The Floating Admiral - Agatha Christie [51]
“You yourself,” suggested Rudge, “accepted co-trusteeship with Admiral Penistone.”
“And if I had not,” said Mr. Dakers, “he might have appointed some other black sheep who needed whitewashing. No. I made the best of a bad job, out of consideration for my poor friend’s daughter. And I must say, in justice to Admiral Penistone, that I have had no cause to complain of his management of his ward’s affairs. Although his manner was abrupt and at times disagreeable, I believe him to have been a perfectly honest man as regards money, nor was there anything unbecoming about the household he set up for his niece. Had there been, I should, of course, have interfered.”
“By whose wish was it that Miss Fitzgerald went to live with her uncle?”
“By her father’s. I thought it unsuitable, but I could produce no valid grounds of opposition. Elma’s share of the money was invested, by my advice, in sound securities, and the payments made to her quarterly by the trustees.”
“A very nice little income,” remarked Rudge.
“About £1,500 a year.”
“It surprises me a little,” said Rudge, “that the Admiral did not keep up a more elaborate establishment for his niece. This house is pleasant enough, but it is very remote, and they did not see much company, or so I understand.”
“That is true,” admitted Mr. Dakers, “but it was not altogether Admiral Penistone’s fault. He himself naturally shrank from going much into society, and from 1914 to 1918 he was, of course, on active service, but he put no restrictions upon his niece. She was given a good education and had the advantage of two London seasons under the chaperonage of a very suitable lady, but I fancy that society life was distasteful to her.”
“Odd that she should not have got married earlier,” said Rudge. “A young lady with £25,000 or so should have had plenty of offers.”
The lawyer shrugged his shoulders.
“I fancy that Elma was—a little difficult,” he said. “She is perhaps not—attractive, in what I may call the marrying sense. There were some—needy persons, of course, but they were not encouraged. Admiral Penistone would not have dreamed of consenting to a marriage except with a man of independent means. And then, unfortunately, there was the scandal about Walter.”
“What was that?”
“Why, that happened in 1920. Obviously the first thing that seemed advisable was to obtain from the Courts leave to presume Walter’s death. We could not do anything till 1919, after the release of the British prisoners of war in Germany. His name was in none of the lists, and we expected to encounter no difficulty. Curiously enough, however, a man turned up who had been in Walter’s unit in 1915, and this man stated that he had seen Walter alive in Buda-Pesth after the cessation of hostilities. He said he had not spoken to him, but that he had no doubt whatever of his identity. Walter was, I believe, a strikingly handsome man—he certainly was handsome as a boy. He was very like his mother, who was a most beautiful woman, much better-looking than her brother the Admiral, though there was a strong family resemblance.
“Well, of course, that meant further delay and more enquiries. We could get no news of Walter at all, but in view of the evidence of the soldier, the Court refused to presume death—naturally. Meanwhile, the affair had a very unfortunate sequel. As soon as it became known that Walter had probably not been killed during the War, we got the news that there was a warrant out for his arrest in Shanghai for forgery, if you please.”
“In Shanghai?”
“Yes. The warrant dated from 1914. Apparently Walter, when he left the country in 1909, had entered the employment of the Anglo-Asiatic Tobacco Company. He was in Hong Kong at first and in 1913 was transferred to Shanghai. He got into some sort of financial difficulties, I suppose. Anyway, he forged a signature of a client of the Company to a large cheque and ran away. The War broke out just