“Can you tell me the shortest way to Coburg Square?”
“It’s round by the Foundling Hospital. I’m going that way myself, so
you’d best come along with me.”
The man peered through the dark fog-laden air into the young pale face
looking up at him from under the brim of a singularly unbecoming plain
brown straw hat. He was an old bachelor who never, if he could help it,
spoke to a woman, but he had been mollified by the sweetness of her
voice.
The Foundling Hospital? It was a comfort to her in her present forlorn
condition to think of all that that great house of human pity and
sympathy had done for innumerable deserted and friendless orphans.
For the first time in her life she was assailed by that most unnerving
of companions, “Little Devil Doubt.” What she was about to do was surely
a terrible risk? If she failed, as she might well fail, and her
desperate enterprise were to become known, would she not be universally
condemned? Might it not even get into the papers? Harry Garlett’s
betrothed taking a place as a servant for his sake! She could almost
picture the terrible headlines! She felt so nervous, so excited, that
when the deep voice of her conductor suddenly interrupted her anxious
self-questioning, she stumbled, and would have fallen had not he put out
his hand.
“If you just turn down to the left here,” said the man, “and then turn
sharp to the right, the house you want will be within three or four of
the corner of the square.”
In response to her word of thanks, he took off his hat and went his way.
Jean then walked on slowly, and now and again she stopped. This was her
last chance to change her mind, to give up what she well knew most of
the people who had known and respected her in her short life would
consider a crazy adventure.
When she came to the end of the long street which led into the square
she pressed her cold hand across her face. Her eyes were smarting,
partly with the fog, partly from the tears she had shed in the night.
She felt unutterably sad and discouraged, and yet deep in her heart she
longed to engage in what she believed would be a duel between herself
and that strange woman, Agatha Cheale.
If Lucy Warren’s tale were true, Agatha Cheale was the one person in the
world who had had a vital reason for desiring Mrs. Garlett’s death.
Throwing off “Little Devil Doubt,” Jean decided to go on. She crossed
over to the corner house of the square. To her left she could dimly
discern the railings of the narrow garden facing the dark houses to her
right.
There was no one in sight, and she felt strangely eerie walking along
the wide uneven pavement trying to make out the number on each door.
Even the street lamps seemed to gleam more dimly here than elsewhere.
She found 109. Then the gloomy-looking unlit house with the portico must
be 106.
Blindly she groped for a bell, and at last she felt a row of knobs. As
her fingers slid over them uncertainly there came over her a sudden
feeling of acute fear. What if Agatha Cheale should open the door and
recognize her?
Then she told herself that her fear was absurd. She had only met Miss
Cheale twice. The first time in the cricket pavilion where Mrs.
Garlett’s housekeeper had been absorbed in looking after the numerous
guests and their entertainment. Then, again, for a few moments on the
morning when Miss Cheale, livid with anger, was giving notice to Lucy
Warren; and on that day, she, Jean Bower, had been wearing a large hat
which completely shadowed her face.
And then, with intense relief, she reminded herself that of course her
way of entrance should be by the back door. Creeping out from under the
dark portico, she felt along the iron railings. Yes, here was the area
gate! And luckily it was unlatched. She pushed it open and found that it
led to a steep stone staircase. Down she went, feeling her way from one
worn step to the next till she reached the bottom.
She was now in a small pit-like yard, and to her right, from behind what
was evidently the kitchen window of the cavernous old house, there shone
a bright light. As she could see no door, she knocked, at last, timidly
on the window. A moment later a narrow door was opened wide and she
walked through into a stone passage lighted by a gas-jet, while a not
unkindly voice exclaimed:
“You’re Elizabeth Chart, I take it? Didn’t think you’d come for another
hour, my dear. Come into my kitchen, do! And I’ll have some tea ready
for you in a jiffy.”
The speaker was a gray-haired, red-faced woman, immensely stout, and
dressed in an old-fashioned alpaca dress. She wore a Paisley shawl
neatly pinned across her vast breast with a cameo brooch.
“Elizabeth’s a mouthful—so if you don’t mind I’ll call you Bet.”
“I’ll like that,” faltered the girl.
“Now then, Bet, you go right into my kitchen and get warm. ’Twill be a
great relief to me, I reckon, having a country girl after them London
sluts. I was that pleased when I got the telegram saying you was coming
this afternoon that I could ’a’ danced!”
It was a homely-looking kitchen with a big red fire in the
old-fashioned, wasteful grate. The bright light the girl had seen from
outside came from a chandelier hanging in the middle of the ceiling.
Under the light the two faced one another—Mrs. Lightfoot, the
housekeeper, and Bet Chart, the new servant. With thankfulness Bet
noticed that her employer had a shrewd, good-humoured face, and, in
spite of her huge girth, a brisk, cheerful way of moving about.
“’Tain’t no good taking you upstairs yet. You can just pop your things
off in my room. This way, please!”
She led the way into what had evidently once been the butler’s pantry in
the stately old house.
“I’d ’a’ liked to ’ave ’ad you near me, my dear, but I wouldn’t keep a
dog’s kennel in any of the other rooms in this ’ere basement; they’re
that damp and dark.”
A fire was burning in the room they were now in, and by its light Jean
saw a big bed and some nice old-fashioned furniture.
“This room and next door to it is my ’ome,” said Mrs. Lightfoot with
pride. “You’ll sleep under the roof. I goes up and down as little as I
can, for though I used to live up to my husband’s name I can’t do with
stairs! Still I can move about quick, as you’ll soon see. Like to wash
your ’ands? You can do so in my basin as a treat to-day, but henceforth
you’ll ’ave to wash ’em at the sink.”
A few moments later Jean came back into the kitchen. She felt very
strange and odd in her full brown skirt, her flannel blouse, and the
neat, Quaker-like little white muslin cap she and Rachel North had
bought that morning.
“That’s right!” exclaimed Mrs. Lightfoot, “not ashamed to wear a cap as
was our last fine lady? A little treasure you’re setting out to be. The
last ’ussy I ’ad ’ere, she’s got a job as a demonstrator—putting rouge
on her lips and whitening her face. I reckon that’ll suit her ladyship
for the present, till she moves on to—I won’t demean myself by saying
where.”
She had set out bread, butter, and jam on the kitchen table. Then,
apparently afraid lest her praise should make her new help uppish, she
observed critically:
“You don’t look over-strong for a country girl. Mind you, there’s stairs
’ere—stairs, stairs, stairs all the time!”
“I’m very strong,” said Jean in a low voice, “it’s only that I’m tired
to-day. You see I’ve come a long way.”
“Ay, that’s true—and not over familiar with London, I daresay.”
“I don’t know London at all.”
Jean looked straight into the other’s fat face. She was glad to be able
to say something which was absolutely true.
“There now, fancy that! You surprise me—seein’ that I can see you’ve ’ad
some edication. I’m a Londoner born and bred—proud of it, too. It’s
unlucky you and me can’t go out together. I’d take you to see the
sights! But you’ll be able to go ’ere and there on your afternoon off. A
young girl like you won’t be long before she gets a friend to walk out
with.”
To that Jean made no answer. Instead she sat down and poured herself out
a cup of tea.
“As you come from Terriford I expect you’re quite familiar-like with all
the parties concerned with this ’ere Garlett murder—The Thatched ’Ouse
Mystery some calls it? Ever seen my top floor—Miss Cheale? She’s in it,
of course!”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen her,” faltered Jean.
She bent her face down to her plate. “I wasn’t in Terriford long.”
“I’ll give you a peep at Miss Cheale some time or other,” said Mrs.
Lightfoot kindly. “But she’s the one of my lodgers you won’t ’ave much
to do with. I do the waitin’ on ’er myself. She simply can’t abear
strangers! But you’ll ’ave to help do ’er room, mind you. ‘What the hear
don’t ’ear, the ’eart don’t grieve at.’ She thinks I never lets any one
into her room. But there she’s mistaken. I can’t do all the work, and
it’s lucky for me that my front ground floor’s been hempty a while,
though now you’ve come, my dear, I don’t mind ’ow soon it fills up.”
Jean’s hands were shaking. How stupid, how idiotic of her, not to have
realized that Agatha Cheale’s connection with the Thatched House would
be known to Mrs. Lightfoot!
“She’s takin’ on awful about that case,” went on the housekeeper. “She
left ’ere over a year ago to go to that very Mrs. Garlett as
lady-’ousekeeper. I says to ’er then, ‘You’re a fool to give up your
hindependence, Miss Cheale, my dear!’ But she would do it. And see where
it’s landed ’er!”
“Has Miss Cheale ever told you how she thinks Mrs. Garlett was
poisoned?” asked Jean.
“I simply wouldn’t dare ask ’er. I ’ave tried once or twice to sort of
lead on to it delicately—but she can’t bear the littlest question about
it. Oh, she’s a fly one! It wasn’t till I seed her name in the paper
that she let on she’d anything to do with it. Since then—well, it stands
to reason she’s ’ad to say just a bit about it to me now and again.
What’s upset her so as been those dratted lawyers—first one side, then
the other, coming and worrying ’er somethin’ hawful! That’s why she’s
’ad to speak to me about it so that I should prevent ’em coming up to
her. And I ’ave prevented ’em!” exclaimed Mrs. Lightfoot.
Unconsciously she put her arms akimbo and assumed a fighting attitude.
“Many a fine bold lie ’ave I told in ’er good cause! Be spot truthful
when you’re young, but as time goes on, allow yourself a little law.
That’s a motter for you, Bet Chart, and a good one, too. After all, Miss
Cheale can’t say what she don’t know—can she?”
“No one knows anything,” said Jean at last. “It’s a terrible, terrible
mystery,” and she pushed her plate away.
“Now you just go on eating, Bet. It’s real butter; no cheap margarine
for me! Never would ’ave it in my ’ouse for all I’ve come down in the
world, as the saying is. During the war plain honest dripping as I got
off a chef I know: since then the best butter. You’ll find I live up to
what I said, ‘a comfortable ’ome for a suitable person.’”
So Jean forced herself to eat a bit more of Mrs. Lightfoot’s excellent
bread and butter.
“In a way ’tis a mystery,” went on her employer, “though in another way
’tis no mystery at hall! Young man marries old woman for ’er money. Gets
fair sick of ’er. Meets a pretty young girl. Takes a fancy to _’er_ and
does away with the old ’un. So far all clear. As I says to Miss Cheale
early this very morning: ‘Don’t you take on so, miss. It’s ’appened
plenty of times before and it’ll ’appen plenty times again—before the
judgment day! Anyway,’ I says, ‘it’ll be all the same a ’undred years
hence.’ But between you and me, Bet Chart, I’ve another idea.”
“There are some people who think that perhaps Mrs. Garlett poisoned
herself,” said Jean.
She had given up the pretence of eating and was now looking fixedly into
Mrs. Lightfoot’s red face.
“Well, that I never will believe! Not if the King himself come out of
Buckingham Palace and commanded me so to do! I’ve read pretty well
heverything that’s been written about this ’ere so-called mystery. I
makes a special study of murders. Always ’ave done so, though it turns
me faint to drown a new-born kitten in warm water. I’ve been found right
many a time, and that afore the judge and jury ’ave made up their
minds!”
“And what d’you think now?” asked Jean eagerly.
“More than once I’ve hasked myself whether that forward hussy, Jean
Bower, did it? She ’ad every reason to want the poor soul out of the
way, but it don’t look at present as if she’d hever ’ad the chance.”
“No,” said Bet Chart quietly, “Jean Bower never even saw Mrs. Garlett.”
“That, beggin’ your pardon, Bet, may be a tale! I don’t see ’ow _you_
could know, anyway. It would ’a’ been strange if they’d never met,
living in the same place, and both being gentry. And she the doctor’s
niece! What’s she like? I suppose you’ve seen ’er?”
“Yes,” said Jean. “I’ve seen her. She’s just ordinary—like everybody
else.”
“They’re generally the worst,” said Mrs. Lightfoot. “Very much the
worst—if you’ll believe me. I’ve given a lot o’ study to that girl.
There’s some one a protectin’ ’er, not a doubt of it! Else why wasn’t
she called when that man ’Enry Garlett was committed for his trial? She
ought to ’a’ been! They did their level best to try and compel my poor
top floor to go to Grendon town. She ’ad to ’ave a doctor, and ’e ’ad to
give ’er a certificate. And even that wasn’t enough! We ’ad a lawyer
’ere—a man from the Crown, he called ’isself—but I don’t believe for one
minute the King knew the way ’e went on. ’Ow ’e worried that poor young
woman! She made me stay in the room all the time—and a good thing, too.
There ’e was, close up to ’er bed, with a big book and a fountain
pen—why it wasn’t decent. She wouldn’t eat any supper after that. She
cried and cried, and I was fair tormented about ’er! Yet they left that
Bower girl—that forward sly ’ussy—habsolutely alone. What d’you say to
that?”
“They didn’t leave her absolutely alone,” said Jean slowly. “Some one
came from the Crown to see her and cross-examine her, too.”
“I’m glad of that,” said Mrs. Lightfoot, “very glad, indeed! That’s the
best word I’ve ’eard you say, Bet Chart, about the whole business. I’m
intending to get in at that trial even if I’m crushed to death doing so!
It’ll take the place of my summer outing. I don’t often go in for that
sort o’ treat, but I did see The Brides in the Bath man. I saw him
black-capped.”
“How dreadful!” whispered the help, and she turned even whiter than she
had been before.
“I’d a friend at the Old Bailey, one of the judge’s clerks—my ’usband’s
uncle was Mr. Justice Barnaby’s clerk—and that gives me a sort o’
connection with the law. So they’re very kind to me when I goes down to
the Old Bailey, and I could get in much oftener than I does if I could
leave the ’ouse. Still, as I ’opes and believes you’ll be ’ere when
’Enry Garlett’s trial takes place, I’ll just give myself the treat of
seeing my poor Miss Cheale in the witness-box.” She waited a moment to
take breath, then added significantly: “You just look over there!”
Jean turned round quickly to see a great pile of newspapers lying in a
corner of the kitchen.
“Miss Cheale takes in five newspapers a day, if you’ll believe me—just
with the idea of seeing something new about that hawful affair. If it
had been war-time I could ’ave made my fortune out of them old papers,
but now the dustman wants to be paid for carrying them away! But there!
I do get something out of it, for o’ course I reads ’em all—when I ’ave
the time, that is! As for Miss Cheale, she just pores over them, and
hevery one of the Sunday papers she takes in too. I ’aven’t ’ad time yet
to look over yesterday’s. But I will this evenin’, and it’ll be a treat
for you too, Bet. There was something in one of them papers as greatly
upset Miss Cheale. She wouldn’t say nought about it—but I knew! It’s
never out of her mind, that it isn’t. She even talks about it in her
sleep. My last girl used to ’ear her, and it fair give ’er the creeps.”
“Hadn’t I better begin washing up?” asked Jean timidly.
“Well, yes, I reckon you ’ad. All the people in this ’ouse goes out to
work for their daily bread. Leastways, all but one does. I won’t ’ave no
drones if I can ’elp it. No drones and no—you can guess what sort I mean
for all you’re an hinnocent young thing. I could ’ave made a lot of
money, retired too, and lived in peace and plenty, if I ’adn’t been a
respectable woman, but there! I can’t help it—I just ham.”
Jean made no reply to that obviously truthful statement. Instead, she
carried the tea-things she had used one after the other to the broad
sink.
“Hullo,” called out Mrs. Lightfoot suddenly, “ever ’eard of a tray?”
The girl turned round surprised.
“How stupid of me,” she exclaimed. And then suddenly her heart almost
stopped beating, for Mrs. Lightfoot walked straight up to her and said,
“You’ve never been hout before? You’re not the plain country lass I took
you for. What har you?”
“I’m the daughter of a man of business, Mrs. Lightfoot. My father failed
before he died. I never was taught to do anything, though I did what I
could in a hospital during the war. When I heard of your situation last
week I was on my beam ends.”
Mrs. Lightfoot looked relieved.
“I guessed you were something just not quite common,” she admitted
cautiously. “The way you put your cup to your lips, in a sort of finicky
way, henlightened me. I expect you was sent to a genteel school.”
“I suppose I was,” said the other almost in a whisper. “But I don’t mind
hard work. You’ll see I don’t.”
And then suddenly she began to cry. “I—I’ve been so unhappy,” she
gasped, “since my father died.”
“There, there! You’ll be ’appy ’ere. Don’t you worry, and don’t you go
and think, as many a silly young girl supposes nowadays, that all the
good chaps were killed in the war. If there’s only one left, you’ll find
him right enough! And if not, I’ll find ’im for you. There’s some good
elderly gents about too, just now. Better be an old man’s darling than a
young man’s slave. Hany old barndoor can keep out the draught! But no
carryings on with the lodgers, mind! But there, I won’t insult you, Bet,
my dear, by supposing you capable of doing such a thing. Likewise, you
won’t ’ave a chance, for I does most of the waiting on the gentlemen
myself.”
Then came three knocks on the floor above the kitchen ceiling.
“What’s that?” exclaimed the new “help.”
“My hinvalid—a mystery _’e_ is—Mr. Gee by name—though not ’is real one,
between you and me and the lamp-post. But you’ll have nothing to do with
’im.”
She went off upstairs: then came back, and said suddenly:
“Can you cook at all, my dear, or shall I ’ave to teach you that—as well
as the use of a tray?”
But Mrs. Lightfoot spoke very good-humouredly.
“I can cook simple things,” said Jean, “and I know some nice Scotch
breakfast dishes.”
“I don’t want you to go a-spoiling my lodgers! Plain and good—that’s my
motter. Eggs and bacon week-days, an’ midget sausages on Sunday for a
treat. My gentlemen pays for ‘bed and breakfast,’ and though it’s near
double what it was afore the war, yet it needs a good bit more
contriving than it did then, I can tell you. As to Miss Cheale, well,
she goes on another plan. I just buys what she wants. She makes a tidy
bit of money out of them Russians she works for. Besides, as you maybe
’ave ’eard, she was left a little fortune by that poor poisoned soul!”
At six-thirty there came the sound of the big front door opening. Then
it was shut slowly, carefully.
“That’s Mr. Robins,” remarked Mrs. Lightfoot; “’e’s a very careful
gentleman. Halways the first to come in, for the reason he works near
’ere at the British Museum. A proper, quiet sort o’ man, though they do
say ’e was a regular devil in the war! But there! ’E’s settled down
peaceful nicely now. ’E’s got my big front drawing room, and beautiful
’e’s made it with some things ’is ma left ’im when she died.”
Something like a quarter of an hour went by, and then again there came
the sound of the front door opening. This time it was banged to.
“Mr. Goodbody,” said the housekeeper. “A merry, cheerful little
gentleman, as lives up to ’is name. Going to be married, so we sha’n’t
keep ’im long. I’ll miss ’im when ’e goes—not that I exactly envy ’is
missis, mind you, but still it’s nice to be always greeted with a laugh
and a joke.”
“That’s Miss Cheale,” exclaimed Mrs. Lightfoot, as a church clock near
by struck seven. “Sometimes she works even later than this. ’Er arrival
is the signal for me to get busy. I got ’er a nice chop to-day. She
going to ’ave fried potatoes with it—fried potatoes and brussels
sprouts—likewise a meringue. Not one of those bought meringues—all glue
and a lick of cream. But a meringue I’ve got to fill chock-full of
whipped cream. Miss Cheale knows what she likes, and, unlike some folks,
she’s willing to pay for it.”
As she spoke she got up, and began moving about, and when Jean offered
to help her she shook her head.
“Let be, let be,” she exclaimed; “’nother night I may let you try your
’and at Miss Cheale’s supper, but to-night I’d better do it, for I knows
what she likes, and exactly ’ow she likes it. But I’ll tell you what I
will let you do! I’ll let you carry up the tray as far as the landing.
We must take the risk of ’er seeing you—morbid, ain’t it, ’er dislike of
seeing people?”
Twenty minutes later Jean took the heavily loaded tray and started going
up the kitchen stairs. In front of her, treading more and more slowly,
more and more wheezily, walked the housekeeper. The gas-light in the
hall showed the fine tessellated black and white pavement and the two
mahogany doors. As they walked past the door giving into a back room on
the ground floor Jean heard a choking cough.
“There ’e is, pore gentleman, coughing ’is life away,” whispered Mrs.
Lightfoot compassionately. “It’ll be a mercy for me, as well as for ’im
and another I could name, when ’e’s gone. But that sort lingers on and
on—never knowing they’re going either.”
They went on, up the first flight, and though there was another gas-jet
halfway up, the house seemed wrapped in gloom. It was, however, a
magnificent remnant of London’s eighteenth-century architecture; the
banisters of the wide staircase were of wrought iron, and it did not
require much imagination to see the beaux and the belles of a hundred
and fifty years ago walking down the wide, low steps hand in hand.
When they reached the drawing-room floor, the door of the back drawing
room opened, and a cheerful chubby-looking young man’s face looked out.
“Hullo! Mrs. Heavyfoot? Got a lady-in-waiting at last, eh?” And then the
speaker looked hard at the girl carrying the tray. “Here’s a pretty
miss! D’you know who you remind me of, pretty miss?”
“Now, none of your nonsense!” said Mrs. Lightfoot sharply, “you an
engaged gentleman too! Fie! Mr. Goodbody.”
“You remind me,” went on Mr. Goodbody, taking no notice of his landlady,
“of a beauteous young female called Pamela—‘Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded.’
But I fear me you’ll have none of the wondrous adventures which befell
Pamela—not while you’re under the eagle eye of your present chaperon!”
Jean made no answer to these facetious remarks, but she looked at him so
coldly that the young man felt, as he expressed it to himself, somewhat
withered. Quietly he withdrew into his own quarters and shut the door.
“’E means no ’arm,” panted Mrs. Lightfoot tolerantly, “’e’s only out for
a bit of fun. And yet, would you believe it? ’Is young lady, well, she
’ardly smiles! I suppose ’e’s tired her with ’is fun, that’s what ’e’s
done.”
On and on they went, and then the housekeeper suddenly said: “’Ush!” In
a low whisper she added: “I sees that ’er door is open. You just give me
that tray, and then, when I’ve fixed ’er up comfortable, you can creep
up be’ind me, and I’ll show you where you’re to sleep. Then I won’t ’ave
to come up again to show you—see?”
And there on the dark staircase the girl waited—it seemed to her for a
long time, while murmurs of conversation came from behind the now shut
door of Miss Cheale’s sitting room. She felt extraordinarily strung up
and excited at the thought that there, within a few feet of her, was the
woman who claimed to have the key to the mystery of Mrs. Garlett’s
death.
At last Mrs. Lightfoot came out of the brightly lit room, and beckoned
to her help; and Jean, hurrying on to the landing, saw a narrow
ladder-like staircase.
“No need for me to go up. You can’t make no mistake, Bet, for only one
o’ the two garrets up there ’as any furniture in it. I don’t say you’ll
find it very comfortable, but ’tain’t as if ’twas terrible cold just
now. You can move about too, for all you’re just over Miss Cheale’s
bedroom. They don’t build ’ouses like this nowadays. She’s in a rare
nervy state to-night. She’s frightened of a feller that’s been ’anging
about ’ere a lot—name of Kentworthy. ’E’s getting up this case for ’Enry
Garlett. But ’e don’t get much change out of me—though before I knew
what ’e was up to, we became quite friendly-like. Oh, ’e’s an artful
one! But ’e won’t get over Jemima Lightfoot—and I told ’im so flat! Only
once did ’e force ’is way into this ’ouse and that was when I wasn’t in
it.”