“My dear Miss Silver!”

She said earnestly,

“Consider for a moment. She has received a letter with a corner torn off. She visits four houses, and in one of them she picks up the missing piece of paper. She has no doubt of the importance of her discovery, and she comes home very much upset. She now knows who has written the slandering letters. Do you for one moment suppose that she was able to conceal all traces of her emotion at the time? She stoops down without thinking, she picks up the scrap of paper, and at once receives a severe shock. The effect of such a shock would be in most cases to paralyse action. She would keep the paper in her hand, stare at it, and become obviously confused and distressed. It is most unlikely that she was alone when she made the discovery, and she was a simple country girl not versed in concealment. We know, in fact, that something of this sort is what happened, since Miss Pell mentioned that she had ‘come over faint’ and had to sit down. Do you think it possible that her agitation was not noticed? And if Doris could recognise the torn-off corner as a piece of damning evidence, would not the person whom it would certainly have ruined be quick to do so?”

His attention had become fixed. He said,

“Go on.”

“What would be your course of action if you were placed in such a predicament, and if, like this detected criminal, you were without moral sense and already actuated by feelings of bitterness and spite?”

He said with praiseworthy gravity,

“You are asking too much of my powers of imagination.”

She shook her head slightly and proceeded.

“It would be absolutely necessary to silence Doris Pell. Three ways of doing so might suggest themselves. She might be bound by a promise, she might be offered a bribe, or there was the third and darker course which was, I believe, adopted.”

“You know, this is pure supposition.”

“Not entirely, Randal. Where a cause proceeds to its logical effect and where all the circumstances combine in a reasonable possibility, there is at least a case for very careful scrutiny. Consider the events of that afternoon. Doris Pell goes up to the Manor with a blouse which she had made for Miss Repton. Some trifling alteration is necessary, and she agrees to make it and bring the blouse back in the evening. She then crosses the Green to Willow Cottage, where she tries on the dress she has been altering for Miss Wayne, and afterwards goes in next door to settle the pattern of a couple of nightdresses for Miss Mettie Eccles. Now it was in one of those three houses that she picked up that scrap of paper, because by the time she arrived at Connie Brooke’s, which was her last call, she was already in a state of distress and in a position to tell Connie what she had seen. What she told Connie was, except for the colour of the carpet, just what she afterwards told Miss Pell. She did not tell either of them in which house she had picked the paper up. I think this points to her having given some kind of a promise not to do so. You will remember that she told her aunt that she did not think she ought to tell her who it was that had written the letters, and that perhaps it would be better if she made the person give a solemn promise never to do it again. Does this not look to you as if she was planning some explanation with this person?”

She waited for him to speak, but as he said nothing, she continued.

“If the scrap of paper was picked up at the Manor, the letter from which it had been torn could have been written by Miss Maggie Repton, by Mrs. Repton, by Valentine Grey, by Colonel Repton, or-just possibly but not at all probably- by Florrie or by one of the other daily maids. I asked Miss Maggie where she tried on the purple blouse which Doris had made for her, and she said at once and without any sign of embarrassment that it was up in her bedroom.”

March said quickly, “You really can’t suspect Miss Maggie.”

Miss Silver coughed faintly.

“In arguing a case it is better that there should be no exception, but I was about to remind you that Connie Brooke in telling Miss Pell of her conversation with Doris reported her as saying that the scrap of paper had shown up so white against the carpet, and that she had told her what the colour of the carpet was.”

“And what was it?”

“Unfortunately, Connie did not say. But with regard to a piece of paper showing up well upon it, the carpet in Miss Maggie’s room would not answer such a purpose at all well, since it is of Indian manufacture and there is a good deal of white in the groundwork.”

He said with a smile, “Miss Maggie is exonerated.”

A shade of severity just tinged Miss Silver’s manner.

“With regard to the other people in the house, I find that Florrie let Doris in and took her up to Miss Maggie’s room. She thinks that at this time Mrs. Repton was out and so was Valentine Grey, but she is not sure. Neither is she sure whether either of them returned before Doris left. Valentine Grey is not really a suspect, but this leaves us uncertain as to whether Mrs. Repton could have seen Doris pick up that scrap of paper. Colonel Repton we need not consider, since he was to be one of the victims. As for Florrie and the other maids, I feel sure they have nothing to do with the case.”

“There I am able to agree with you.”

She continued as if he had not spoken.

“To come to Willow Cottage where Miss Wayne tried on a dress, I think we may conclude that this would also take place in her bedroom. The carpet there is a plain Wilton in a faded shade of pink. That in the spare room, which I have been occupying but which would have been empty at the time of Doris ’ visit and might therefore have possibly been used for the trying on, is in a similar shade of blue. A piece of paper would certainly show up much better than on a carpet with a pattern. In the case of Miss Eccles there was no question of trying anything on. The interview with Doris for the purpose of selecting a nightdress pattern could have taken place wherever it suited Miss Eccles’ convenience, but it would most likely have been held in the sitting-room. I have seen this carpet for myself, and it is darker in tone than the one in Miss Maggie’s bedroom. Colonel Repton was for a number of years in the East and brought these carpets back with him as presents for his sister and his cousin. I have not seen the carpet in Miss Eccles’ bedroom, but Mrs. Rodney informs me that it is a square of powder blue with a border in a darker tone. A piece of paper would show up very well on this, but no better than on either of the carpets at Miss Wayne’s. I do not feel that any conclusion can be drawn from these particulars, but I thought it right to touch upon them.”

“Do you really feel that any conclusions are to be drawn at all?”

“Some, I believe. You see, Randal, whether it can ever be proved or not, I am convinced that Doris Pell did not commit suicide. The account I received from her aunt does not warrant the theory. A girl who was so completely shattered by the allegations in an anonymous letter as to fly in the face of her upbringing and her religious training by taking her own life was not the girl who set out that afternoon on a round of errands and was prepared to go up to the Manor again in the evening. If she had been in the state of morbid despair which had been indicated, she would have shrunk from meeting people, shunned her friends, and implored her aunt to do the errands for her. In response to a question from me Miss Pell stated that Doris set off quite cheerfully. It is true that she was upset when she came home, but this was entirely natural, and the distress was not of the kind to drive her into suicide. She had discovered the writer of the anonymous letters, and she was profoundly shocked and on the whole disinclined to expose the person. Her mind was, in fact, fully occupied in considering what she ought to do. Could there be any moment when she would be less likely to take her own life? There is simply no motive for it at all.”