House in Charlton Crescent Read online

  “Yes.” Lady Anne’s voice faltered, then gathered in strength as it went on. “I wish to consult a member of your firm. As I am a chronic invalid, unable to get out much, I cannot come to you. Besides, under the circumstances, I should not wish it to be known that I have paid a visit to your office, so I should be glad if one of your principals could call upon me as soon as possible. And I dare say that you will think this a strange request, but possibly you are used to them. Would you be kind enough to say at the door that you are applying for this post as secretary? I dismissed my secretary a few days ago and am now looking out for another. If you will allow it to be supposed that you are coming after the post, your being admitted will excite no surprise or suspicion in the household, and I am most anxious to avoid this.”

  Another pause. Lady Anne fancied that there was a consultation, then the same voice spoke again.

  “Certainly. That would be the best plan. Would it suit you if I came in an hour’s time?”

  “Yes, it would,” Lady Anne said decidedly. “Unless,” she added grimly, “you could come in half an hour’s time!”

  Lady Anne did not move; very often on her bad days she did not go down to the dining-room for meals, but had something brought to her in her room. To-day, however, she gave orders that she was not to be disturbed until Mr. Cardyn’s arrival.

  It seemed a very long hour to her, and the soft spring gloaming had merged into something like darkness before Mr. Cardyn came.

  The blinds had been closely drawn and the electric light turned on fully. In the old days Lady Anne had loved the twilight, but now she had got into the habit of glancing into the corners in a frightened fashion, and if she were alone the light was always turned on at the earliest possible moment.

  She looked with curiosity at the man who came forward when the door closed.

  “Mr. Bruce Cardyn?”

  He bowed.

  “You look very young,” Lady Anne said discontentedly. “I hoped to see some one much older and with more experience.”

  Mr. Cardyn permitted himself a slight smile.

  “I have had a good deal of experience and—I am not so young as I look, perhaps, Lady Anne; I am thirty-one.”

  “Are you indeed?” Lady Anne said incredulously, as she glanced at his fair, clean-shaven countenance, at the close-cut, fair hair, brushed straight back from his forehead, and the slim, youthful figure.

  “I am, indeed,” he confirmed.

  “I heard of your firm from my friend, General Hetherington,” Lady Anne resumed as she motioned him to a chair very close to her own. “I believe Messrs. Wilkins and Alleyn did some very successful work for him—not only discovered the criminal but recovered the stolen property. I am speaking of a burglary that took place at Hetherington Hall last year.”

  “I remember,” Bruce Cardyn nodded. “Yes, we were fortunate enough to satisfy General Hetherington.”

  “But the General spoke of Messrs. Wilkins and Alleyn. I never heard him mention your name.”

  “I dare say not.” Bruce Cardyn’s smile deepened. “Yet I am the junior partner. My senior’s name is Misterton. Wilkins and Alleyn is merely a—shall I say?—nom de plume. You see, if we visited you under our own names we should be more likely to be recognised by any professional crook who has read the list of private inquiry agents. If you will entrust your business to us, Lady Anne, I can promise that we will do our best for you.”

  “I believe you will. But it is no easy problem that wish you to solve.”

  She stopped, and seemed for a moment to be really struggling for words in which to state her dilemma.

  As Bruce Cardyn watched her the pity in his grey eyes grew and strengthened. There was something very pathetic about the stern old face, with the strong mouth that twitched every now and then, and the nameless dread looking out of the big shadowed eyes.

  At last Lady Anne seemed to rally her courage by a supreme effort.

  “Mr. Cardyn, I have never been a coward in my life—till now! And here to-day I am living in my own house, surrounded by servants, who have for the most part grown grey in my service, and by those who are bound to me by ties of blood and professed affection, yet—”

  “Yet?” Bruce Cardyn echoed, a touch of surprise in his grey eyes.

  Lady Anne looked at him, the faint colour that had come back to her withered cheeks ebbing once more; the dread in her eyes deepening. Her voice sank to a whisper:

  “And yet, as I say, in my own house, surrounded by those I know and love, and who one would expect to have some sort of liking for me, some one is trying to kill me!”

  It was not at all what Bruce Cardyn had expected to hear. He was silent for a minute. Sundry stories he had heard of old people who accused their own families of trying to murder them recurred to his mind, but Lady Anne was not old enough for that.

  “You have some ground for your belief?” he hazarded at last.

  Lady Anne bent her head.

  “At first it was only a mere suspicion. I tried to smother it, to assure myself that it was only the merest fancy. I said to myself I am a disagreeable, snappy old woman, I know, but surely I am not so bad that anyone should wish to murder me. Now, however, conviction has been forced upon me. But, Mr. Cardyn, before we proceed, can you with as many underlings as you choose to bring, with any and every expense guaranteed, can you promise me safety in my own house?”

  Bruce Cardyn’s face was very grave. Lady Anne’s aspect was so controlled, so direct, that the momentary suspicion that had flitted across his mind was dismissed finally and for ever.

  “We will do our best to ensure your safety in every way, Lady Anne,” he said steadily. “And I think we ought to succeed. More it is not in the power of mortal man to promise.”

  “It is not!” Lady Anne assented. “Well, Mr. Cardyn, I am going to trust you to safeguard me. Life is sweet to anyone, suppose, even when one is old and lonely. And we all shrink from the great abyss. Now, as I tell you, my life is being attempted, has been attempted by some member of my household, as I believe, and I want you to discover who it is, and to prevent the crime. But, above all things, I do not want the regular police called in. I want the whole thing kept as quiet as possible. I know that this will make your work more difficult, but I hope you will be none the less willing to undertake it.”

  “Certainly we will undertake it,” Bruce Cardyn promised, his face pale and grave. “But first you can give some of the ground you have to go upon, Lady Anne?”

  Lady Anne hesitated a minute, then she bent forward and took the pill-box again.

  “I think this will show you best what I have to fear. Look!” She held the box toward him.

  He put up a monocle and looked at its contents with great curiosity as it lay in his hand.

  “The pills in that box originally were made up by the chemist I have employed for years, from a prescription given me by my own doctor. I was taking one the last thing every night. There were twelve in the box when it came. I took one at bed-time for five nights. I was glancing at them, only after I had taken the fifth; there were still eight left! What do you make of that?”

  Mr. Cardyn looked at the pills; the gravity of his expression deepened.

  “You are quite sure of your facts, Lady Anne. It would not be difficult, for instance, to make a mistake in the number of pills or of the number of nights you took them.”

  For answer, Lady Anne drew a small silver key from the handbag in front of her, and unlocked another small drawer. Inside was a sheet of embossed letter-paper. There were very few lines upon it, but the signature was one of the best known of the day:

  DEAR LADY ANNE,

  I have analysed the pills you sent me. Seven of them are harmless. The eighth contains hyoscine enough to kill ten women. I am returning them as you requested.

  What can I do for you now? Please let me help you.

  Yours always,

  ROBERT SAINTSBURY.

  “That,” said Lady Anne very deliberately, “sett
les the question, think!”

  CHAPTER II

  Bruce Cardyn put the box down. “It certainly does appear to settle the question that some one is attempting your life. But—pardon me—it proves nothing with regard to the would-be assassin being a member of your household.”

  “Do you not think so?” Lady Anne questioned coldly. “Since the pills were kept in a drawer in my bedroom, it is difficult to see how anyone, not a member of my household, could have access to them.”

  “Difficult,” Bruce Cardyn assented, “but not impossible. And, in a case of this kind, we cannot afford to rule out any possibilities, Lady Anne. But, now, is this all you have to go upon?”

  “I am sorry to say it is not.” Lady Anne’s pale blue eyes were mechanically watching the flickering of the leaves on a branch of the creeper that had strayed over her window. “I have had several curious accidents, but the most serious of them all, to my mind, is this. To begin with, it is my custom to take a glass of hot milk the last thing at night. For some time I have not been feeling very well—indigestion, I thought it to be—and took my usual simple remedies without success.

  “I am not over fond of doctors, but was beginning to think I should have to consult my old friend, Dr. Spencer, when, one night as I was drinking my milk, I became conscious of a very curious taste. It set me thinking. I put the glass down, meaning to make inquiries, and went on with my reading. Half an hour later, when the milk had got cold, my pet Persian cat, climbing about as she does sometimes, got on the table by my side and lapped up some of it before I noticed what she was doing. A very short time afterwards she was violently sick and lay writhing about in awful pain. I thought at first that she was going to die, but in the end got her round again. Since then I have taken no more hot milk. It goes down the drain, and I feel better. My indigestion is a thing of the past.”

  “And that is all?” Bruce Cardyn questioned.

  “Is it not enough?” Lady Anne parried.

  “It ought to be,” Cardyn assented. “But, Lady Anne, have you no idea who is your would-be assassin?”

  Lady Anne shook her head.

  “None! Of course I do not say that my fancy has not strayed from one to another, and have said to myself—‘it could not be so-and-so, it could not be so-and-so,’ but of real knowledge, or even suspicion, I have none.”

  “I see.”

  There was a long pause. Cardyn sat with his eyes apparently studying the pattern of the carpet. At last he raised them and gave Lady Anne one long, penetrating look.

  “Has anyone in the house any motive for desiring your death?”

  “Every one of them,” Lady Anne said slowly, a momentary moisture clouding her glasses. “Every servant in my employ comes in for a legacy at my death, small or large according to their time of service. This is well known and one which might have provided a motive.”

  “Exactly,” Cardyn acquiesced. “And if the motive seems inadequate, one must remember for what exceedingly small sums murders have been committed in the past. Now will you tell me exactly of whom your household consists? First the servants?” He took out his note-book and waited.

  Lady Anne’s pale eyes gave him one swift look and then glanced obliquely away.

  “To begin with there are Soames, the butler, and my maid, Pirnie. Both of them have been with me—with us—for many years. Pirnie came as quite a young girl, soon after my marriage. Then there are two housemaids, a kitchen-maid, and the cook-housekeeper, who has been here some years, a young footman under Soames, and a boy. That is all the indoor staff except that both the girls have maids—Miss Fyvert and Miss Balmaine, I mean. Outside we have a head gardener with a couple of men under him, and a chauffeur. But those, as I say, are out of count.”

  “I cannot at present put anyone out of count,” Bruce Cardyn dissented, as he wrote a few lines rapidly in his note-book. “Now the members of your family, Lady Anne, please.”

  “They are soon told.”

  For a moment the detective fancied that Lady Anne’s stern lips quivered; then he told himself that he must be mistaken as she went on in the same clear voice:

  “There are my two nieces, Dorothy and Maureen Fyvert. They have made their home with me for the most part since their mother’s death two years ago. Maureen is a child of twelve, usually at a boarding-school at Torquay, but at present at home on account of an outbreak of measles. Dorothy is twenty, and a very good girl. Then there is Margaret Balmaine, my husband’s granddaughter.”

  She was not looking at the detective now or she would have seen his interested expression change to one of utter amazement.

  “Miss Margaret Balmaine!” he repeated, but even as he spoke the veil of inscrutability dropped over his features once more, and he became again the impassive-looking detective.

  “Has Miss Balmaine, too, been here for some time?”

  “No, she is a comparatively recent comer,” Lady Anne said quietly. “She has not been here quite three months as a matter of fact.”

  Cardyn was writing quickly now. “You said your husband’s granddaughter?” he questioned.

  “Yes,” Lady Anne said, with another quick glance at the detective’s sleek, bent head. “My husband had been married and lost his wife before he met me. He had one daughter who ran away and nearly broke her father’s heart. She died many years ago in Australia, and we had no idea that she had left any children until this girl turned up a few months ago and introduced herself to me.”

  “She had, I presume, the necessary credentials?”

  “Oh, yes. Quite so. Quite so!” Lady Anne assented. “My lawyer saw to that, naturally. And, as a matter of course, the girl is making her home with me while she remains in England. Then, running up and down so often that, though he is not a member of my household, he might almost be reckoned as such, is John Daventry, my husband’s nephew, who succeeded to the estate on the death of his—cousins.”

  There was a momentary break in the firm voice at the allusion to her dead sons, then she went on: “He is half engaged to my elder niece, Dorothy Fyvert. At least for some years it has been a sort of family arrangement about them. Just of late, however, I have begun to wonder whether it will ever come to anything. They seem to regard one another as cousins and Mr. Daventry certainly admires Miss Balmaine. This is being very confidential, Mr. Cardyn, but I wish you to be thoroughly au courant with everything in the house.”

  “I quite understand that,” Cardyn said quietly. “But you said just now that every member of the household had a motive. I presume these young people are included?”

  Lady Anne bent her head and for a moment pressed her dainty handkerchief to her lips.

  “Every one in the house has some motive, as I said. By my husband’s will, his private fortune— a very large one—is divided at my death between John Daventry and the heirs of my husband’s daughter, Marjorie—Miss Balmaine, in other words. Should Mr. Daventry predecease me his share passes on with my estate. Oh, I was forgetting! Until last Saturday my house had another inmate—my secretary, David Branksome. Now, Mr. Cardyn, as I told you, I am looking for a new secretary, and it occurred to me that the post might be occupied by one of your employees who, while ostensibly working with me, might be really watching over my safety.”

  “A very good idea,” Cardyn assented. “With your permission I will take the post myself. I suppose there are no special qualifications needed.”

  Lady Anne looked a little doubtful.

  “I have a collection of wonderful old miniatures, which I am having catalogued and described. Do you know anything of them? Of course I could help you.”

  “I think I should be able to manage.” Cardyn made an entry in his book. Then he looked at her, tapping his lips with his pencil as he waited. “May I ask why Mr. Branksome left?”

  Lady Anne hesitated.

  “I had some reason to be displeased with him,” she said stiffly. “But that does not enter into this matter at all.”

  Bruce Cardyn frowned.

>   “Pardon me, I think it does. In that very cause for your displeasure may lie the clue to the mystery we are trying to solve. You must be perfectly frank with me, Lady Anne.”

  Lady Anne’s indecision was apparent, but at last common-sense prevailed.

  “Well, I do not see how it can have the slightest connection,” she surrendered. “But, though David Branksome was in some respects a good enough secretary, I did not care for him; he took too much upon himself—I hardly know how to describe it— and I seriously objected to his manner with Miss Balmaine. She, of course, coming from Australia, where I suppose all men are equal, apparently saw no harm in it. She assured me that she had no thought of anything serious and begged me not to dismiss him, but I felt it best to keep to my resolution. But I think this is begging the question, Mr. Cardyn. David Branksome alone of my household was not mentioned in my will. He was only a recent acquisition called in to help me in cataloguing my collection of miniatures, and the old editions in the library downstairs. Thus he had no motive. And, moreover, he had left me before I discovered the eighth pill. No, he had certainly no motive.”

  “H’m! No. Nevertheless, I think I will look Mr. Branksome up a bit. There is no certainty, as far as can see, when the extra pill was added. Was he with you before Miss Balmaine came, Lady Anne?”

  “Oh, yes. A couple of months, should think.” Lady Anne wrinkled up her brows. “I can give you the exact dates by looking up my diary.”

  She drew the book at her side towards her and turned over the pages rapidly.

  “Here it is! Branksome came to me on the 12th of September last year; Miss Balmaine reached us on the 29th of October.”

  “I see.” Bruce Cardyn put the elastic band round his pocket-book. “Lady Anne, your new secretary would like to come in at once.”

  “To-day?” Lady Anne questioned.

  “In an hour’s time,” Cardyn acquiesced. “I have to go back to the office to make a few arrangements. For, with your permission, I am going to set a watch on the house outside!”