Major Warrender experienced some relief. He would not, it appeared, be obliged to face Miss Olivia Benevent without support, if indeed he had to face her at all. He looked at Miss Silver with gratitude, for of course what she said was perfectly true. Olivia Benevent had really no legal status. It was not she but Candida Sayle who was Cara Benevent’s heir. He reached for the telephone and rang up Mr. Tampling.

Chapter Thirty-six

In the darkness Candida remained motionless, her hand on the torch. Brushing past handkerchief and purse, it had closed on the smooth, cold metal and become frozen there. For the moment thought was frozen too. Then gradually it came to life again, questioning, clamouring for an answer. How had the torch got into her bag?

It wasn’t hers. She had brought no such thing to Underhill. There was a torch of Barbara’s packed up in one of the boxes she had left in store, an old battered thing which had gone through the war in the days when Barbara Sayle was a warden and had come out of it with a veteran’s scars. There was a dent on the rim which held the glass… Her fingers moved on the thing she held – unchipped glass and a smooth metal ring. This couldn’t be Barbara’s torch. It lay there under her hand new and undented, and whoever it belonged to, it was not she who had put it into her bag. Then who? There was an answer to that – the same person or the same people who had dressed her in her outdoor clothes and brought her here.

But why? As to the clothes, the answer was not far to seek. It was meant to look as if she had run away. She had been accused, and she had run away. The picture was clear enough. But the torch – that didn’t account for the torch. She had been put into this dark place and left there to its terrors. Then why the mercy of the torch? She thought it would have taken more than one person to carry her. Perhaps it had come to one of them how dreadful it might be to die in the dark. Perhaps – her thought broke off.

Since she had the torch, it was all that mattered. Then why did she delay to use it? In the depths of her mind she knew the answer. It was because it gave her a little hope which she was loth to lose. She could stay there with the torch under her hand and feel that she could break the darkness. She had only to move her finger on the switch and there would be light. But was there any chance that the torch would have been put in her bag if it was going to help her? She could not think… Suppose she pressed on the switch and no light came – could anyone be cruel enough to make such a mock of hope? She didn’t know. She had stumbled into a nightmare where anything might happen.

Suppose the light came on and showed her something more dreadful than the dark – some trap, some pit, or just the blank unbroken walls of a tomb. Perhaps the torch was there to show her how little hope there was.

All this time she had been dulled by the drug, but the effect was waning. Quick and suddenly her courage rose. If you don’t do everything you can, you will always be beaten and you will deserve it. If you don’t fight on even after it doesn’t seem to be any good, you are not worth saving. She lifted the torch out of the bag and pressed the switch.

The beam was bright and strong. It cut the darkness and came to rest no more than a yard away, splashing its light against the dull surface of a wall. She turned it this way and that. There was a wall on either side of her and a roof above. She thought the roof would be six foot over her head as she sat, perhaps more, perhaps less. She was sitting back upon her heels with the bag in her lap. The passage ran away in front of her.

Her feet and ankles were cramped. She got up on to her feet and stood waiting for the blood to come back into them. She was dizzy enough for her first step to take her to the wall with a hand stretched out and groping for it. The air was heavy. Turning the torch the other way, she could see that the passage went away to the right. She didn’t know whether to go on or to go back. As her head cleared she became aware that the wall against which she was leaning was made of brick. With nothing to sway her choice, she went step by step in the direction towards which she had been facing when the light came on. Ten paces brought her to a turn. The passage narrowed and the roof was nearer. She came to a flight of steps, very narrow, very steep, and climbed them. Ten steps going up, and at the head of them a small square platform and a door. She went down on her knees and set the torch beside her, propping it with her bag.

The door was about two and a half foot high by two foot wide. It was made of old weathered oak. The light showed up the grain and the dry grey surface of the wood. It was all dry here – dry and dusty. Not damp like the passage below. She put out her hand to the oak and pushed against it. It was as solid as the floor upon which she was kneeling. There was no handle to the door.

Chapter Thirty-seven

Mr. Tampling was a little grey man. He had a bright enquiring eye and a tendency to romance which he made it his business to hold in check. He considered that it should be kept in its place, where it afforded him a good deal of secret pleasure. He was now in his early sixties, and he had known Miss Olivia Benevent ever since he could remember. His father, his grandfather, and his great-grandfather had handled the Benevents’ affairs. When he had first come into the firm as a very young man Miss Olivia had patronised him. She was a few years the elder, and she had not only behaved as if those few years were a good many more, but she had very obviously regarded him from the other side of a social rubicon which could never be crossed. He made up his mind about her then, and had never seen any occasion to alter it. He was sorry for Miss Cara, who was obviously quite incapable of standing up for herself, and he had done his best to protect her interests. He was now quite prepared to do his best for Candida Sayle, and since he was an executor of the will under which she inherited, he was in a position to do so. He expressed himself as shocked at her disappearance and concerned for her safety.

As he waited for the Chief Constable to pick him up, this concern increased. He was remembering a conversation with Miss Olivia Benevent after her father’s death. It had been necessary for him to remind her that it was not she but Miss Cara who inherited the estate, and that, apart from Miss Cara’s right to assign a life-rent of the property to her husband in the event of her marriage, it would pass at her death to her sister Candida Sayle.

She had stared back at him with cold anger.

‘My sister Candida is dead.’

‘I believe she had children.’

‘A son and a daughter. What has that to do with it?’

‘The son would inherit. Failing him or his children, the daughter would do so.’

He had never been able to forget her look, her words. She had not raised her voice. She had said that she hoped no child of Candida Sayle would survive, and she had said it as if she were cursing them. He had been most profoundly shocked, and he had not forgotten. He remembered that Miss Cara had cried out, and that Olivia had quelled her with a look. He could see poor Cara now with the tears running down her face, catching her breath and murmuring, ‘Oh, no – no – that is a dreadful thing to say!’

Miss Olivia was in the drawing-room when Joseph informed her of Mr. Tampling’s arrival.

‘There is another gentleman with him – Major Warrender – and the Police Inspector.’

She sat very upright, her plain dead black relieved against the white brocade chair. She had her embroidery-frame upon her lap, and a needle threaded with scarlet silk in her hand. There were three handsome rings on the third finger. They crowded one another, but the diamonds flashed bravely. She said in a measured voice,