Chapter TWENTY-NINE: Mrs. Bonsor Speaks

This time Andy decided he would not wait till the morning for an explanation. It would probably be a very simple one, and—a light had appeared in the hall-room. He only tapped gently on the door, but Stella answered him.

“Who is that?”

There was a note of anxiety in her voice.

“It is Andy!”

“Andy!” He heard her fingers fumbling with the chain. “Oh, Andy!” She fell into his arms, sobbing. “I’m so frightened! I’m such a fool!”

“Everybody seems frightened and foolish to-night,” said Andy as he smoothed the brown head that lay on his shoulder. “What have you seen?”

“Have you seen anything?” she asked, looking up.

Mr. Nelson’s voice called from upstairs.

“It is Andy, father. Will you come down?”

“Anything wrong?” Nelson was fastening his dressing-gown as he descended the stairs.

“I’m just trying to find out,” said Andy. “Beverley Green seems to be in a state of nerves to-night.”

Mr. Nelson’s dressing-gown was purple, he noted, and he had the appearance of a man who had just been aroused from sleep.

“Did you knock before?” he asked. “I could have sworn I heard somebody.”

“No, daddy, it wasn’t Andy.” She shivered.

“Did somebody knock?” asked Andy.

She nodded.

“I sleep very lightly,” she said, “and I must have heard the knock the first time. I thought it was you and opened the window to look out. I saw somebody down below standing on the path. He was quite distinct.”

“How was he dressed?” asked Andy quickly. “In a dressing-gown?”

“Have you seen him?” she said. “Who was it, Andy?”

“Go on, my dear, what happened?”

“I called out ‘Who is it?’ and he didn’t answer at first,” Stella went on, “and then in a deep kind of voice he said, ‘Have you got your scarf?’ I didn’t know what he meant at first, then I remembered the scarf which had been found in the orchard. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Who are you?’ But he didn’t answer, and I saw him walking away. I sat for a long time in the dark puzzling my head as to who it could be. It wasn’t your voice; it wasn’t the voice of anybody unless—but that is absurd.”

“Unless it was Merrivan’s?” said Andy quietly.

“Of course it wasn’t his, but it was very low and gentle, just as his was, and the more I thought about it the more frightened I became. Yes, I did think it was Mr. Merrivan’s, and fought hard against the idea. Then I put my light on and came downstairs, intending to call father and to get a glass of milk. Then you knocked, Andy.”

“It is extraordinary,” said Andy, and told them what he had seen and heard in the night. “Johnston is a dithering wreck. You’ll have to let him go away, Mr. Nelson.”

“But who could it be? Do you think it was somebody trying to frighten us?”

“They succeeded very well if it was,” said Andy.

“My theory is,” said Mr. Nelson, who was never at a loss for a theory, “that you were all upset by that wretched woman’s fit. I knew you were upset the moment I came in.”

“Johnston wasn’t upset,” said Andy, “and I think my nerves are in pretty good order.”

He took the key out of his pocket.

“Go along and have a look at Merrivan’s house,” he smiled.

“Not for a thousand,” said Mr. Nelson fervently. “Now, off you go to bed, Stella. You’ll be a wreck in the morning.”

“It is morning now,” said the girl, pulling aside the blinds. “I wonder if Arthur Wilmot is awake?”

The same thought had come into Andy’s mind, and, having extracted a solemn promise from Stella that she would go straight to bed, he left her and made his way to Mr. Wilmot’s bijou residence.

It was a very long time before he aroused the milliner, and Arthur Wilmot received the news with strange calmness.

“It is curious,” he said. “I was in the house yesterday. In fact, it was I who put the bolts in the back window. They haven’t been bolted since the murder.”

“You have seen nothing?” asked Andy.

“Nothing whatever,” said Wilmot. “If you’ll wait a minute while I dress, I’ll come over to the house with you. It ought to be light enough then to see whether there are any footprints in the garden.”

“Don’t bother your head about footprints,” said Andy irritably. “A cinder path and an asphalted courtyard are not the best material to collect that sort of evidence from.”

Nevertheless, he accompanied Arthur to the house, and they made a thorough search of the rooms, beginning at the hall.

“Here’s something.”

Wilmot pointed to the floor.

“Candle grease,” said Andy, interested. “Have you had anybody here with candles?”

Arthur Wilmot shook his head.

They found another gout of grease in Merrivan’s room, and then they discovered a half-burnt candle. It lay at the back of the deep fireplace.

“I didn’t need this to know that something more substantial than a spirit had been in this place,” said Andy. “Without professing to be an authority on ghosts, I always understood they carried their own illumination.”

He wrapped the candle carefully in paper.

“What are you going to do with that?” asked Wilmot in astonishment, and Andy smiled.

“Really, for a man who suggests that I should look for footprints on asphalt you are singularly dense, Wilmot. This candle is covered with finger-prints.”

The murderer, sane or insane, was attracted to the scene of the crime, and probably his visits were of frequent occurrence.

He said nothing about his plans to Wilmot or to the Nelsons. His first business lay with Mrs. Crafton-Bonsor, but that lady was not visible. More than that, when Andy urged the imperative necessity for an interview, she flatly and firmly refused to see him. And Scottie was her messenger.

“Women’s whims,” murmured Scottie. “It is no good, Macleod, she is as hard as a neolithic fossil. I have done my best, but she won’t see you.”

“Now, Scottie,” said Andy, “I have treated you fair and you have got to help me. What was Abraham Selim to her?”

Scottie gave an elaborate shrug.

“Never enquire into a woman’s past, Macleod,” he said. “‘The past is dead, so let it die’ as the song says, ‘and happiness is with the future.’”

“I am not concerned with the future, but with Mrs. Crafton-Bonsor’s past,” said Andy unpleasantly, “and I intend seeing that lady or there is going to be serious trouble.”

Scottie disappeared, and was gone for nearly half an hour before he returned.

“She’s ill, Macleod, there is no doubt about it. You as a medical man, will see it with half an eye. But she’ll give you two minutes.”

Mrs. Bonsor was lying on a couch, and Scottie had not exaggerated the tragic effect which his chance reference of the previous night had produced upon the woman. Her plump cheeks seemed to have grown haggard; the insolence in her blue eyes had departed.

“I’ve got nothing to tell you, mister,” she said sharply, almost as soon as Andy was in the room. “I don’t know Abraham Selim and I don’t want to talk about him. If he is a friend of yours, well, I don’t admire your taste.”

“Hasn’t Scottie told you——” he began.

“Scottie has told me nothing,” she said shrilly, “and I don’t see why you should come up here into my private sitting-room—God knows they charge me enough for it—and try to pump me.”

“Did you ever know Abraham Selim?”

She hesitated.

“Well, I did,” she said reluctantly. “That was years and years ago. I don’t want to talk to you about it, mister. My private affairs are my own private affairs. I don’t care who you are, policeman or not. My character will bear investigation, believe me.”

Andy waited until she was finished, and then he said:

“Your name was Hilda Masters, and you married John Severn at St. Paul’s Church, Marylebone.”

Her jaw dropped, and she stared up at him. And then she began to cry, and from tears she turned to laughter.

It was a wonderful Scottie that Andrew Macleod saw in that moment of the woman’s despair. He was by turns tender and authoritative, soothing and sarcastic. Andy in his discretion left them alone for half an hour, at the end of which time Scottie came to him.

“Macleod,” he said quietly, “she’s going to tell you the whole truth, and, stenography being my long suit, I’d like to take it down for you. Mirabel,” he hesitated, “hasn’t got what I might term my _flair_ for high-class language, and I guess it will look better if I put it into police-English than if you dig up the hotel stenog. She’s a freckle-nosed woman with gold-filled teeth. I took a dislike to her the first time I saw her. Your surprise at my versatility does credit to your intelligence, but I used to do 180 when I was a youngster, and few key-punchers have ever passed me in a straightforward bit of typing. I’m keen on this girl. She’s not a girl to you, but you’ll get elastic in your ideas as you get older. Will you let me do it? You fire in the questions and I’ll sort out the answers and fix ’em together.”

Andy nodded, and of this strange partnership was born a stranger story.