Meriel – why had she ever taken the creature into her life? She went back to the first sight of her – six months old in the arms of a frightful old woman with a glib tongue and greedy eyes. And the baby had looked at her through its long dark lashes with the strange unwinking stare of all very young things. Puppies, kittens, babies – they stare at you, and you have no idea of what may lie behind the look which does not see. The child’s mother lay dead with her lover’s knife in her heart. And the baby stared.

Adriana turned a page mechanically. If she had known, would she still have taken the child? She thought probably. She looked back at Meriel emerging from a stormy, passionate babyhood into the moody, and still passionate little girl – the hysterical, passionate schoolgirl – the unstable neurotic woman. She made her thought cold and quiet. Here, if anywhere, must be the enemy. Only you couldn’t really believe a thing like that about the creature who had grown up beside you, and who, for all its tempers, was a part of your life.

She went on with her list.

Star – oh, no, not Star. There was nothing in Star that hated or would strike. Star loved Star, but she loved other people too. She would have neither use nor time for murder.

Ninian – her mind refused the thought. Janet’s judgement of him marched with her own. He could be selfish certainly, light perhaps – she thought there were depths below. But there wasn’t any hatred, or the cold ruthlessness which can strike where it does not hate.

The staff- She wearied suddenly. What, after all, did you know of any other human beings? The Simmons – they had served her for twenty years. The daily woman – respectable to her backbone, with crime of any sort a social taboo. That irritating girl Joan Cuttle who was Edna’s pet… She let them go and shut her book, addressing Miss Silver.

‘Well, it is only half past nine, but I suppose most of us have had enough of today. Speaking for myself, I am going up to my room. How about you? And Edna?’

Miss Silver smiled and began to put away her knitting. Edna Ford finished the stitch she was taking and folded up her embroidery. She had not spoken for quite a long time. She said now in a thin, tired voice,

‘Oh, yes, I shall be very glad. I haven’t been sleeping at all well. One can’t go on without sleep. I must take something tonight.’

Chapter Twenty-five

John Lenton had come in late to his supper. He was tired, and out of the common grave. Mary Lenton was a good wife. She set food before him, and she asked no questions. If he wanted to eat in silence, well, he could. And if he wanted to talk, she was here. She thought he looked dreadfully tired, but she thought there was more in his silence than fatigue. She kept her thoughts to herself, changed his plate, and presently cleared away. As she went out with the tray, he said,

‘Come to the study when you’ve finished. I want to talk to you.’

She put the used china in a bowl of water and went to him.

He was walking up and down with a face of perplexity and anger. She said, ‘What is it, John?’ and he paced the room twice before he answered her.

‘You know I had a sick call – old Mrs Dunn over at Folding-’

‘Is she very bad?’

‘No – no – she always thinks she’s dying – there’s nothing much wrong with her. But as I was there, I thought I would go on and see Mrs Collen about that girl of hers, Olive. You know she’s at Ledbury with Mrs Ridley, helping with the children, and she hasn’t been behaving at all well – staying out late at night and making friends who are not much good to her. She’s only just sixteen, and Mrs Ridley is a good deal worried about it. She rang up this morning and asked me if I would say a word to Mrs Collen, so I thought as I was so near I had better get it over.’

Mary Lenton was wondering what all this was leading up to.

John would be sorry and concerned about Olive Collen, but it wouldn’t be on her account that he would look as he was looking now. She said,

‘Yes?’

He made an odd abrupt movement.

‘I went to the Collens, and I got more than I bargained for.’

She was gazing up at him, her fair hair catching the light, her face sweetly serious.

‘John, what is it?’

His hand came down on her shoulder.

‘I spoke to her about Olive. I wasn’t looking forward to it. She is the type of woman who can be disagreeable.’

‘And she was?’

‘She told me to look to my own household. “What about what’s going on under your own roof?” she said.’

‘Oh, John!’

‘She said that Ellie was carrying on with Geoffrey Ford. She said everyone knew about it except me. And she said I had better put things right in my own house before I started taking away her daughter’s character-’ He stopped, took his hands off her, and walked to the window and back. ‘I won’t tell you all the things she said. She’s a foul-tongued woman and I couldn’t bring myself to repeat them. She said Ellie had been going up to Ford House in the night. She said it was common talk. She said Ellie had been seen coming back here at two in the morning! I want the truth! Is it all lies, or is there anything in it? If you know anything, you’ve got to tell me!’

Mary Lenton’s blue eyes were steady.

‘John, I don’t know. She has been very unhappy. I moved the children into a room of their own because Jenny said she cried in the night. And she locks her door-’

‘Since when?’

‘Since I moved the children.’

He said with a hard anger in his voice,

‘I won’t have it in my house! It’s a most dangerous thing! There’s no reason – there’s no reason at all!’

But in both their minds a reason stood out plain. If a girl was getting out at night she wouldn’t want to run any risk of her room being found empty while she was away.

He said, ‘I’ll have to see her.’

‘No, John – no!’

He turned a darker look upon her than she had ever had from him.

‘This can’t be covered up!’

The tears had come into her eyes.

‘John, let me see her first. She isn’t strong, and she has been terribly unhappy. It may not be nearly so bad as you think. Let me see her first.’

There was a moment of suspense. Then he said harshly,

‘Very well, but it must be now.’

‘She will have gone to bed.’

He looked at his wrist-watch.

‘At half past nine?’

‘She often goes at half past eight – you know she does.’

‘She won’t be asleep, or if she is you must wake her. I won’t have this thing put off or glossed over! You can see her first since you make such a point of it, but in the last resort the responsibility is mine, and I neither can nor will hand it over to anyone else.’

Mary Lenton had not been married for eight years without knowing when she had come up against an immovable barrier. In this case it was John’s conscience. She stood aghast at the thought that it might some day arise between them. Her own was of a less unyielding type. It could speak with no uncertain voice, but it did, and always would, listen to the promptings of kindness. In theory she could condemn the sinner, but in practice she found it only too easy to forgive.

She went upstairs with a heavy heart and knocked upon Ellie’s door. There was no answer, and she knocked again. After a third time she tried the handle.

The door was locked.