank you. Good-morning. I should like to speak to Inspector March.”

“What name, please?”

“Miss Maud Silver.”

The bass voice appeared to be allied to extremely heavy boots. They could be heard receding with a measured tread. After an interval other, less resounding footsteps and a familiar voice.

“Miss Silver? How are you? What can I do for you?”

Miss Silver’s faint cough travelled along the line. It took Randal March a long way back to a schoolroom where a little inky boy and two much tidier little girls had absorbed instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic from a Miss Silver who must in those days have been a good deal younger than she was now, but who never seemed to him to have changed in any way with the passage of years. Kind, dowdy, prim, intelligent – oh, very intelligent – and firm. That was Miss Silver twenty-seven years ago, and that was Miss Silver today. They had always kept up with her, his mother, his sisters, and at long intervals himself. Recently however they had been rather closely associated, for it was from Matchley that he had just been transferred to Ledlington, and it was in Matchley that the horrible dénouement of the affair of the poisoned caterpillars had taken place. If it had not been for Miss Silver, he might very well have been occupying a grave in the family plot instead of listening with grateful attention whilst she replied to his questions.

“Thank you, Randal, I am quite well. I hope you are settling down comfortably. Ledlington is a charming, old-fashioned place, though rather spoilt by some of the newer buildings.”

“What does she want?” thought Randal March. “She didn’t ring me up to discuss architecture. What is she on to?”

“I hope you have good news of your dear mother,” pursued Miss Silver.

“Oh, yes – very. She never gets any older.”

“And dear Margaret and Isabel?”

“Blooming.”

“Please give them my love when you write – but I shall be seeing you.”

“Oh, you will, will you?” He did not say this aloud, but he grinned.

Miss Silver went on speaking.

“I thought of taking a little holiday in Ledlington.”

“A holiday?” said Randal severely.

“I hope so. And I really rang up to know whether you could recommend me a quiet boarding-house, not too expensive. I am sure you will know what would suit me.”

“Well – I don’t know-”

“I thought of coming down this afternoon. If you would be so kind as to make some enquiries about a boarding-house-”

“Yes, of course-”

“I could call in at the station, and if you should not be there, perhaps you would leave a note.”

Inspector March said that he would. He hung up, wondering what Miss Silver had got hold of. It couldn’t be the Cole case – or could it? He felt a pringling in his bones. If Maud Silver was coming to Ledlington, it was because she had got her nose down on a trail. All that about a holiday and “your dear mother,” and “dear Margaret and Isabel,” and a nice boarding-house, was camouflage. She had just had a holiday with her niece Ethel. Not only did he know that, but he knew that she knew that he knew it. And she didn’t throw any dust in his eyes. He knew his Miss Silver.

He went off to enquire about boarding-houses.

Chapter 28

THE inquest took place next day in the village hall. The village attended in force. Miss Cole in black between her brother James and his plump, emotional wife. The party from Tanfield Court. William, uplifted by his own importance as the last person with the exception of Pell, whom he and every one else was already calling the murderer, to see Cissie alive. Inspector March, very smart and upright. The Coroner, old Dr. William Creek who had brought Cissie into the world and knew most things about nearly everybody in the room. Pell, sitting beside a stolid young constable, incredibly tousled, sallow and unshaven, with red-rimmed eyes and a jutting, obstinate jaw. He sat there and took no notice of anyone. Every now and then he yawned, showing yellow teeth.

Miss Silver in the third row reflected, not for the first time in her professional career, that girls did fall in love with the most extraordinary people. A woman beside her said in an indignant whisper, “Look at him sitting there and yawning! Don’t care what he done to the poor girl! But he won’t get out of it that way. A real murdering face he’s got.” Someone else said “Ssh!”

Miss Silver was watching Pell’s left hand. It hung down beside him and grasped the edge of the bench on which he sat with such a desperate force that the knuckles looked as if they were about to split the skin. She saw it pale, stretched, straining, a mute witness to the man’s tortured mind, and then lifted her eyes again to his unwitnessing face.

She looked next at the Tanfield party. After a moment she leaned to the woman beside her and with a faint preliminary cough enquired which of the two gentlemen was Mr. Dale Jerningham. On receiving the whispered reply she sat back again and resumed her survey. A good-looking man – oh, yes, very decidedly. He and Mrs. Jerningham made a very handsome couple – though of course handsome was scarcely the word one would use to describe anyone so slender and sweet-looking as she was. No – lovely would be a much truer description. And Lady Steyne now – how should she be described? Very pretty – very pretty indeed. Very simply and suitably dressed in white linen, with a black riband round her hat, and black and white shoes. On such a very hot day nothing could be more suitable, and the touches of black would be appreciated by the village. Mrs. Jerningham was in white too, but without any black. Of course Lady Steyne, being a widow and a fairly recent one, would have had the black by her, whereas Mrs. Jerningham would probably have only a choice between white and some colour, and a colour would not be suitable to the occasion – oh, no, not at all.

Lady Steyne and Mrs. Jerningham sat next to each other. A pretty contrast – one so dark and the other so fair. But Lady Steyne had a lovely colour, and Mrs. Jerningham was quite dreadfully pale. Of course it did her credit, poor thing – a most distressing occasion. Mr. Jerningham was on his wife’s other side. Very right and proper, and most natural that he should appear concerned at her looks. He put a hand on hers, bent and whispered to her, and even after receiving what was obviously a reassurance continued to manifest a good deal of affection and concern. The young man beyond him was of course the cousin, Mr. Rafe Jerningham. Really they were an extraordinary good-looking family. Such a graceful person, if one could apply that description to a man. Not so tall or so broad in the shoulders as his cousin Dale, but so very well proportioned. A very mobile, expressive countenance, and such beautiful white teeth. In happier circumstances, Miss Silver judged, he would be a lively and amusing companion. His expression at the moment was decorous in the extreme.

The proceedings began.

Evidence of identification. Medical evidence. Miss Cole’s evidence.

The coastguard who had found the body at 7. 15. The doctor who had examined it. The time at which death must have taken place, somewhere between 9 p. m. and midnight. Then Miss Cole.

Dr. Creek treated her very gently.

“You say that your niece was unhappy.”

Miss Cole pressed a clean handkerchief to her eyes.

“Oh, yes, sir,” she said with a sob.

“Would you say that she was desperately unhappy – that is, unhappy enough to do some desperate thing?”

Miss Cole sobbed again.

“Oh, no, sir.”

“And did she ever speak of doing anything desperate, such as taking her own life?”

“Oh, no, sir. And she never did, and never had any cause to. She was a good girl, Cissie was.”