Murder Is Easy

Luke refused but Bridget promptly lighted a cigarette.

Sitting bolt upright in a chair with carved arms, Miss Waynflete studied her guest for a moment or two and then, dropping her eyes as though satisfied, she said:

‘You want to know about that poor girl Amy? The whole thing was very sad and caused me a great deal of distress. Such a tragic mistake.’

‘Wasn’t there some question of—suicide?’ asked Luke.

Miss Waynflete shook her head.

‘No, no, that I cannot believe for a moment. Amy was not at all that type.’

‘What type was she?’ asked Luke bluntly. ‘I’d like to hear your account of her.’

Miss Waynflete said:

‘Well, of course, she wasn’t at all a good servant. But nowadays, really, one is thankful to get anybody. She was very slipshod over her work and always wanting to go out—well, of course she was young and girls are like that nowadays. They don’t seem to realize that their time is their employer’s.’

Luke looked properly sympathetic and Miss Waynflete proceeded to develop her theme.

‘She wasn’t the sort of girl I care for—rather a bold type—though of course I wouldn’t like to say much now that she’s dead. One feels un-Christian—though really I don’t think that that is a logical reason for suppressing the truth.’

Luke nodded. He realized that Miss Waynflete differed from Miss Pinkerton in having a more logical mind and better processes of thought.

‘She was fond of admiration,’ went on Miss Waynflete, ‘and was inclined to think a lot of herself. Mr Ellsworthy—he keeps the new antique shop but he is actually a gentleman—he dabbles a little in water-colours and he had done one or two sketches of the girl’s head—and I think, you know, that rather gave her ideas. She was inclined to quarrel with the young man she was engaged to—Jim Harvey. He’s a mechanic at the garage and very fond of her.’

Miss Waynflete paused and then went on.

‘I shall never forget that dreadful night. Amy had been out of sorts—a nasty cough and one thing and another (those silly cheap silk stockings they will wear and shoes with paper soles practically—of course they catch chills) and she’d been to the doctor that afternoon.’

Luke asked quickly:

‘Dr Humbleby or Dr Thomas?’

‘Dr Thomas. And he gave her the bottle of cough mixture that she brought back with her. Something quite harmless, a stock mixture, I believe. She went to bed early and it must have been about one in the morning when the noise began—an awful kind of choking scream. I got up and went to her door but it was locked on the inside. I called to her but couldn’t get any answer. Cook was with me and we were both terribly upset. And then we went to the front door and luckily there was Reed (our constable) just passing on his beat, and we called to him. He went round the back of the house and managed to climb up on the outhouse roof, and as her window was open he got in quite easily that way and unlocked the door. Poor girl, it was terrible. They couldn’t do anything for her, and she died in hospital a few hours later.’

‘And it was—what—hat paint?’

‘Yes. Oxalic acid poisoning is what they called it. The bottle was about the same size as the cough linctus one. The latter was on her washstand and the hat paint was by her bed. She must have picked up the wrong bottle and put it by her in the dark ready to take if she felt badly. That was the theory at the inquest.’

Miss Waynflete stopped. Her intelligent goat’s eyes looked at him, and he was aware that some particular significance lay behind them. He had the feeling that she was leaving some part of the story untold—and a stronger feeling that, for some reason, she wanted him to be aware of the fact.

There was a silence—a long and rather difficult silence. Luke felt like an actor who does not know his cue. He said rather weakly:

‘And you don’t think it was suicide?’

Miss Waynflete said promptly:

‘Certainly not. If the girl had decided to make away with herself, she would have bought something probably. This was an old bottle of stuff that she must have had for years. And anyway, as I’ve told you, she wasn’t that kind of girl.’

‘So you think—what?’ said Luke bluntly.