By the Pricking of My Thumbs (Tommy & Tuppence 4)

'Of course, of course,' said the vicar. 'As a matter of fact, I suppose I've got several. I've got a Greek Testament,' he said hopefully. 'That's not what you want, I suppose?' 'No,' said Tuppence. 'I want,' she said £mnly, 'the Authorized Version.' 'Oh dear,' said the vicar. 'Of course, there must be several in the house. Yes, several. We don't use that version in the church now, I'm sorry to say. One has to fall in with the bishop's ideas, you know and the bishop is very keen on modernization, for .young people and all that. A pity, I think. I have so many books m my library here that some of them, you know, get pushed behind the others. But I think I can f'md you what you want. I think so. If not, we'll ask Miss.Bligh. She's here somewhere looking out the vases for the children who arrange their wild flowers for the Children's Corner207 in the church.' He left Tuppence in the hall and went back into the room where he had come from.

Tuppence did not follow him. She remained in the hall, frowning and thinking. She looked up suddenly as the door at the end of the hall opened and Miss Bligh came through it. She was holding up a very heavy metal vase.

Several things ricked together in Tuppence's head.

'Of course,' said Tuppence, 'of course.' 'Oh, can I help - I - oh, it's Mrs Beresford.' 'Yes,' said Tuppence, and added, 'And it'sMrs.ohnson, isn't it?' The heavy vase fell to the floor. Tuppence stooped and picked it up. She stood weighing it in her hand. 'Quite a handy weapon,' she said. She put it down. 'Just the thing to cosh anyone with from behind,' she said - 'That's what you did to me, didn't you, Mrs ohnson.' 'I - I - what did you say? I - I - I never ' But Tuppence had no need to stay longer. She had seen the effect of her words. At the second mention of Mrs Johnson, Miss Bligh had given herself away in an unmistakable fashion.

She was shaking and panic-stricken.

'There was a letter on your hall table the other day,' said Tuppence, 'addressed to a Mrs Yorke at an address in Cumberland. That's where you took her, isn't it, Mrs Johnson, when you took her away from Sunny Ridge? That's where she is now. Mrs Yorke or Mrs Lancaster - you used either name -York and Lancaster like the striped red and white rose in the Perrys' garden ' She turned swiftly and went out of the house leaving Miss Bligh in the hall, still supporting herself on the stair rail, her mouth open, staring after her. Tuppence ran down the path to the gate, jumped into her car and drove away. She looked back towards the front door, but no one emerged. Tuppence drove past the church and back towards Market Basing, but suddenly changed her mind. She turned the car, drove back the way she had come, and took the left-hand road leading to the Canal House bridge. She abandoned the car, looked over the gate to see if either of the Perrys were in the garden, but there was no sign of them. She went through the gate and up the path to the back door. That was closed too and the windows were shut.

Tuppence felt annoyed. Perhaps Alice Perry had gone to Market Basing to shop. She particularly wanted to see Alice Perry. Tuppence knocked at the door, rapping fLrSt gently then loudly. Nobody answered. She turned the handle but the door did not give. It was locked. She stood there, undecided.

There were some questions she wanted badly to ask Alice Perry. Possibly Mrs Perry might be in Sutton Chancellor. She might go back there. The difficulty of Canal House was that there never seemed to be anyone in sight and hardly any traffic came over the bridge. There was no one to ask where the Perrys might be this morning.

CHAPTER 17 Mrs Lancaster

Tuppence stood there frowning, and then, suddenly, quite unexpectedly, the door opened. Tuppence drew back a step and gasped. The person confronting her was the last person in the world she expected to see. In the doorway, dressed exactly the same as she had been at Sunny Ridge, and smiling the same way with that air of vague amiability, was Mrs Lancaster in person.

'Oh,' said Tuppence.

'Good morning. Were you wanting Mrs Perry?' said Mrs Lancaster. 'It's market day, you know. So lucky I was able to let you in. I conlcln't fred the key for some time. I think it must be a duplicate anyway, don't you? But do come in. Perhaps you'd like a cup of tea or something.'

Like one in a dream, Tuppence crossed the threshold. Mrs

/ / Lancaster, still retaining the gracious air of a hostess, led Tuppence along into the sitting-room.

'Do sit down,' she said. 'I'm afraid I don't know where all the cups and things are. I've only been here a day or two. Now - let me see... But - surely - I've met you before, haven't I?' 'Yes,' said Tuppence, 'when you were at Sunny Ridge., 'Sunny Ridge, now Sunny Ridge. That seems to remind me of something. Oh, of course, dear Miss Packard. Yes, a very nice place.' 'You left it in rather a hurry, didn't you?' said Tuppence.

'People are so very bossy,' said Mrs Lancaster. 'They hurry you so. They don't give you time to arrange things or pack properly or anything. Kindly meant, I'm sure. Of course, I'm very fond of dear Nellie Bligh, but she's a very masterful kind of woman. I sometimes think,' Mrs Lancaster added, bending forward to Tuppence, 'I sometimes think, you know, that she is not quite -' she tapped her forehead significantly. 'Of course it does happen. Especially to spinsters. Unmarried women, you know. Very given to good works and all that but they take very odd fancies sometimes. Curates suffer a great deal. They seem to think sometimes, these women, that the curate has made · them an offer of marriage but really he never thought of doing anything of the kind. Oh yes, poor Nellie. So sensible in some ways. She's been wonderful in the parish here. And she was always a first-class secretary, I believe. But all the same'she has some very curious ideas at times. Like taking me away at a moment's notice from dear Sunny Ridge, and then up to Cumberland - a very bleak house, and, again quite suddenly, bringing me here ' 'Are you living here?' said Tuppence.

'Well, if you can call it that. It's a very peculiar arrangement altogether. I've only been here two days.' 'Before that, you were at Rosetrellis Court, in Cumberland ' 'Yes, I believe that was the name of it. Not such a pretty name as Sunny Ridge, do you think? In fact I never really settled down, if you know what I mean. And it wasn't nearly as well run. The service wasn't as good and they had a very inferior brand of coffee. Still, I was getting used to things and I had found one or two interesting acquaintances there. One of them who knew an aunt of mine quite well years ago in India.

It's so nice, you know, when you fred connections.'

'It must be,' said Tuppence.

Mrs Lancaster continued cheerfully.

'Now let me see, you came to Sunny Ridge, but not to stay, I think. I think you came to see one of the guests there.'

'My husband's aunt,' said Tuppence, 'Miss Fanshawe.'

'Oh yes. Yes of course. I remember now. And wasn't there something about a child of yours behind the chimney piece?' 'No,' said Tuppence, 'no, it wasn't my child.'

'But that's why you've come here, isn't it? They've had trouble with a chimney here. A bird got into it, I understand.

This place wants repairing. I don't like being here at a/1. No, not at all and I shall tell Nellie so

as soon as I see her.' 'You're lodgifng with Mrs Perry?'

'Well, in a way I am, and in a way I'm not. I think I could trust you with a secret, couldn't I?'

'Oh yes,' said Tuppence, 'you can umst me.'

'Well, I'm not really here at all. I mean not in this pan of the house. This is the Perrys' pan of the house.' She leaned forward. 'There's another one, you know, if you go upstairs.

Come with me. I'll take you.'

Tuppence rose. She felt that she was in rather a crazy kind of dream.

'I'll just lock the door first, it's safer,' i'd Mrs Lancaster.

She led Tuppence up a rather narrow staircase to the first floor. She took her through a double bedroom with signs of occupation - presumably the Perrys' room - and through a door leading out of that into another room next door. It contained a washstand and a tall wardrobe of maple wood.

Nothing else. Mrs Lancaster went to the maple wardrobe, fumbled at the back of it, then with sudden ease pushed it aside. There seemed to be castors on the wardrobe and it rolled out from the wall easily enough. Behind the wardrobe there was, rather strangely, Tuppence thought, a grate. Over the mantelpiece there was a mirror with a small shelf under the mirror on which were china figures of birds.