He had no refuge but silence. It was some little time before he said,

“This is all the purest conjecture.”

“Major Hardwick, if you did not follow Pippa Maybury, where were you? I do not think that you were in the house. Your wife was out of her room for a considerable time. She and Mrs. Maybury were backwards and forwards-to the bathroom, to the kitchen. During all this time your wife never mentioned you. She neither suggested asking for your help nor expressed any fear lest you should wake. I think she already knew that you were not in her room.”

“The house was full of people who did not wake.”

“The Trevors are down the passage on the left of the main landing, Mrs. Field in the corresponding room on the right. Lady Castleton, whose room was next to Mrs. Maybury’s, had taken a sleeping-draught.”

“Had she?”

“She had been complaining of headache. Your wife went up with her and saw her take a couple of tablets. She also looked in later on when the others came up in order to make sure that they had had the desired effect.”

He had no comment to make. Miss Silver said,

“I will not press you any farther now. Whatever your motive for silence may be, I ask you to weigh it against these facts. Pippa Maybury would have been arrested tonight if it had not been for a piece of evidence which the police have felt obliged to investigate. But unless there is some further development I am afraid that the arrest may take place. I ask you to consider the consequences. Even if it were not she but some other innocent person who was arrested, what must the effect be? Unhappiness-ruin! And in the end you would be forced to speak. There is also another aspect of which you probably do not know. Alan Field was, I believe, murdered because he was blackmailing a person who was prepared to go to any length to protect the secret which he threatened. I have some reason to suppose that this person is being blackmailed again. Do you imagine that someone already proved to be ruthless would hesitate at a second crime? Pray think of what I have said.”

As she spoke she turned and began to walk back towards the house. The interview was over.

James Hardwick found himself a little dazed. Frank Abbott had once remarked that as far as Miss Maud Silver was concerned the human race was glass-fronted. To find one’s thoughts and actions suddenly laid bare to a probing eye is a good deal too like the Day of Judgment to be a comfortable experience. When, as in this case, the experience is quite unexpected and the things revealed not such as one would wish to have exposed to view, the result is apt to be confounding.

They walked in silence until they reached the garden door. Here Miss Silver turned to him.

“Are you by any chance an admirer of Lord Tennyson?”

He considered this to be a social digression. He hastened to respond.

“I think I am. He has had quite a vogue again lately, you know.”

Miss Silver coughed.

“A great man, too much neglected. May I for a moment quote from one of his poems?

‘…to live by law,

Acting the law we live by without fear;

And, because right is right, to follow right

Were wisdom in the scorn of consequence.’ ”

Once more James Hardwick found that he had nothing to say. Fortunately, it did not appear that he was expected to say anything. Alfred, Lord Tennyson was to have the last word. They went up the garden together in silence.

When they had come to the glass door, they stood for a moment looking in upon the lighted room. They might hardly have left it. Nothing had changed. And to James Hardwick there seemed to be a strangeness about this. When thought has been strongly moved, there is an instinctive feeling that the world about us should also have suffered change. But this room and its occupants might have been here for time indefinite. The light from an overhead chandelier shone down with a mellow glow. Behind the Times Colonel Trevor was undoubtedly asleep. Over her magazine Maisie Trevor yawned. Lady Castleton was still at her game-or it might be that one had been swept away and another begun. Esther Field took the fine stitches of her embroidery. And on the stiff Victorian sofa the two girls sat together, the scarlet of Pippa’s dress, her floating ash-blonde hair, in vivid contrast to Carmona’s dark waves and flowing white.

And then all in a moment the scene broke up. Beeston opened the door on the farther side and a man came past him into the room-a strongly built man, square-faced, sunburnt, and in a hurry-“Never gave me time to announce him nor anything-just said, ‘My name’s Maybury-I think my wife’s staying here,’ and walked right past.”

Pippa looked up and caught her breath. Then she was on her feet, gasping his name and running down the room to throw herself into his arms.

“Oh, Bill! Oh, Bill-Bill-Bill!”

The night closed down. The earth gave out its heat. The water lay dark under a sky which never quite lost a faint mysterious light. In the houses there were some that slept, and some who could not sleep because of the weight upon the heart or the restless procession of thoughts which passed ceaselessly before the tired mind. There were some who could have slept if they had dared, but did not dare because of what might wait for them in dreams. There were some who waked because they had that to do which could not be done in the day.

Marie Bonnet had very little difficulty in keeping herself awake. She was in a complacent and confident frame of mind, and in a state of great satisfaction with the cleverness, the competence, the efficiency, and the prudence of Marie Bonnet. It was, of course, to be seen at a glance that the affair must be conducted in a private manner. Such things could not be discussed in the street, upon the beach, or in a tea-shop. It was of, the first importance that the two persons concerned should not be seen to meet at all. If the matter was to be safe, it must be private. With José she was on a different footing. A girl may meet a lover and incur no more than a little scandal, but with this one it was different. There could be no meeting that would not set every tongue in Cliffton asking why.

So the meeting must be private. But if that one had had the idea that Marie Bonnet, prudent Marie Bonnet, would come to a meeting on the cliff for example, where a push would be enough to send one over, or on the beach-perhaps even in the very hut where a man had died already…No, no, no-she was not born yesterday! She knew how to look after herself, and from this house she did not go! They could talk through the window, and after all what was there to be said? She had seen what she had seen, and the money must be paid, or she would go to the police. One-pound notes, and within the week. Just how and where, was one of the things to be arranged at the meeting.

The clock of St. Mark’s struck twelve. Another half hour and there would be a tap on the dining-room window. Marie would open it. Not wide, it is understood-there would be no need for that, since there would be neither going out or coming in. A little pushing up of the old-fashioned sash, a few minutes whispered talk, and the whole thing would be settled. Mrs. Anning’s room looked out to sea, Miss Anning’s to the side of the house. On this side only one bedroom occupied for the moment, and by old Miss Crouch who would not hear if the house fell down.

At five minutes to the half hour Marie went down the stairs in her stocking feet. The curtains in the dining-room had not been drawn, and the two big windows showed up against the darkness of the room. She skirted the table, made her way to the one on the left, and pushed back the catch. She had done it often enough before to be assured that there would be no sound. No sound from the catch, no sound from the cords of the big sash window as she lifted it. It ran up a little over a foot from the bottom and stopped there. She took her hands away. The space would be enough. They could talk through it very well, but if anyone had the idea that they could get in, it would be easy enough to push the window down. Marie Bonnet knew how to look after herself.