Nodding Canaries by Gladys Mitchell

Author:Gladys Mitchell [Mitchell, Gladys]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Tags: Mystery
ISBN: 9780745171333
Google: bhBKAgAACAAJ
Amazon: 0727814907
Publisher: Severn House
Published: 1987-10-29T00:00:00+00:00

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Chapter Nine

The Subterranean Canaries

* * *

‘Thy name affrights me, in whose sound is death.’

Shakespeare

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BY Wednesday morning in the same week, Dame Beatrice had received replies from both the young teachers of physical education in response to her prepaid telegrams and she sent off immediately to state that she would be in Edinburgh on Saturday and in Ilfracombe on the following Tuesday. These second telegrams contained invitations to lunch in Edinburgh, and to dinner in Ilfracombe respectively. The hotels were contacted over the telephone by Laura, and rooms booked for the nights of Saturday and Sunday in Edinburgh, and for Tuesday in Ilfracombe. On the Wednesday Dame Beatrice proposed to return to Nodding and on Thursday to attend Sir John’s lecture.

She set off, Laura beside her, and the respectable and stolid George driving, immediately after an early breakfast. They went north by way of Kings Lynn, Spalding, Lincoln and Doncaster and spent the night with friends in York. The next day, after another early start, they covered one hundred and forty-five miles to Berwick, had a fairly late lunch at the Kings Arms and then pressed on, to reach Edinburgh in the early evening of Friday.

The Scottish teacher, whose name was Maxwell, arrived punctually at the hotel on the following day and proved to be a pleasant, freckled girl of about twenty-four. She and Laura took to one another at sight and the three had sherry and then went in to lunch.

It was not until the main course was finished that Dame Beatrice introduced the subject of Pigmy’s Ladder.

‘I should value your personal account of what happened when you went there with Miss Hooper and Miss Boorman,’ she said. ‘It is a lovely afternoon. Shall we find a seat in Princes’ Gardens?’

‘Yes, if we can,’ the girl replied. ‘There will be a good many people there on an afternoon like this.’

They were fortunate, however. Miss Maxwell sat between Dame Beatrice and Laura, so that both could hear the tale, and asked where she should begin.

‘Begin with your arrival at Miss Boorman’s flat,’ said Dame Beatrice, ‘and give all the relevant details.’

‘Very good. I travelled by the night train and reached Nodding Central station, after changing at Lincoln, on the Saturday morning at just after nine. I had breakfast in the station restaurant. I had no difficulty in finding Miss Boorman’s flat because she had given me a meal there after the first interview at which three of us were shortlisted – Miss Boorman, Miss Hooper from Devonshire and myself.

‘When Miss Boorman let me in, I found that Miss Hooper had already arrived, having got to Nodding on the previous night. They were having breakfast. I had a cup of coffee, but, of course, did not need anything else. Then Miss Boorman cleared away and she and Miss Hooper washed up and tidied the flat while I slept. I could not book a sleeping compartment on the journey down, and I felt tired.

‘I slept until about eleven and then Miss Boorman asked whether we’d like to see some of the historic buildings in the city.

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