Miss Silver was approaching the heel of her sock. She set the knitting down upon her knee for a moment in order to give her full attention to Major Albany.

‘How long have you known Miss Meade?’

Garth frowned, he didn’t quite know why.

‘I’ve known her always. Her father was the doctor here. They lived next door.’

Miss Silver smiled.

‘Pray do not be offended if I ask you some questions about her. I will give you my reason for doing so presently, and I hope you will agree that it is a good one.’

There was something disarming about voice and manner – authority stepped down to ask instead of demanding. Garth lost his frown, met her look with one as straight, and said, ‘What do you want to know?’

She was grave again.

‘Miss Meade is young. She has enthusiasm and loyalty – I do not doubt that. But I would like to know your opinion of her judgement. Is it likely to be unduly swayed by feeling?’

‘I don’t think so. I don’t know that I agree with all her arguments, but they are arguments – they represent a point of view. She was fond of Harsch and sorry for him. She doesn’t like Madoc particularly – he is an intensely disagreeable person – but she is quite sure he isn’t a murderer. Is that what you want? I don’t think feelings come into it – at any rate not unduly.’

‘Would you agree with that, Miss Fell?’

Miss Sophy started slightly.

‘Oh, yes – I suppose so. Poor Mr Madoc, he really can be very disagreeable indeed.’

Miss Silver coughed.

‘To return to Miss Meade. Would you take her account of anything as being accurate?’

Garth said, ‘What do you mean by that?’

Miss Silver coughed again.

‘I will tell you presently, but just now I should like an answer to my questions.’

‘Well then, the answer is yes. I should say she was rather scrupulously accurate.’

‘A very sweet girl,’ said Miss Sophy. ‘And such a good daughter. Her father had a very sad illness, and she was most devoted – so reliable and unselfish.’

‘And truthful?’ said Miss Silver.

Miss Sophy bridled.

‘Oh, yes, indeed!’

‘What do you mean, Miss Silver?’ said Garth in a low, angry voice.

She took up her knitting again.

‘You consider that Miss Meade is most truthful and accurate?’

‘Of course I do!’

‘Then I am wondering why two total strangers should have been at some pains to give me the opposite impression.’

‘What?’

The sock revolved briskly.

‘I heard Miss Meade’s name for the first time on Sunday afternoon. Two ladies behind me in a Tube booking-office were talking about her. I could not avoid hearing what they said, and I was struck by the Christian name, which I had not heard before. They spoke as if they knew her well. There was a mention of being at college together. They said she was charming but quite unreliable – you could not believe a word she said – that kind of thing. It was very well done, and I thought nothing of it at the time, but when I got Miss Meade’s telegram this morning, and later on when I had seen her, I wondered why it had been done at all.’

‘What a strange coincidence-’ said Miss Sophy in rather a bewildered voice.

Miss Silver’s needles clicked sharply. She said in her most governessy tone, ‘I am really quite unable to believe that it was a coincidence, Miss Fell.’

MRS BUSH, WHO had been born Susannah Pincott, was the kind of stirring woman whose energies are quite unable to find sufficient scope in the domestic round. As soon as her children could be bundled off to school she embarked upon the contest with a reluctant husband which resulted triumphantly in the addition of a glass bay to their living-room and the stocking of it with picture postcards, bottles of lemonade and other soft drinks, china ornaments, cigarettes, and cheap sweets. She could thus see life, enjoy unlimited opportunities for gossip, and ensure her own control over at least a part of the family finances.

When Miss Silver entered the shop at eleven o’clock, Mrs Bush was deep in conversation with a little elderly person with a long nose, pale eyes, and a black felt hat tipped sideways over straggling grey hair. Mrs Bush herself towered mountainous behind her counter, her hair still as black as when she was a girl, her cheeks red and firm, her massive figure upright and controlled in spite of the temptation offered by the prevailing village fashion. Like every other woman in Bourne, she wore a loose flowered overall, but beneath it were the formidable stays of her youth.

In a most deprecating manner Miss Silver enquired if she might look at some postcards.

‘I am in no hurry – no hurry at all. Pray do not let me disturb you. I always like plenty of time to make a choice.’

She became immersed in a colourful series depicting the ruined Priory, Bourne village showing the stream running down the side of the street, the church with its old squat tower, the new secondary school at Marbury, and the water-works. As she turned them over she was aware of the two women’s voices, hushed to a sibilant undertone. Not for the first time, she felt gratitude for the excellence of her hearing.

‘He ought to be ashamed of himself,’ said the little elderly woman.

Mrs Bush was leaning close. Her voice was deeper.

‘Ezra never did have any shame, nor never will. Nothing but a trouble to the family first and last, and no good expecting anything different. I suppose he was drunk as usual.’

Out of the tail of her eye Miss Silver saw the black felt hat shaken.

‘Not to say drunk, Tom says – it takes more than what you can get nowadays to make Ezra Pincott drunk, Tom says. Just a bit above his usual, if you know what I mean, and telling everyone that’d listen to him as how he knew something that’d be money in his pocket if some he wouldn’t name knew which side their bread was buttered.’

‘Gracious, goodness me!’ said Mrs Bush.

‘And all of them laughing and egging him on, but he wouldn’t say no more than that, only of course everybody knew what he meant.’

‘Ssh, Annie!’

There was a nudge across the counter. Two pairs of eyes were turned upon Miss Silver, who gazed with rapt attention at the card which depicted the secondary school, bright yellow against the kind of blue sky which an English summer has seldom been known to achieve. The voices dropped still lower. No more words were discernible until Annie straightened up and said she must be going.

‘And I’ll be taking my sweet ration here same as usual, Susannah, if you’ll bear me in mind for the first lot of peppermints as come through. Wonderful partial to peppermints, Tom is.’

She went out, and Mrs Bush moved down the counter.

‘Very interesting views,’ said Miss Silver. ‘I am staying with Miss Fell at the Rectory. She told me you would have pictures of all the most interesting places in the neighbourhood. So nice, I always think, to be able to send a really interesting card to a friend when one is on a holiday.’

The ice thus broken, conversation flowed. There were reminiscences of the old rector, of Miss Sophy at the time of the last war.

‘They had the sewing-parties up at the Rectory regular, and nothing would serve them but I must do the cutting out. No good at all with the scissors, Miss Sophy wasn’t. Oh, well, we didn’t think we was going to have it all over again, and worse, did we? That’s the church, and a very good likeness, as you can see if you take a look out of the window – and the last one I’ve got left. You wouldn’t believe the run there’s been on them this week on account of poor Mr Harsch shooting himself while he was playing the organ. And I’m sure he played beautifully, though I’m not such a one for music myself. It’s Mr Bush that’ll go anywhere for a bit of good playing, and what I say is, it’s all very well in its place and a little of it don’t hurt anyone, but look at poor Mr Harsch when all’s said and done – it didn’t do him any good.’