Miss Sophy looked mildly shocked. She helped herself to a rock bun and said in a soft, distressed voice, ‘Not at all a satisfactory girl, I am afraid. She does daily work up at Giles’, and her mother has very little control over her.’

Janice leaned forward with an appealing look.

‘I don’t really think she’s as bad as they make out.’ She turned to Miss Silver. ‘She’s one of those giggling, bouncing girls who get themselves talked about. She likes boys, and she’ll do anything for a lark, but she’s not bad – really.’

‘I would like very much to see her,’ said Miss Silver. ‘I wonder if it could be managed. When is she likely to be free – about six o’clock?’

‘Yes, I should think so.’

‘She lives with her mother?… Then perhaps we might take a walk in that direction and look in.’

‘Oh, yes, but-’ Janice hesitated ‘-I wouldn’t like to get her into trouble.’

Miss Silver smiled.

‘There is a country proverb which says, “If you don’t trouble trouble – trouble won’t trouble you.” ’

Garth Albany gave her a direct look.

‘What do you mean by that?’

She turned the smile on him.

‘Gladys won’t get into trouble – from the law – if she hasn’t broken the law. I do not for a moment imagine that she has done so, but if she was in the churchyard on Tuesday night she may have seen or heard something. I should like to know whether she did.’

Janice said, still in that hesitating voice, ‘I could take you to see Mrs Brewer. I know them quite well.’

At a little before six Miss Silver and Janice turned off the main street into a narrow lane where half a dozen old cottages mouldered. They were of the kind which are called picturesque, with old tiled roofs, minute windows, and a general air of dilapidation. Mrs Brewer’s cottage was the smallest and the most delapidated. It had sunflowers and hollyhocks in the garden, and a few ragged gooseberry and currant bushes. The doorstep was freshly whitened.

When Mrs Brewer opened the door Miss Silver thought she looked rather like the cottage, battered, and as if time had been too much for her. She had lost most of her front teeth, the late Mr Brewer having knocked them out when ‘under the influence’. She had told Janice all about it whilst obliging at Prior’s End. She seemed to feel a kind of gloomy pride in her husband’s prowess – ‘Life and soul of a party he was, and no harm in him as long as he wasn’t crossed. And Gladys is as like him as two peas, but a bit tiring, if you know what I mean, miss.’

She invited them into her spotless kitchen. The door opened directly upon it, and disclosed very old uneven flagstones on the floor, and very old sagging beams not very far overhead. In the corner a narrow ladder-like stair led up to the bedroom. With the exception of a lean-to at the back to hold fuel and store vegetables, there were only these two rooms. Bathrooms and indoor sanitation were unguessed at when these cottages were built, and the petrifying dictum was that what was good enough in the past was good enough for the present had never been disputed.

Mrs Brewer pulled forward a couple of chairs and invited her visitors to be seated.

‘Was it about me coming up to Prior’s End, miss? If there was anything extra, I’d be very pleased-’

But even as she spoke, the horrid fear took hold of her that Miss Madoc might have sent to say that she needn’t come any more, and then she’d be two days short, and nowhere to fill them unless she went back to the Miss Doncasters that never stopped telling you what to do and what not to do until you didn’t know one from the other. And as like as not some of the china got broken. There was a cup with a blue border and little bunches of flowers the last time she was there, and such an upset as never was.

But Miss Janice wasn’t saying anything like that. It was just, ‘Miss Silver is staying with Miss Sophy, and I was showing her the village. She was saying your cottage must be very old.’

Mrs Brewer looked relieved.

‘Mr Brewer’s grandfather lived here,’ she said, as if imagination could go no farther back. She turned to Janice. ‘Oh, miss, what a dreadful thing about Mr Madoc! I’m sure I never slept a wink after I heard. Oh, miss, he never done it!’

Janice said, ‘No, we don’t think he did.’

And with that the door swung in with a clatter and Gladys Brewer bounced into the room – a large plump girl with a bright colour and a fine head of chestnut hair piled up in front and hanging in a bush behind. She had bright blue eyes, very good teeth, and an exuberant air of health and jollity.

She said, ‘Hello, Mum!’ and then caught sight of the visitors and giggled, voice and laugh at full stretch. ‘Hello, Miss Janice!’ She giggled again.

Miss Silver said, ‘How do you do?’ and then went on talking to Mrs Brewer about the cottage.

‘So picturesque – but sadly inconvenient.’

Gladys let off another loud giggle.

‘I’m sure you’d say so if you’d bumped your head as often as I have going upstairs! Well, I’ll go up and change. I’m going out. You can expect me when you see me. We’re going into Marbury to the pictures.’

Miss Silver addressed her directly.

‘It must be rather dull for you in Bourne. What do you do in the evenings when you do not go to the pictures?’

Gladys giggled twice as loudly as before.

‘What does any girl do if she gets the chance?’

Miss Silver smiled affably.

‘You have a boyfriend, I expect – or perhaps more than one, which is quite the best way when you are young. You will not want to settle down until you are older, and meanwhile, I expect, there are lots of boys of your own age to go about with?’

Mrs Brewer fidgeted with her fingers, twisting them in and out. She looked from Gladys to Miss Silver.

‘Oh, miss – she don’t want any encouragement with the boys!’

Gladys seemed to take this as a compliment.

‘Oh, get on with you, Mum!’

Miss Silver continued to smile indulgently.

‘I am afraid you have spoiled her, Mrs Brewer.’

By this time Gladys was in high good humour.

She felt herself the centre of attention, and was duly flattered. She thought Miss Silver ever such a kind old lady. Most of them expected a girl to behave as if she was dead and buried. That there Miss Doncaster with her ‘Does your mother know you’re out, Gladys?’ – she never had no boyfriends in her life. You could tell that as easy as easy – looked as if she’d been brought up on vinegar and never got rid of the taste of it.

Miss Silver’s voice came in amongst these meditations. Quite a low voice it was, but something about it you couldn’t help taking notice of.

‘When you were in the churchyard on Tuesday evening, Gladys-’

‘Who says I was in the churchyard?’

The interruption came so quickly as to suggest practice.

‘There would be no harm in it if you were – I am sure of that. You are not that sort of girl, are you? But you do sometimes go in there with a friend on a fine night, don’t you? I expect there are places where you can sit and talk.’

Gladys giggled.

‘And I think you were there on Tuesday night. You were, were you not?’

Mrs Brewer fairly wrung her hands.

‘Oh, no, miss – she wouldn’t do a thing like that! She’s a good girl.’

‘I am sure she is,’ said Miss Silver. ‘I am quite sure that there was no harm in it. Come Gladys – you were there, were you not?’

The blue eyes met Miss Silver’s and found that they could not look away. She made you feel like a kid at school again, when you were called out in front of the class and you dursn’t hold your tongue, no matter how much you wanted to, or what you were asked.

‘What if I was?’ Her voice was half defiant, half afraid.

Miss Silver said equably, ‘Well, then, my dear, I would like you to tell me just what you saw or heard.’

‘I didn’t hear nothing.’

‘But you saw something, didn’t you?’