NASTY TEMPER. IF YOU DO THAT AGAIN FRED WILL KNOW ALL. WHAT ABOUT THE MIDDLE OF LAST JUNE?

Helen Adrian stared defiantly across the table.

“That’s as far as we’ve got.”

“When did this come?”

“This morning. That’s when I rang you up.”

Miss Silver continued to knit.

“Miss Adrian, do you know who is blackmailing you?”

“How should I?”

“I cannot tell you that. The address would, of course, be an accommodation address. If you went to the police, they would advise you to send a letter as requested. They would then watch the place and endeavour to trap the blackmailer.”

“I won’t go to the police.”

Miss Silver looked at her shrewdly.

“I think you may have some idea of the blackmailer’s identity. Did you, for instance, recognize the voice which spoke to you on the telephone.”

“No. He was making it all squeaky-like a Punch and Judy show.”

“It was a man?”

“Oh, yes.”

Helen Adrian said,

“Well, there was someone down at Brighton last year-we were in a concert party together a couple of years ago. He was doing a sketch with Althea Paine. He was rotten, but she’d got a crush on him. Women fell for him-he was that sort. Cyril Felton is the name. It was just the sort of thing he might do. Of course-” The words came out in a hesitating manner.

Miss Silver said,

“I think you have someone else in mind, Miss Adrian.”

“Well, I don’t know… Yes, I suppose I’d better tell you. I won’t say I haven’t thought it might be Felix himself-Felix Brand, my accompanist. He’s crazy about me, and jealous of Fred-that’s my fiancé, Mr. Mount-and he might think it was a way of getting it all broken off.”

“Would he ask you for money?”

“I don’t know-that might be just a blind, and to get me deeper in. I shouldn’t be surprised if he hadn’t got a revengeful nature, and though there isn’t anything in it of course, there’s Fred. He’s jealous, and all his people are Chapel-you know the sort of thing. The first time he heard me sing I was having a big hit with a number about a child saying its prayers and the father and mother making it up- the God bless Mummy and Daddy touch. ‘God bless our Home’ it was called, and that was the refrain-

Real hot sob-stuff. Felix said it made him sick, but it went over big and Fred fairly lapped it up. I’ll say this for him, he doesn’t let the grass grow under his feet-the next thing I knew, he was asking me down to meet the family. There’s an old maid sister that keeps house for him, and a lot of married brothers. Well, that meant business, so I had to sit up and take notice. They were all very friendly, and I sang for them at a Chapel sociable. ‘God bless our Home’ went down like hot cakes. Fred told me I was his idea of an angel, and that’s the way he’s thought about me ever since. All very well, you know, but it means you have to mind your p’s and q’s. If he’d even half an idea there’s ever been anyone else- week-ends, you know, and that sort of thing-well, there wouldn’t be any wedding-bells, that’s all. There isn’t anything modern about Fred. There are good women and bad women. If you’re a good woman you get the wedding-bells, if you’re a bad woman you don’t. Nice, simple, easy way of looking at things, isn’t it?”

After a thoughtful silence Miss Silver said,

“I cannot take up your case, Miss Adrian, but I will give you some advice. You ought to take these letters to the police. But if you will not do so you would, I think, be well advised to tell your fiancé that an attempt is being made to blackmail you. You would, no doubt, be able to put the whole thing in such a way as to convince him that you are being subjected to an unscrupulous persecution. You should not, I think, find it difficult to convince him of your complete innocence.”

If Miss Silver’s tone was unusually dry, Miss Adrian did not notice it. She said with all the emphasis at her command,

“You don’t know Fred.”

Helen Adrian arrived at Cove House on the following day. In some extraordinary way her presence immediately pervaded it. A scent of violets came and went, clashing a little with the naphthalene which was Mrs. Brand’s specific against moth. It even came over into Marian’s side of the house, which was mercifully free from moth-ball, Martin Brand having disliked the smell, maintaining that there had been no moths in his mother’s time, and that she used nothing but lavender to ward them off. To which Eliza Cotton had been wont to respond that some people drawed them.

The violet scent was only one manifestation of Miss Adrian’s presence. The shutters were open and the curtains drawn back in the drawing-room. The sound of the piano could be heard continually, and the notes of a high and lovely voice went floating up, and up, and up, and then down, and down, and down, as she practiced scales, and runs, and trills, never really letting her voice out, but keeping to the enchanting half-voice which tests the breath-control and imposes no strain on the throat. Felix, plunged head over ears in his dream, was like someone moving on another plane.

Eliza, ejecting a queen wasp from a honeypot, remarked with a rasp in her voice that, insects or men, it was all one when there was honey about, they were bound to trap themselves no matter what came of it.

“And no use your looking like that, Penny my dear. If he knew what was good for him he’d do different, but men don’t and never will.”

Penny said in a small dejected voice,

“I don’t know what you mean.”

She stood looking out of the old kitchen window, one hand absently stroking Mactavish, who was sunning himself on the window ledge. Through the half-open casement Miss Adrian could be heard trilling melodiously.

Eliza looked grimly at Penny’s back. It would have given her a good deal of pleasure to have started a barrel-organ in opposition. She would also have liked to tell Felix what she thought of the silly way he was acting-black as a May thunderstorm and sour enough to curdle the milk one minute, and grinning like a Cheshire cat the next. “And what I’ve always said, and always will say, is, being in love is all very well in reason, but no need to make a show of yourself!” This last bit came out aloud to the accompaniment of a vigorous rattling of pots and pans.

Penny said in a still smaller voice,

“I suppose he’s in love with her.” Then, after a pause, “I said that to him one day, I said it right out-‘I suppose you are in love with her.’ And what do you think he said?”

Eliza snorted.

“Something soft!”

Penny didn’t turn around. She went on stroking Mactavish.

“He looked at me. You know the way he can look-black, like you said just now-and he said, ‘Sometimes I think I hate her!’ and he went out of the room and banged the door.”

Eliza said harshly,

“She’s the tormenting sort. Maybe she’ll do it once too often. Hatred’s like muck-it breeds things.”

Penny nodded.

“He didn’t mean it-not really-at least-” Her voice trailed away.

“Better say it.”

“It’s wicked to hate. I suppose I’m wicked. I do very nearly hate her-when she-makes Felix-look like that.” Then, with sudden energy, “And when that scent of hers comes crawling up into my attic, I’d rather it was moth-ball, and that shows!”

Mactavish, who had been on the edge of purring, uttered a sharp protest. The stroking fingers had become quite hard. They had pressed upon a tender spot, they had actually hurt. It was not his habit to suffer in silence. Since the fingers were Penny’s, he refrained from biting them. Instead he rose to his majestic height, dazzled her for a moment with an orange glare, and leaped out of the window.