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By Root 544 0

after all these years!’ and he said, ‘I came to see for myself exactly how things are with you.’ And Mrs. Lansquenet said, ‘I’m all right.’ I think, you know, she was a teeny bit offended by his turning up so casually—after the long break. Anyway Mr. Abernethie said, ‘No use keeping up old grievances. You and I and Timothy are the only ones left—and nobody can talk to Timothy except about his own health.’ And he said, ‘Pierre seems to have made you happy, so it seems I was in the wrong. There, will that content you?’ Very nicely he said it. A handsome man, though elderly, of course.”

“How long was he here?”

“He stayed for lunch. Beef olives, I made. Fortunately it was the day the butcher called.”

Miss Gilchrist’s memory seemed to be almost wholly culinary.

“They seemed to be getting on well together?”

“Oh, yes.”

Susan paused and then said:

“Was Aunt Cora surprised when—he died?”

“Oh yes, it was quite sudden, wasn’t it?”

“Yes, it was sudden… I mean—she was surprised. He hadn’t given her any indication how ill he was.”

“Oh—I see what you mean.” Miss Gilchrist paused a moment. “No, no, I think perhaps you are right. She did say that he had got very old— I think she said senile….”

“But you didn’t think he was senile?”

“Well, not to look at. But I didn’t talk to him much, naturally I left them alone together.”

Susan looked at Miss Gilchrist speculatively. Was Miss Gilchrist the kind of woman who listened at doors? She was honest, Susan felt sure, she wouldn’t ever pilfer, or cheat over the housekeeping, or open letters. But inquisitiveness can drape itself in a mantle of rectitude. Miss Gilchrist might have found it necessary to garden near an open window, or to dust the hall… That would be within the permitted lengths. And then, of course, she could not have helped hearing something….

“You didn’t hear any of their conversation?” Susan asked.

Too abrupt. Miss Gilchrist flushed angrily.

“No, indeed, Mrs. Banks. It has never been my custom to listen at doors!”

That means she does, thought Susan, otherwise she’d just say “No.”

Aloud she said: “I’m so sorry, Miss Gilchrist. I didn’t mean it that way. But sometimes, in these small flimsily built cottages, one simply can’t help overhearing nearly everything that goes on, and now that they are both dead, it’s really rather important to the family to know just what was said at that meeting between them.”

The cottage was anything but flimsily built—it dated from a sturdier era of building, but Miss Gilchrist accepted the bait, and rose to the suggestion held out.

“Of course what you say is quite true, Mrs. Banks—this is a very small place and I do appreciate that you would want to know what passed between them, but really I’m afraid I can’t help very much. I think they were talking about Mr. Abernethie’s health—and certain—well, fancies he had. He didn’t look it, but he must have been a sick man and as is so often the case, he put his illhealth down to outside agencies. A common symptom, I believe. My aunt—”

Miss Gilchrist described her aunt.

Susan, like Mr. Entwhistle, sidetracked the aunt.

“Yes,” she said. “That is just what we thought. My uncle’s servants were all very attached to him and naturally they are upset by his thinking—” She paused.

“Oh, of course! Servants are very touchy about anything of that kind. I remember that my aunt—”

Again Susan interrupted.

“It was the servants he suspected, I suppose? Of poisoning him, I mean?”

“I don’t know… I—really—”

Susan noted her confusion.

“It wasn’t the servants. Was it one particular person?”

“I don’t know, Mrs. Banks. Really I don’t know—”

But her eye avoided Susan’s. Susan thought to herself that Miss Gilchrist knew more than she was willing to admit.

It was possible that Miss Gilchrist knew a good deal….

Deciding not to press the point for the moment, Susan said:

“What are your own plans for the future, Miss Gilchrist?”

“Well, really, I was going to speak to you about that, Mrs. Banks. I told Mr. Entwhistle I would be willing to stay on until everything here was cleared up.”

“I know. I’m very grateful.